Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main
6 OCTOBER 2021 TO 30 JANUARY 2022
This autumn the Städel Museum is celebrating the work of the greatest of Dutch artists of the 17th century: Rembrandt van Rijn. The exhibition “Rembrandt in Amsterdam: Creativity and Competition” is the first to trace Rembrandt’s rise from a young, ambitious artist from Leiden to a famed master in Amsterdam. The story is told through 60 of Rembrandt’s artworks placed in direct dialogue with paintings by other artists of his time.
Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680)
Self-portrait, c. 1647
oil on canvas, 97.5 × 77.5 cm,
Michele and Donald D’Amour Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, The James Philip Gray Collection,
Photo: David Stansbury - The James Phillip Gray Collection
Nicolaes Eliasz. Pickenoy (1588–1650/56)
Portrait of a Man, 1628
Oil on canvas, 196 x 126 cm
Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
Portrait of a Standing Man (Andries de Graeff), 1639
Oil on canvas, 199 x 123,5 cm
Museumslandschaft Hessen Kassel, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister
Photo: Ute Brunzel
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
The Three Trees, 1643
Etching, engraving and drypoint on laid paper, 213 x 278mm
Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main
Photo: Städel Museum
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
The Abduction of Ganymede, 1635
177 × 129 cm
Oil on canvas
Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden
Photo: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
Judith at the Banquet of Holofernes, 1634
Oil on canvas
143 × 154,7 cm
Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid
Photo: Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
Landscape with a Stone Bridge, c. 1638
oil on panel, 29.5 × 42.5 cm
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Purchased with the support of the Rembrandt Association and A. Bredius, Amsterdam
Photo: Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Rembrandt Harmensz van Rijn (1606–1669)
Self-Portrait with Velvet Beret, 1634
Oak wood, 58,4 × 47,7 cm
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie
Photo: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie - Christoph Schmidt
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
Self-portrait, Leaning on a Stone Still, 1639
Etching on laid paper, 206 x 163 mm
Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main
Photo: Städel Museum
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
The Blinding of Samson, 1636
Oil on canvas
219,3 × 305 cm
Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main
Photo: Städel Museum - U. Edelmann
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606–1669)
Tronie of a Man with a Feathered Beret, c. 1635–40
oil on panel, 62.5 × 47 cm
Mauritshuis, The Hague
Photo: Mauritshuis, The Hague
The exhibition combines the important Frankfurt holdings of Rembrandt’s work, including The Blinding of Samson (1636), with a string of stellar loans from major museums in Europe and North America. Around 140 paintings, prints, and drawings by Rembrandt and his contemporaries – loaned from the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, the Gemäldegalerie Berlin, the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister in Dresden, the National Gallery in London, the Museo Nacional del Prado in Madrid, and the National Gallery of Art in Washington – reveal the artist’s impressive rise, breakthrough, and market domination in the 1630s to the mid-1650s.
As a painter, Rembrandt produced an astonishingly rich and varied oeuvre made up of landscapes, genre scenes, and still lifes, but he is best known for his dramatic history paintings and realistic portraits. His interaction and exchange with other painters shaped both his development as an artist and his entrepreneurial ambitions. Amid the rivalry and competition that characterized the inspiring atmosphere of Amsterdam at the time, where many talented artists were courting the favour of the wealthy bourgeoisie, Rembrandt developed his uniquely expressive visual vernacular, which ultimately allowed him to rise to the top of this fiercely contested art market.
“With ‘Rembrandt in Amsterdam’, the Städel Museum takes a close look at one of the most celebrated figures in the history of art. Through more than 40 works from our own collection and 94 important international loans, we retrace the decisive years of Rembrandt’s career and follow him on his path to success and mastery – over his rivals and in his art. Two years after ‘Making Van Gogh’, our Rembrandt exhibition also signals a new start for Frankfurt – we wish to thank the supporters of this exceptional project, as well as the local citizens, partners, foundations, and companies whose overwhelming solidarity has kept us going over the past months, more than ever before,” states PHILIPP DEMANDT, director of the Städel Museum.
