Charles I in Three Positions

In Van Dyck's triple portrait of Charles I of England, the same tear-drop pearl hangs from the king's left ear in all three views. Charles wore that specific pearl in every royal portrait after his coronation. It was a Stuart family jewel. The painting exists because Bernini in Rome had been commissioned to carve the king's marble bust, and Charles refused to travel to sit for it. Van Dyck painted the king from three angles instead, so Bernini could carve without him. The bust was finished, sent to England, and destroyed in the fire at Whitehall Palace in January 1698. This painting is now the only three-dimensional record of Charles I's face. Charles had been beheaded in the meantime, in 1649. Now at Royal Collection, Windsor @royalcollectiontrust