Self-portrait holding a palette

Furini painted himself in 1638 with the palette of his trade in hand. By then he had been an ordained priest for about five years, serving a country parish north of Florence, and still he presents himself here as a working painter, brush and colours ready. The Uffizi keeps the picture among its gallery of artists who portrayed themselves, a company he joined as one of the busiest painters in Florence in these years, working for the Medici court. He faces the viewer directly, holding a palette rather than a breviary.