Rembrandt's Paintings Research Articles

Rembrandts eerste Amsterdamse periode

In 1925 W. Martin published Pieter Lastman's painting Coriolanus and the Roman Women (Dublin, Trinity College). He read the date as 1622, which is stated in all subsequent publications. In the Lastman exhibition at the Rembrandthuis in 1991 the signature was transcribed as 'PLastman fecit A 0 1625'. This reading was, albeit unnoticed, a new source of information about Rembrandt's debut. Lastman's importance as Rembrandt's teacher is known. His Coriolanus turned out to be a key work, as has been stressed by Schatborn and Schwartz. On the basis of this painting, Rembrandt's training stint with Lastman has been dated 1624-1625 (Haak, Van de Wetering, White). Broos favoured 1625-1626, contending that this is suggested by Rembrandt's paintings of those years. Rembrandt's status in Lastman's workshop evidently entitled him to sign his own work. This view is contradicted by Defoer, who deems it unlikely that work signed by pupils would have left the master's workshop. It now appears that this actually did happen. In the year that Lastman painted his Coriolanus (1625), Rembrandt signed his first biblical painting, The Stoning of St. Stephen. This work, and notably the History painting in Leiden, is, also according to Chr. Vogelaar, inconceivable without the example of Coriolanus. A series of pictures dating from 1625 and 1626 were painted under Lastman's supervision. Henceforth they will have to be assigned to Rembrandt's first Amsterdam period, although they were hitherto regarded as dating from his time in Leiden. In the 1630s and also towards the end of his life, Rembrandt bore witness to his admiration of Lastman. Rembrandt must have been in Amsterdam in 1625 and 1626. During his stay there he met Hendrick van Uylenburgh, who settled in Amsterdam in 1625. Rembrandt was in contact with him, invested in his business, moved into his house in 1631, met his niece Saskia there and fell in love with her. The year 1625 undeniably marked a turning point in the life of the Leiden painter who was to become a burgher of Amsterdam.

The Rembrandt Research Project: reculer pour mieux sauter

Only an art historian who had languished for years in solitary confinement could have remained unaware of the controversy excited by the first three volumes of A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings published by the Rembrandt Research Project (RRP). Nor can anyone have failed to notice the hubbub caused by the big Rembrandt exhibition of 1991 1992, in which the RRP's hand was evident.1 Although the tempest has subsided appreciably since then, the appearance of the remaining volumes of the Corpus will undoubtedly flutter the dovecotes again. This calm after and before the storm seems a good moment to examine the intentions of the Rembrandt team, to establish what came of them, what prompted criticism and what we may expect of the next volumes of the Corpus. The present writer is not a specialist in this particular field, a circumstance which, for all its obvious drawbacks, has one advantage: he has no earlier stance to defend.2 It is of course up to the reader to judge whether this position has led to the balanced evaluation of the RRP that I have in mind. Before embarking on a detailed consideration of the RRP, though, I should like to point out that none of those involved in the Project could possibly have foreseen the tremendous impact their work would have. And there is no apter demonstration of the upset caused by their findings than the reactions elicited by a single phrase in a review by Joos Bruyn, a member of the team, of Sumowski's book on Rembrandt's pupils. Bruyn suggested that further research pertaining to Willem Drost, one of Rembrandt's pupils, should take into consideration the Polish Rider in the Frick Collection, New York (Br.279) which, according to Bruyn, has much in common with Drost's early, Rembrandtesque work.3 A circumspect remark, really, but it did seem to voice the opinion of the Rembrandt team and certainly sparked off a major commotion. The Guardian and The New Yorker spoke of 'blood on the canvas' and dubbed the Rembrandt team 'the Amsterdam Mafia'.4

:Rembrandt: The Painter at Work

Rembrandt's intriguing painting technique stirred the imaginations of art lovers during his lifetime and has done so ever since. In this book, now revised, updated, and with a new foreword by the author, Rembrandt's pictorial intentions and the variety of materials and techniques he applied to create his fascinating effects are unraveled in depth. At the same time, this 'archaeology' of Rembrandt's paintings yields information on many other levels and offers a view of Rembrandt's daily practice and artistic considerations while simultaneously providing a more dimensional image of the artist.

New evidence for the dendrochronological dating of Netherlandish paintings

The authors elaborate on a recent paper by Baillie et al. (See AATA 22-1966 for abstract of article) which resolved a number of problems in art-historical dendrochronology. They remark that analysis of oak panels used by Rembrandt, Rubens, and other painters between the 14th and the middle of the 17th centuries revealed a new tree ring pattern not cross-matching with any of the existing oak chronologies. They undertook a study of building timbers from churches and other historical buildings and excavated artifacts in North Poland around Gdansk and were able to confirm one of the two tree ring chronologies existing for the Netherlands. The statistical data of concordance are detailed. A table summarizes the dating of 10 Rembrandt paintings. Dating of other identified art objects are presented as unaffected by these findings.

Woodbiological investigations on panels of rembrandt paintings

Paintings on 150 wooden panels accepted and not accepted as authentic Rembrandts were investigated using wood-anatomical and dendrochronological techniques. Paintings on 131 panels came from oaks in the coastal area of the Netherlands and 1 panel came from an oak in the interior. The wood of the remaining 18 panels was from beech, poplar and walnut, presumably from the Netherlands, and from cedrela, mahogany and jequitiba imported from Central and South America. In several cases wood of different panels was from the same trunk. By determining the felling date of a tree, a “terminus post quem” could be set for the production of the panel and the completion of the painting, respectively. The art-historical dating of most paintings could be dendrochronologically confirmed. In some cases the attribution was corrected by a few years. In one case an older panel was re-used.

ELEMENT DISTRIBUTION IN CROSSSECTIONS OF PAINTINGS STUDIED BY THE X-RAY MACROPROBE

The study of the structure and materials of ancient works of art has been much intensified with the development and use of improved analytical techniques. It was considered desirable to apply an X-ray fluorescence technique which could scan polished cross-sections of paint materials embedded in plastic. Layer thicknesses of 20–50 μ were successfully surveyed with an X-ray macroprobe attached to a fine-focus vacuum X-ray spectrograph. Elements above atomic number 16 in areas of 50 μ diameter were successfully detected and precisely located in the cross-section. The method has been applied particularly to the study of the technique of Rembrandt and Lievens paintings.