Christ Crowned with Thorns (van Dyck) Christ Crowned with Thorns (van Dyck) Christ Crowned with Thorns is a 1619-20 painting by Anthony van Dyck. He produced it aged 20 during his first Antwerp period, when he was the main studio assistant and pupil of Peter Paul Rubens. It shows Rubens' influence in its relatively sombre palette, chiaroscuro and highly realistic portrayal of musculature. He seems to have completed it early during his stay in Italy, since it also shows the influence of Titian and other Venetian painters in Jesus' face. Once it was complete, van Dyck offered the painting to Rubens, who declined it. It was
Anthony van Dyck Henrietta Maria, as well as their children. Many portraits were done in several versions, to be sent as diplomatic gifts or given to supporters of the increasingly embattled king. Altogether van Dyck has been estimated to have painted forty portraits of King Charles himself, as well as about thirty of the Queen, nine of the Earl of Strafford, and multiple ones of other courtiers. He painted many of the court, and also himself and his mistress, Margaret Lemon. In England he developed a version of his style which combined a relaxed elegance and ease with an understated authority in his