Rembrandt van Rijn

            When looking for a museum with self-portrait work, I decided to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. An artist that I had found in the museum is Rembrandt van Rijn, who was a Dutch painter from the 1600s. During his career as an artist, he was very focused on visual arts, portraits, and self-portraiture. When I saw his self-portrait work in the museum, I read the details and it interested me how it was not his only self-portrait, but one of the dozen that he painted throughout his time. In the MET, the self-portrait that was showcased, was when he was 54 years old, showing wide applications of paint conveying an open record of the artist’s aging features. The other dozen or more self-portraits by Rembrandt’s career vary considerably in composition, expression, and technique.

Self-Portrait (1660)

            Throughout his lifetime, Rembrandt had created about one hundred self-portraits, which included over forty paintings, thirty-one etchings, and seven drawings. He made these self-portraits by looking in a mirror and drawing in reverse to his actual features. The self-portrait that I had seen in the museum was showing features of Rembrandt getting old, such as through wrinkled brows and a worried expression; this may be because during this time of his life, he had declared bankruptcy and was deserted by friends and family. His eyes denies defeat, his mouth shows undeserved neglect, and his tilted cap and raised hand shows jauntily, his merry pride. From his many self-portraits, I learned that he painted them to show his expression and feelings during the time, as well as the way he looked.

            What I realized about the theme of the paintings in the room of Rembrandt’s work is that the majority of his work was all portraits, with one of the paintings being a self-portrait specifically. The portraits were of men and women during his time. One of the ones that I had seen was his painting, “Man with a Magnifying Glass;” the painting was of a man named Pieter Haringh, who was the seller of a painting that was being auctioned. The magnifying glass shown was used to evaluate jewelry, silver, paintings, and other luxury goods. A painting I saw next to this one was of a portrait of a woman named “Woman with a Pink,” which was of a woman wearing exotic jewelry and holding a pink carnation, the symbol of love. Similar to the title of the first one portrait which was “man with a…,” the second one was “woman with a…” It turns out that the two paintings were actually related; the first one was of Pieter Haringh, and the second one was of his wife, Elizabeth Delft. It was interesting to see how Rembrandt put meaning into his work, being something related to his life.

Man with a Magnifying Glass (early 1660s) | Woman with a Pink (early 1660s)

            When walking around the room, I saw even two more paintings that were done by Rembrandt. The first one was titled “Portrait of a Woman,” which had an unknown woman in it, like many of Rembrandt’s paintings. He painted this during the 1630s and during this time he was assigned many paintings to do of portraits; he excelled at this portrait with a delicate drawing of the cap, strong modeling of the face, and immediacy of the expression. One other portrait I saw on the wall was a portrait which was titled “Portrait of a Man Holding Gloves,” which was consistent with his style and execution in the late 1940s. The quality of the face, and textures of the skin are typical of Rembrandt’s paintings.  I had realized and seen that the titles for his paintings were very straightforward and said exactly what was depicted in the painting. An example is the most recent one I talked about titled “Portrait of a Man Holding Gloves;” the painting was exactly showing a portrait of a man holding something, which seems like gloves.

Portrait of a Woman (1633)

Portrait of a Man Holding Gloves (1648)

In the room with the paintings by Rembrant, there was also one more painting, but it was not a portrait. It was odd to see it in the middle of all of the portraits and one self-portrait, so I did not take much note of it. The name of the painting was “The Toilet of Bathsheba,” and it apparently shows King David seeing Bathsheba bathing, even though she is married to a loyal soldier, Uriah. This painting was one of Rembrandt’s “cabinet pictures” for collectors. This painting reminded me of a quote by John Berger, “In the average European oil painting of the nude, the principal protagonist is never painted. He is the spectator in front of the picture and he is presumed to be a man” (Pg. 54). The reason I say this is because even though the description says that King David is shown atop the palace in the background, I cannot see him at all and he seems to be quite unnoticeable. Being an European nude painting, it was in fact for the principal protagonist, King David, to see, who is not really shown directly in the painting.

The Toilet of Bathsheba (1643)

Overall, I think it was interesting to visit a museum since I do not regularly go to one. There were many artists that I had seen, but by seeing a variety of portraits and a self-portrait by Rembrandt, I decided to base my work off of him. He is known to be a very famous painter today and by researching and learning more about him, it was thought-provoking to see the type of skill that he had and the way he did his art work. 

For more information about Rembrandt's painting "Self-Portrait" visit: https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437397

For more information about Rembrandt's painting "The Toilet of Bathsheba" visit: https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437393