MYSTERY ARTIST, MYSTERY WOMAN
for many years the painting“Lady in a Fur Wrap”
(left) was attributed to El Greco, the Crete-born
artist who lived in Spain. Reflecting an awareness
that Sofonisba Anguissola’s paintings had often
been wrongly attributed to male painters, histo-
rians have suggested this portrait was painted
by her. In 2019 a joint study by Pollok House in
Glasgow—the painting’s owners—and the Prado
Museum in Madrid concluded that “Lady in a Fur
Wrap” is not by El Greco or Sofonisba, but by Span-
ish court painter Alonso Sánchez Coello. Although
many historians accept this new attribution, others
continue to insist that the painter was indeed So-
fonisba, and that her sitter (whose identity is also
unconfirmed) was the infanta Catalina Micaela.
This assertion brings another painting under the
spotlight: The portrait (below) of Princess Catalina.
The Prado attributes the work to Sánchez Coello
while acknowledging that others attribute it to So-
fonisba. In 1584, when the picture was painted, the
infanta left Madrid for Savoy, not far from Genoa,
where Sofonisba was then living.^“LADY IN A FUR WRAP,” ATTRIBUTED
TO SOFONISBA ANGUISSOLA AND
ALONSO SÁNCHEZ COELLO, 1577-79.
POLLOK HOUSE, GLASGOW, SCOTLAND
ALBUM/ORONOZ
THE INFANTA CATALINA MICAELA,
CIRCA 1584. ATTRIBUTED TO
SOFONISBA ANGUISSOLA AND
ALONSO SÁNCHEZ COELLO. PRADO
MUSEUM, MADRID
ARTEFACT/ALAMY