(Lübeck 1631–1689 Regensburg)
Portrait of Emperor Leopold I, wearing the Order of the Golden Fleece,
oil on canvas, 74.5 x 59.5 cm, framed

We are grateful to Georg Lechner for endorsing the attribution of the present painting.

Block was born into an artist family in Lübeck. In 1655, through one of his brothers, he met prince Ferenc Nádasdy III who invited him to Hungary, where he is documented to have spent three years. In the mid-1650s he was commissioned to paint the Jesuit scholar Athanasius Kircher. In 1659 he is registered in Rome. After working as a portrait painter in Siena, Florence and Venice, Block returned in 1664 and settled in Nuremberg where he was knighted by Emperor Leopold in 1684.

Leopold was the fifth child of Emperor Ferdinand III and his first wife Maria of Spain. When he was fourteen he became heir to the throne after the sudden death of his elder brother Ferdinand. Three years later, in 1657, his father died and he assumed the regency, aged just seventeen. His appointment as Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire proved more difficult than expected. The traditional Habsburg claim to the emperorship was challenged by France, which was increasingly interfering in the politics of the Empire. Louis XIV, who was to become Leopold’s lifelong rival, had a growing influence over a part of the electors and was himself at times brought into play as a candidate. Considerable diplomatic efforts on the part of the Habsburg faction were needed before the election was decided in favour of Leopold. The coronation eventually took place in the summer of 1658.

The handling and treatment of the sumptuous fabrics and the lace in the present painting recall other works by Block, among them the Portrait of Joseph I as a young boy in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (inv. GG 3409). Leopold married Eleonore of Pfalz-Neuburg in 1676. Prior to the engagement and subsequent marriage, portraits were exchanged. The present painting could well have been painted in this context. Indeed, in an anonymous portrait engraving in Arolsen, the empress is holding a medallion that resembles the present composition .