Rembrandt

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Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (15 July 1606 – October 1669) was a Dutch draughtsman, painter, and printmaker.

He is widely considered one of the finest visual artists in history and the most influential in Dutch art history.

Rembrandt's works, unlike the majority of Dutch masters of the nineteenth century, represent a variety of styles and subject matter, from portraits and self-portraits to landscapes, geographical representations, allegorical and historical scenes, and biblical and mythological studies as well as animal studies.

His contributions to art came during a period of great wealth and cultural achievement for historians (especially Dutch painting), but in many ways antithetical to Europe's Baroque style, which dominated Baroque art, was extremely prolific and innovative and gave rise to new genres.

Rembrandt, like many artists of the Dutch Golden Age, such as Jan Vermeer of Delft, was also an avid art collector and dealer. Rembrandt never went abroad, but the work of Italian masters and Netherlandish artists who had studied in Italy, such as Pieter Lastman and the Utrecht Caravaggists, and Flemish Baroque Peter Paul Rubens, inspired him greatly.

Rembrandt's later years, after achieving great success as a portrait painter, were marred by personal tragedy and financial difficulties.

Life

Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn was born in Leiden, the Netherlands Republic, and now the Netherlands. He was the ninth child born to Harmen Gerritszoon van Rijn and Neeltgen Willemsdocht van Zuijtbrouck. His family was quite well-to-do; his father was a miller, and his mother was a baker's daughter. Rembrandt's life and the religiously challenging period in which he lived makes his faith a point of concern. His mother was Catholic and his father belonged to the Dutch Reformed Church. Though Rembrandt's work reveals a deep Christian faith, no proof that he attended any church, although some scholars, including Hendrik Willem van Loon, suggest he may have been Mennonite, and five of his children were christened in Dutch Reformed churches in Amsterdam: four in the Oude Kerk (Old Church) and five in Titus (Southern Church), according to Hendrik Willem van Loon, and five of the Zui christen christen in the Zui christen christen's, and five of Reformed in Amsterdam's, including five of christena orthodox, was christen, and five of Reformed in the christeno christen, five in the Monnot christendom (Olt e in the Zuiderkerk (Old Church of the Zuid Church of the Zuid Church of the Zuizen's (Southern Church of Titan's's on the Zuiderkerk (Southern) and one, five of the Zuiderkerk (Southern) and one, five of Zui orthodox, christen in the Zazen'st in the Beit in the Zak (Zen).

He attended Latin school as a youth. He was enrolled at the University of Leiden at the age of 13, but according to a modern, he had a greater inclination toward painting; he was apprenticed to a Leiden history painter Jacob van Swanenburg, with whom he spent three years. Rembrandt stayed a few months with Jacob Pynas and then started his own workshop in Leiden, although Simon van Leeuwen claimed that Joris van Schooten taught Rembrandt. Rembrandt never left the Dutch Republic during his lifetime, unlike several of his contemporaries who went to Italy as part of their artistic education.

In 1624 or 1625, he established a studio in Leiden, which he shared with friend and colleague Jan Lievens. Rembrandt began to accept students in 1627, which included Gerrit Dou in 1628.

Rembrandt was discovered in 1629 by the Dutch mathematician and physicist Christiaan Huygens, who obtained significant commissions from the Hague's court. Prince Frederik Hendrik continued to buy paintings from Rembrandt until 1646, as a result of this link.

Rembrandt left Amsterdam, a rapidly growing city in the Netherlands' new capital, at the end of 1631. For the first time, he began to work as a professional portraitist, with a great success. He began working with Hendrick van Uylenburgh, and in 1634, Hendrick van Uylenburgh married Saskia van Uylenburgh, Hendrick's cousin. Saskia's father was a lawyer and the burgemeester (mayor) of Leeuwarden, and she was adopted by a loving family. Saskia was a child in Het Bildt when she was an orphanage. Rembrandt and Saskia were married in the local church of St. Annaparochie, but without the presence of Rembrandt's relatives, there was no one present. Rembrandt became a burgess of Amsterdam and a member of the local guild of painters in the same year. He also acquired a number of students, including Ferdinand Bol and Govert Flinck.