“Rembrandt went his own way ¬– with inspiration and innovation, a keen sense of the importance of networking and collaboration, but also with a stubborn streak and a good dose of willpower and drive. These attributes are still what determine the fate of projects in today’s world. We believe in the power of art to inspire innovation and change. At ING Deutschland, with headquarters in Frankfurt and strong ties to Amsterdam, we are therefore thrilled to support this extraordinary exhibition at the Städel Museum and help retrace Rembrandt’s path”, is how NICK JUE, CEO of ING Deutschland, describes the company’s support to the exhibition.
“The Städelscher Museums-Verein has been supporting the Städel’s museum work for over 120 years, so we are delighted to lend our support to this new exhibition venture. When we think of Rembrandt, we not only think of the most innovative artist of his time, but also of the spectacular acquisition of his large history painting The Blinding of Samson for the Städel Museum’s collection. It was thanks in part to our engagement that this exciting work was acquired in 1905. It is therefore no coincidence that it holds a special place in the exhibition. Its story is even told in that most modern of formats: the podcast, with four episodes all to itself,” explains SYLVIA VON METZLER, president of the Städelscher Museums-Verein e.V.
“Today the name Rembrandt is still an international brand, and his artworks are coveted ‘blue chips’. That said, during his lifetime he had to make a name for himself on the Amsterdam art market, where competition among artists reached unparalleled heights. Rembrandt’s exceptional ability to convincingly penetrate the psychology of the figures he portrayed is his enduring trademark. The exhibition examines the work of Rembrandt and his competitors, colleagues, and pupils in the febrile artistic milieu of mid-17th century Amsterdam,” explains JOCHEN SANDER, the exhibition’s curator, vice director, and curator of Dutch, Flemish, and German paintings before 1800 at the Städel Museum.
THE EXHIBITION
“Rembrandt in Amsterdam: Creativity and Competition” follows a thematically structured route. The architecture of the galleries allows Rembrandt’s work to enter into a free dialogue with that of his contemporaries.
When Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn arrived in Amsterdam in the early 1630s, he was far from unknown. In the global trading capital of Amsterdam, the art-buying public was not limited to the wealthy mercantile class but included artisans and mariners as well. Seeking to distinguish himself from his competitors through more than just style, Rembrandt began signing his works with merely his first name shortly after setting up in Amsterdam. This has become one of his most distinctive trademarks. His inventiveness soon impressed the local bourgeoisie whose commissions initially made him a sought-after portraitist. As demonstrated by the exhibited Portrait of Andries de Graeff from 1639 (Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Museumslandschaft Hessen, Kassel), Rembrandt had to the power to capture the vivid, immediate expression of the sitter. This becomes particularly evident when juxtaposed with portraits by his Amsterdam rivals, such as Nicolaes Eliasz. Pickenoy’s stately, life-size Portrait of a Man (1628, Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe).
In addition to commissioned portraits, Rembrandt painted self-portraits throughout his life. Studying his own face – whether in paintings, drawings, or etchings – allowed Rembrandt to explore the expression of every imaginable feeling and emotional state. Rembrandt also used his self-portraits and head studies as a calling card to promote himself and his artistic abilities. They too became a kind of signature as he incorporated his own facial features into character sketches called tronies. The painting Tronie of a Man with a Feathered Beret (c. 1635–1640, Mauritshuis, The Hague) is a particularly impressive example of this.
Soon after settling in Amsterdam, Rembrandt joined the Guild of Saint Luke in 1634. As a member of the professional association of artists, Rembrandt was now able to establish his own workshop, achieve independence as a businessman, and teach paying pupils. At least 40 young artists went through his workshop in Amsterdam. Through their work, every student actively contributed to building the reputation of the Rembrandt brand. Yet Rembrandt encouraged his pupils to develop their own creative variations rather than merely copy his work. The creative exchange with other talented artists therefore exerted a consistent influence on his art and that of this workshop assistants.
Rembrandt was a master of several painting genres: portraits and tronies, narrative histories, landscapes, still lifes, and genre scenes. Among his contemporaries, Rembrandt was considered a universal artist. Through his masterful handling of light and chromatic effects, he was able to render precious materials on canvas, as evidenced by his mysterious Heroine from the Old Testament (1632/1633, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa). Rembrandt was without peer in his ability to heighten the intensity of his pictures by condensing the narrative into a single decisive scene. His histories depict stirring moments with the power to move, unsettle, and even alarm the spectator. But despite this, Rembrandt’s figures are nuanced and convey ambiguity and doubt, particularly in their facial expressions, as exemplified by the figure of King Saul in the picture David Playing the Harp for Saul (c. 1630–1631, Städel Museum).
