Self-portrait of Justus Sustermans

This is the painter looking at himself, and it hangs where it does for a reason. Cardinal Leopoldo de' Medici, the grand duke's brother, had begun asking notable artists across Europe for their self-portraits, building a gallery of faces that grew into the collection the Uffizi still keeps. Sustermans, the family's own court portraitist for more than 30 years by 1655, was an obvious contributor. He shows himself plainly, in dark clothes, without the trappings he gave his grander sitters. The gallery of self-portraits Leopoldo started with faces like this one has since grown past a thousand.