Isabella Brant, a portrait drawing, was executed in Antwerp around 1621, by Flemish artist and diplomat, Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640).

The portrait is drawn in black and red chalk with white heightening on brown wash paper.

Rubens employed the aux trois crayons technique, using red and black chalk, with white heightening on light grey-brown paper.

The 1621 painting of Brant outside the portico of the family home, was done by Rubens' pupil, Anthony van Dyck as a parting gift to his mentor.

The striking similarity between the portrait and drawing meant that van Dyck would have had access to the sketch for this work.

[2][6] In 1964, the drawing was re-mounted in preparation for its inaugural showing at the 1965 "Masterpieces of the Print Room" exhibition at the British Museum.

[7] The removal of the mount revealed a rough sketch in red and black chalk of a bearded man with hat standing beside a woman and a small child.

[8] He surmised that the sketch would not necessarily have been used as a basis for portraits containing similar family groupings such as Rubens and Hélène Fourment in their Garden at Munich, or Rubens and Hélène Fourment and their son Peter Paul in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Anne-Marie Logan based her analysis on the New York painting and suggested the child to be either their first born, Clara Johanna (b.1632) or Peter Paul (b.1637) thus dating the sketch to about 1638.

Vlieghe supported Daughtery's stance that the child would have been Nicolaas Rubens from the evidence of the garden portrait.

Their identities are revealed by the collector marks found on the recto (front) and verso (back) side of the portrait.

The top mark is linked to Robert Stayner Holford and the bottom is the British Museum acquisition stamp.

He was employed as an assistant by Peter Lely (Pieter Van der Faes) (1618–1680), the leading portraitist to the court of Charles II.

After Lely's death in 1680, Lankrink had the opportunity to purchase part of his art collection, including the Flemish drawings by Rubens and van Dyck, in a sale of assets in 1682 and 1688.

The sale of Lankrink's assets was announced in 1693: The sale of Lanckrinck's most curious and vast collection of drawings and Prints will begin on the 8th day of May, at 3 after Noon, at the House of the Deceased, at the Golden Triangle in the Piazza's in Covent GardenAmongst the items catalogued, one of the three items (Nos.

He was identified through an inscribed text on an attached piece of paper ( is now lost due to re-mounting in 1964) on the verso side of the drawing.

He was less than complementary when describing the drawing of Ruben's first wife: [Her] face is one of the most disagreeable I have ever seen, and I am sure it is more so than was necessary for the likeness, however ugly she really wasBy the time Richardson died, he had amassed a large collection of no less than 4,947 drawings, part of which was sold by his son, Jonathan Richardson the Younger (1694–1771), in January 1747 (old style, 1746).

[18] The collector mark for Robert Stayner Holford (1808–1892) is the initials RSH contained within a triangle (Lugt.