Occasionally Rembrandt’s work also reveals a coarse and humorous streak. His sense of graphic detail and irony is manifested in The Abduction of Ganymede (1635, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister): rather than depicting Ganymede as an attractive boy in the iconographic tradition of Michelangelo’s famous drawing, which was very popular at the time, Rembrandt paints him as a plump toddler.
Rembrandt’s representations of nature – such as the etching The Three Trees (1643, Städel Museum) or Landscape with a Stone Bridge (c. 1638, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam) – reveal how he used visual effects in an attempt to tangibly render light and weather phenomena and movement in nature. At the time, his work represented a startling alternative to that of other painters who specialized in southern landscapes bathed in Italian light which were an easy sell on the art market.
Starting in the middle of the 17th century, the artists in Amsterdam, much like their French counterparts before them, began turning to the rules of classical antiquity for inspiration: light colours and clear structures gained in popularity. This new classicism was radically different from Rembrandt’s painting style. Nowhere is this more evident than in the juxtaposition of Rembrandt’s painting Diana and Her Nymphs bathing, with the Stories of Actaeon and Callisto (1634, Sammlung der Fürsten zu Salm-Salm, Wasserburg Anholt, Isselburg) and Jacob van Loos’s Diana and Her Nymphs (1654, Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen). In fact, Rembrandt moved further and further away from contemporary taste in his later work, employing a dark palette and thick impasto from the mid-1650s onwards. As a result, his dominant position on the Amsterdam art market already came to an end during his lifetime.
The exhibition is organized by the Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main, and the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa.
WALL TEXTS
Rembrandt – a name, a face, a brand established in Amsterdam between 1630 and 1655, and still famous to this day. It was during his years in Amsterdam that the young artist from the town of Leiden developed into the master we know him as today. He quickly made his signature his trademark: In 1633, “Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn” notably became simply “Rembrandt”. In the international commercial metropolis of Amsterdam, the artist moved in an inspiring environment that challenged and motivated him. The Amsterdam art market of the day was one of the largest and most competitive in Europe, with a wealth of talented artists each vying for commissions from the city’s wealthy residents.
Unlike many of his competitors, Rembrandt didn’t specialise in a particular genre of painting. Instead, he responded to the great demand for pictures by creating a diverse portfolio of works. He specialised primarily in vivid portraits and dramatic history paintings, but he was also an expert at landscapes, still lifes and genre scenes – painted, etched or drawn. His students and apprentices also contributed significantly to spreading the reach of the “Rembrandt” brand.
This exhibition presents the tremendous artistic diversity that collectors and art lovers in the Amsterdam of Rembrandt’s day were privileged to choose from.
AMSTERDAM – CAPITAL OF WORD TRADE
The port city of Amsterdam experienced a spectacular economic boom in the 17th century. The ships of the Dutch East and West India Companies brought wares and luxury goods to the city from throughout the world. Amsterdam’s population grew quickly. Between 1580 and 1670 the city’s population grew from 30,000 to over 200,000 residents. The city’s Grachtengordel (Canal Belt) was developed with elegant homes for newly wealthy citizens. In the midst of the war-torn Europe of the day, Amsterdam offered a strong job market and a relatively peaceful coexistence between different religions. Until recently, this cultural and economic heyday of the Dutch Republic was referred to as the “Golden Age”. But this euphemistic and now controversial term ignores the fact that wealth and power in international trade were also achieved through exploitation and slavery.
REMBRANDT AS COURT ARTIST?
In 1632 Rembrandt was commissioned to paint a portrait of Amalia von Solms, the wife of the Dutch Stadtholder Frederik Hendrik. The painting was intended to complement an existing portrait of the Stadtholder on display at the court in The Hague, painted by Gerard van Honthorst, therefore requiring Rembrandt to employ the same strict profile pose and painted frame. But Rembrandt’s portrayal must have seemed too bourgeois for the tastes of the court. His reserved depiction of the princess was not as flattering as the elaborate splendour of the many Van Honthorst paintings she commissioned. Although Rembrandt was evidently unsuccessful as a court portraitist, his studio assistants adopted the profile pose for portraits and head studies that were sold on the free market.