Rembrandt and Saskia moved to their own house in fashionable Nieuwe Doelenstraat with a view of the Amstel river in 1635. They moved to a prominent newly built house in the upscale 'Bobet House Museum' in 1639 (eng.). 'Broadway', now known as Jodenbreestraat in what was then called the Jewish quarter, followed by a young upcoming neighborhood.' A major reason for future financial difficulties would be the mortgage to finance the 13,000 guilder purchase. Rembrandt should have been able to pay the house off with his substantial income, but it appears that his spending matched his income, and he may have made some unsuccessful investments. Rembrandt used to be a stumbling block for his Old Testament scenes, and it was there that he frequently requested his Jewish neighbors to model for his Old Testament scenes. Despite being wealthy, the couple suffered several personal tragedies; their son Rumbartus died two months after his birth in 1635; and Cornelia died at the age of 1638 at the age of just three weeks old. They had a second daughter, Cornelia, who died after only over a month. Titus, the fourth child of the family's 1641 birth, lived to adulthood. Saskia died in 1642, likely from tuberculosis, shortly after Titus' birth. Rembrandt's drawings of her on her sick and death bed are among her most moving works.

Geertje Dircx was hired as Titus' caretaker and nurse during Saskia's illness and also became Rembrandt's lover. She would later accuse Rembrandt of breach of contract (a euphemism for seduction under [breached] promise to marry] and was given alimony of 200 guilders a year. Rembrandt tried to have her commited to an asylum or poorhouse (called a "bridewell") in Gouda after learning she had pawned jewelry he had given her that once belonged to Saskia.

Rembrandt began a friendship with Hendrickje Stoffels, who had been his maid, in the late 1640s. They had a daughter, Cornelia, who gave Hendrickrickje a summons from the Reformed Church to answer the accusation "that she had committed the acts of a whore with Rembrandt the painter" in 1654. She confessed to this and was refused to receive communion. Rembrandt was not summoned to appear in the Church council because he was not a Reformed member. Both were considered legally married under common law, but Rembrandt had not married Hendrickje. If he had remarried, he would have lost contact with Titus' trust established in Saskia's will.

Rembrandt lived beyond his means, including bidding up his own art), prints (often used in his paintings), and rares, which may have contributed to a court deal (cessio bonorum) in 1656. He sold the bulk of his paintings and a large collection of antiquities, but was able to keep his tools. Rembrandt's catalogs survive, with busts of Roman emperors, suits of Japanese armour, and collections of natural history and minerals among other items included in Old Master paintings and drawings. However, the prices paid for the 1657 and 1658 were disappointing. Rembrandt was forced to sell his house and his printing press in order to move to more modest accommodation on the Rozengracht in 1660. The police and his creditors were generally sympathetic to him, except for the Amsterdam painters' union, which had a new law that no one in Rembrandt's situation could work as a painter. Hendrickje and Titus formed a dummy company as art dealers in 1660, with Rembrandt as an employee to get around this.

Rembrandt (or rather the new company) was hired to complete the newly constructed city hall in 1661, but only after Govert Flinck, the artist's original commission, died before starting to paint, he was commissioned. The Conscience of Claudius Civilis' project was rejected and returned to the painter; the remaining fragment is only a fraction of the total work. Aert de Gelder, Rembrandt's last apprentice, was born about this time. He was still doing major commissions for portraits and other works in 1662. One of Rembrandt's creditors, Hof van Holland, went to the High Court in 1662 to challenge Titus' payment first. Isaac van Hertsbeeck also lost twice and had to pay the money he had already received to Titus, which he did not do in 1668. When Cosimo III de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, arrived in Amsterdam in 1667, he visited Rembrandt at his villa.

Rembrandt lived out of both Hendricke and Titus, who died in 1663, and Titus, who died in 1668, who left a baby girl. He died within a year of his son's birth in Amsterdam on October 4th, and was buried as a wealthy man as the heirs paid in burial taxes a considerable sum, f 15. It was in a numbered 'kerkgraf' (gree owned by the church) it was buried somewhere beneath a tombstone in the cathedral. His remains were stolen and burned after 20 years, as was customary.

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