Portrait of Gian Gastone de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany

Richter dated this portrait 1737, the year the Medici ended in Tuscany. Gian Gastone had been grand duke since 1723 and by the close of his reign he governed mostly from his bed in this palace, with no heir. The succession had already been settled over his head by the European powers, and when he died on 9 July the state passed to Francis Stephen of Lorraine, the husband of Maria Theresa of Austria. So the ermine mantle, the crown resting on its cushion and the dome and campanile of Florence behind him all belong to an office that was promised to somebody else. That October his sister Anna Maria Luisa signed the agreement with the incoming grand duke that bound the Medici collections to Florence for good, which is why the picture is still in the building. It stands a little over three metres tall, one of Richter's last dated works.