THE NEW TOWN HALL AS CITIZENS’ PALACE
When Amsterdam’s old town hall was destroyed by fire on July 7th, 1652, the construction of its stately successor had already been underway for four years. Dedicated in 1655 at Dam Square, the building that stands today as the Royal Palace of Amsterdam was the city’s most important construction and public art project of the 17th century. It was designed to emphasize Amsterdam’s economic and political power. The most successful artists of the day were chosen to furnish the building, with Rembrandt’s former students Govaert Flinck and Ferdinand Bol selected to create monumental paintings for its most prestigious rooms. Rembrandt himself also contributed the painting The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis, but the picture was removed shortly after it was installed for reasons that remain unclear today.
REMBRANDT BEFORE AMSTERDAM
To round out his artistic education, Rembrandt had his first extended stay in Amsterdam in the winter of 1624/25, leaving his hometown of Leiden to study for six months under Pieter Lastman. Lastman was Amsterdam’s leading history painter in the 1620s, and he specialised in pictorial narratives from the Bible, ancient mythology and antiquity. Lastman dressed the figures in his stories in colourful costumes, luminous turbans and precious fabrics. Rembrandt took on this type of imagery in the small, meticulously detailed history paintings he created during his early years in Leiden. When he relocated to Amsterdam, he ramped up the narrative drama using the powerful contrast of light and shade and intense depiction of emotion that would become the trademarks of his history paintings from then on.
FAMILIAR FACES
Rembrandt’s partners Saskia van Uylenburgh, Geertje Dircks and Hendrickje Stoffels frequently modelled for the artist in a variety of motifs. Rembrandt portrayed them in paintings and prints, drew them in intimate moments, or used their faces for female figures in his history paintings. Rembrandt had an especially intimate relationship with his wife Saskia, who passed away in 1642 at the age of 29 nine months after the birth of the couple’s son, Titus. Saskia was a mayor’s daughter from the northern province of Friesland and the cousin of art dealer Hendrick Uylenburgh, with whom Rembrandt worked closely in his early days in Amsterdam.
SELF-PORTRAIT AND ROLE PORTRAIT – THE ARTIST’S FACE AS TRADEMARK
Over the four decades of his career, Rembrandt painted and etched more selfportraits than any other artist of his time. He posed leaning on one arm, like his famous role models Raphael and Titian in poses from the Italian Renaissance. He also lent his facial features to the studies of heads and facial expressions known as tronies. Rembrandt used these depictions of himself to ensure recognisability on the art market, making his own face a trademark of his art. His students and competitors repeated and varied Rembrandt’s forms of self-portraiture, adopting comparable roles and poses. Tronies were available on the art market at affordable prices, so they helped to further extend the reach of the “Rembrandt” brand.
PRIDE AND STATUS – PORTRAITS FOR AMSTERDAM CITIZENS
As a newcomer to Amsterdam, Rembrandt benefitted by teaming up with art dealer Hendrick Uylenburgh until 1634/35. Uylenburgh promoted the careers of a variety of artists, and provided Rembrandt with lucrative portrait assignments. For socially conscious urban citizens portraits were prestige objects. Rembrandt delighted his clients with his keen observational skills, quickly becoming the most in-demand portrait painter in the city. In the mid-1630s, Jacob Backer was a key rival. Backer too understood how to present Amsterdam’s wealthy burghers in a lifelike, elegant manner. Portrait painting gave artists the opportunity to network with a prosperous clientele who were frequently interested in purchasing other pictures as well. Page
TOP CHOICES FOR DISCERNING BUYERS
In the mid-1630s, flat lace collars made from several layers of reinforced linen replaced the aptly-named “millstone ruff” as the height of fashion. Style-conscious women customized their individual looks with accessories such as pearl jewellery or opulent handheld fans. Amsterdam’s elite citizens were spoiled for choice not only in terms of their wardrobe or how they presented themselves – the city’s art market was brimming with talented portrait painters. Each of these artists developed their own techniques for the most evocative portrayal of white lace and shimmering black satin. Aside from Rembrandt, artists including Jacob Backer, Govaert Flinck and Bartholomeus van der Helst helped meet the demand for the most meticulous, realistic depiction of these elegant fabrics.
TWO BROTHERS – TWO PORTRAITISTS
The brothers Adriaen and Jacob Trip came from a wealthy Amsterdam merchant family that had amassed its fortune through international trade. Their parents’ generation had hired Rembrandt to paint their portraits, but the sons had different tastes. In 1644, Adriaen Trip took on a confident pose in a portrait by Jan Lievens. The artist had shared a studio in Leiden with Rembrandt, then worked in London and Antwerp. In 1644, he settled in Amsterdam and quickly gained success. Ten years later, the younger brother Jacob commissioned Bartholomeus van der Helst, who was the ideal choice in the 1650s for this kind of elegant portrait, posed in formal black before a landscape background.
PORTRAITS OF COMMUNAL PRIDE
Wealthy burghers of Amsterdam assumed leadership positions in non-profit communal institutions such as the Spinhuis, the women’s penitentiary, or the Leprozenhuis, a health care facility for sufferers of infectious diseases. Numerous group portraits bear witness to the esteemed offices held by the “Regents”, both male and female, and by citizens who served in volunteer civic guard companies. While these pictures proudly parade the social commitment of the upper class, the actual occupants of charitable institutions were rarely regarded as worthy of depiction themselves. Rembrandt’s Night Watch, the most famous civic guard portrait, was painted for the Kloveniersdoelen, the assembly hall for the Musketeers' company. Group portraits commissioned by public organizations were prestigious assignments for painters. Those who succeeded established contacts with powerful regent families and profited from further commissions.
A MATTER OF TASTE: OPTIONS FOR SELF-REPRESENTATION
How would you have chosen to be portrayed back then? Amsterdam citizens could pick and choose from first-class artists and formats in a variety of price ranges, but only the wealthiest could afford a full-length, life-sized portrait. Nicolaes Eliasz Pickenoy was Amsterdam’s leading portrait painter into the 1630s. He immortalised his clientele in dignified poses and created likenesses of the greatest elegance. As a younger competitor, Rembrandt offered a contrasting approach that relied on dynamic movement and natural vitality. His lively portrait of Andries de Graeff broke with convention and elevated portrait painting to a new level. But by the 1640s popular taste had changed. The next generation preferred the brighter painting style of Rembrandt’s former assistant, Govaert Flinck.
THE PORTRAITS PRINT – STEPS TOWARD PERFECTION
Rembrandt’s etchings demonstrate his love of experimentation and his great narrative talent. Admirers of his prints commissioned him to create portrait etchings – among them the art collector Jan Six and the print dealer Clement de Jonghe, two of his most important supporters. De Jonghe acquired over 70 copper plates by Rembrandt and made prints from them to sell. Rembrandt’s portrait of the print dealer was developed in several states. Collectors valued the unfinished proof impressions so much that Rembrandt sold small print runs of them as artworks in their own right, adding value to his print business. While most prints were inexpensive, some of Rembrandt's etchings sold for the same price as paintings.
CHOOSING A PORTRAITIST – BUT NOT REMBRANDT! // ARTISTIC COMPETITION ON PAPER
Poet and playwright Joost van den Vondel was decidedly not one of Rembrandt’s collectors and patrons. Vondel was an important figure in Amsterdam’s cultural life, and he had numerous portraits made of himself, but none by Rembrandt. In his poems Vondel praised Sandrart, Lievens and Flinck. He preferred their brighter painting approach, a style that Rembrandt did not offer. In his prints, Rembrandt sought to compete artistically with contemporaries and earlier artists whose works he collected. He perfected a unique blend of etching, engraving and drypoint and printed special impressions on Asian paper or even vellum. With his Hundred Guilder Print, Rembrandt produced an etching of extraordinary market value. He once traded an impression of this work for The Plague among the Trojans (Il Morbetto) – Raimondi’s famous etching after Raphael.
ART MARKET AND ART CRITICISM
Amsterdam’s most important commercial hub was the Bourse or beurs, the stock exchange founded in 1611 in the city centre. In Job Adriaensz. Berckheyde’s painting we can see merchants from all over the world bustling around the building’s courtyard, where international goods and securities were traded. To the right of the entrance we see an art dealer’s stand offering landscapes, genre scenes and still lifes for sale. At places like this and even in their own studios, artists were confronted with art critics. Rembrandt’s opinion of contemporaries who marketed themselves as informed art critics is demonstrated in one satirical drawing: The artist at lower right unabashedly does his “business” while an art critic with donkey’s ears – a symbol of stupidity – comments on a painting he is pointing at.
THE TRAGIC HERO – COMPETITION ON THE GRAND STAGE
Beginning in 1635, Rembrandt returned to history painting as his specialty. Emotional depth and climactic moments of drama became a trademark of his pictorial narratives. In 1639 he wrote to Constantijn Huygens, secretary of Stadtholder Frederik Hendrik, explaining that his aim was to capture the greatest and most natural movement and emotion. In the same letter he offered a huge painting to Huygens as a gift, most likely The Blinding of Samson. This painting presents the most brutal moment of the biblical story as no other artist had done before, depicting Samson being blinded. Rembrandt took inspiration for the fallen tragic hero from Rubens and Van Dyck. Art connoisseurs of the time recognised these connections and appreciated the international competition that Rembrandt had now entered into, simultaneously setting new standards and creating inspiration for artists who would follow.
REAL OR IDEAL? STYLISTIC OPTIONS FOR STORYTELLING
In Diana Bathing with her Nymphs, with the Stories of Actaeon and Callisto, Rembrandt has combined two narratives from Ovid’s Metamorphoses in a highly original way. While some of the women splash playfully in the water, the nymphs on the right have thrown the pregnant Callisto to the ground and are violently tearing off her clothes. Meanwhile, Actaeon has been secretly observing the goddess of the hunt and her entourage bathing. As punishment, Diana transforms Actaeon into a deer, as indicated by the antlers on his head. Rembrandt’s composition is full of contrasts and vitality, and he gave the nymphs natural bodies and movements. This image could hardly have contrasted more with the classical portrayal of the scene painted by Jacob van Loo 20 years later, whose female characters conform to the Page 7/10 feminine ideal of beauty based on classical antiquity. Bright colours and balanced proportions were in demand in the 1650s, increasingly displacing Rembrandt’s style, equal parts drastic and natural, from the market.
REMBRANDT OR NOT?
Rembrandt’s landscape drawings are actually always sketches drawn before the motif. The kind of finished composition we find here, with tiny people in a majestic “world landscape” of mountains, a river, city and countryside is found in only a few of his paintings. This and the signature, unusual in his drawings, led to the suspicion as far back as the 19th century that this drawing was a “forgery”. More recent examinations however have produced arguments favouring the notion that it could in fact be an original. A close look at the range of details, simply drawn but vibrant, such as the travellers in the left foreground, reveals a level of drawing expertise not anticipated in a first glance at this surprising drawing.
LANDSCAPES – PLACES OF LONGING AND OBJECTS FOR SALE
Around the year 1600, landscapes without a narrative from the Bible, mythology or history were a rarity. A mere 50 years later landscape was among the most popular subjects on the Amsterdam art market. Sunny Italian scenery, poetic fantasy landscapes or sweeping views across the Dutch flatlands provided relaxation and a change of scenery for people in urban environments. Hercules Segers and Philips Koninck specialised in this market segment, while Rembrandt remained primarily a figure painter. In the few landscape paintings and numerous drawings and prints he created beginning in the late 1630s, he renewed his interest in the dramatic, artfully seeking to capture the natural phenomena of light and weather.
ENIGMATIC HEROINES
Rembrandt’s circle brought to market numerous paintings featuring powerfully expressive female figures. Biblical and mythological heroines were clothed in fanciful costumes made of luxurious materials, reflecting a fascination for foreign cultures and materials. The artists took advantage of the availability of all kinds of foreign goods in Amsterdam to enliven their paintings. The jewels, silk fabrics, or seashells from faraway lands they depicted were available in Amsterdam as highly coveted import goods. The identification of the women represented is enigmatic not only for today’s audiences: Art connoisseurs of the 17th century welcomed deliberate ambiguity in art as a catalyst for the imagination and a prompt for sociable discussion.
AN OLD TESTAMENT THEME AS BESTSELLER: ABRAHAM AND HAGAR
The Amsterdam art market offered scenes from the Old Testament in every price range. Fighting for liberation from Spain in the Eighty Years´ War, the Dutch often identified themselves with the Biblical Israelites as a new chosen people. Depictions of Abraham’s expulsion of Hagar, a family drama beset with moral conflicts, were especially popular. Pieter Lastman's depiction of the story in 1612 proved widely influential, putting the focus on the emotionally charged interactions between the figures. Rembrandt’s drawing after Lastman’s painting precisely captured this quality. The lasting success of the composition was still on display 40 years later in the variation painted by Rembrandt's student Barent Fabritius. In contrast, Rembrandt’s former employee Govaert Flinck innovatively presented the central figures in a halflength format.
IDEAL BECOMES REAL – THE ABDUCTION OF GANYMEDE
The myth of Ganymede tells the story of the most beautiful boy on earth being kidnapped by the father of the gods, Jupiter, who transforms himself into an eagle, grabs up the youngster and carries him off to serve as a cupbearer to the gods. The most beautiful boy on earth? Rembrandt’s Ganymede is the exact opposite. In monumental format he presents a chubby toddler, crying in fear and even wetting himself. The contrast to depictions of Ganymede common at the time could not have been greater. Copper etchings of an original motif by Michelangelo portraying Ganymede as an attractive, muscular young man were broadly popular. Ganymede's abduction was sometimes depicted to symbolize the ascent of the soul to heaven, especially the soul of a deceased child, but it is unclear whether this meaning can be applied to Rembrandt's painting. The bold immediacy of Rembrandt’s lifelike portrayal remains strikingly unique. It would certainly have fuelled discussion among Amsterdam art lovers.
ANGELS: A TRADEMARK THEME IN REMBRANDT’S CIRCLE
Rembrandt had a talent for reinventing popular themes. He passed this on to his students and encouraged them to come up with their own creative variations of his compositions. Rembrandt earned good money from the sales of works by his students and from the apprenticeship fees he charged them for his tutelage. Scenes featuring angelic messengers became bestsellers in his studio. We can also see the impact of the Rembrandt team’s angelic depictions in the work by Jan Victors, who was not a Rembrandt student. Victors’ adaption of Rembrandtesque themes and Page 9/10 motifs is a testament to the broad influence that “Rembrandt & Co.” had on the making and marketing of art in Amsterdam.
ITALIAN AMBIANCE OR HOMELY INTIMACY? // ABRAHAM’S SACRIFICE AS ARTISTIC CHALLENGE
Amsterdam artists offered consumers an enormous range of appealing themes and styles. Motifs from Christ’s childhood were in great demand, and the artists portrayed them both in dark tones as well as featuring a luminous lustre with a bright palette. While Rembrandt’s former student Samuel van Hoogstraten took on the deep, chiaroscuro tone of his former teacher in the modest setting of his nativity portrayal, his contemporary Jan Baptist Weenix had spent time in Italy, and his depiction of the Holy Family is set in gleaming sunlight with classical architecture in the background. Rembrandt also passed on his passion for drama and emotion to his successors. In depictions of the sacrifice of Isaac, they captured the heavenly messenger intervening at the last minute to prevent Abraham from sacrificing his son. The portrayal of dramatic turning points became something of a trademark for pictorial narratives in Rembrandt´s circle.
ARTFUL AMBIGUITY
Part still life, part genre painting – Rembrandt’s Girl with Dead Peacocks holds a special place in his work. He was clearly fascinated by the colourful shading and structure of the birds’ shimmering plumage, but he resisted painting a simple still life, instead integrating the arrangement of birds within a scene of daily life. We also find a thoroughly lifelike scene in the depiction of a girl with a broom. The painting is inscribed with Rembrandt's name, but its execution has recently been attributed to one of the master’s most talented students: Carel Fabritius. Fabritius used the earthy colours and atmospheric treatment of light so characteristic of his teacher’s work, creating a product of the “Rembrandt” brand. The different painting methods evident in the picture indicate that another artist must have completed it after Fabritius had left Amsterdam.
EVERYDAY WORLDS: NARRATIVE VARIETY
The open market for genre paintings grew exponentially between 1630 and 1660. Scenes from daily life were appreciated as highly modern works of contemporary art. From festive groups of elegant people to gritty farm scenes, genre paintings Page 10/10 contrasted with traditional themes of religious history by being easy to understand, as well as witty and entertaining. It was especially in his drawings and prints that Rembrandt captured observations from day-to-day life. Many artists, also from surrounding cities, specialised in genre painting, and their works put pressure on Amsterdam artists to compete. For Rembrandt, genre scenes were simply one of the many categories of pictures he marketed for sale.
