Rembrandt Self Portrait: The Artist’s Way to Depict His Life

Among the several seventeenth-century documents, the paper from 1632 describes Rembrandt being briefly visited by a notary and two witnesses at the house of Hendrick Uylenburg, his residence at the time. The document says, “Today, the 26th of July of 1632, I, Jacob van Swieten, Public Notary, visited the house of Mr Heijndrick Uylenburch, painter, living on Breestraat, near Antonysluis in this city, and there asked a certain young girl who came to the door whether Mr Rembrandt Harmens v Rijn, painter, (who had taken lodgings at the house) was at home and available. The same girl replied ‘yes’ and when on my request the aforementioned Rembrandt Harmens v Rijn, painter, was called and had come to the entrance hall where I was waiting for him, I asked if he was Mr. Rembrandt Harmens v Rijn, painter, and he had replied ‘yes’ I then said to him that that was all and that it appeared to me that he was still fresh and vigorous and in good health, to which he replied, ‘that is true, I am- thank God- fit and in good health.” The text of Van Swieten does not merely hold these words but comes with the two Rembrandt Self-Portrait pictures and a few etchings from the same period. What’s so special about these two portraits is that these were the only paintings, which show Rembrandt in the daily life clothes we see today. As all art lovers know, Rembrandt was an artist who painted many self-portraits, inspiring countless artists after him to do the same. Yet almost all of his portraits are different from one another, so looking at them becomes meaningful. And it is not wrong to say that Rembrandt created the most famous series of self-portraits in the history of art; which no other artists ever approached in their artworks as he had the most unforgettable portrayals of his own features. Today, around thirty self-portraits of the artist survive, with a dozen drawings and two dozen etchings. It is interesting to note that besides his self-portraits, he sometimes included himself among the subsidiary figures in the religious pictures, as we saw in The Storm on the Sea of Galilee. So, it now becomes clear that to get a closer look at the artist, we have to look at his self-portraits. So, let’s start!

Artist Abstract: Rembrandt.

Rembrandt was one of the most incredibly gifted artists, who, with his intense psychological study of people, objects, and their surroundings, coupled the Christian devotion through his artworks. His ability to observe and intense love for stage drama led him to master human emotions and their expressions in his paintings, capturing them in stunning chiaroscuro. In no time, he would paint all kinds of portraits, historical and biblical paintings as well as mythological scenes. With a usual spontaneity and sensitivity, the artist developed his message with his artwork. And not to forget, he had excellent knowledge of light and shadows, which made it possible for him to paint through torch light chiaroscuro. Regarded as one of the most significant artists in Dutch art history, he talked about his entire life through his self-portraits.

Born as the son of a prosperous miller in Leiden, he achieved brilliant early success in 1631 and 32 as he moved to the capital, Amsterdam. After his marriage to Saskia in 1634, his happiness was marred by a series of infant deaths, including three of four children who died within weeks of their birth and Saskia’s death in 1642, aged 29.

Briefly Analysing Rembrandt’s Self Portraits.

1. Self-Portrait With Two Circles, 1665.

One of the eighteenth-century biographers of Rembrandt, Arnold Houbraken, wrote about this Rembrandt Self Portrait, saying,

“In the last years of his life, his pictures, when examined close by, looked as if they had been daubed by a bricklayer’s trowel.”

It contains an interesting clue that indicates that the mirror Rembrandt used for painting this portrait was quite large. A look at the genesis of this painting also reveals the faithfulness with which he began and the complexities involved in painting one’s own reflection. According to an X-radiograph of Rembrandt’s impressive painting, he must have originally portrayed himself as he saw himself in the mirror, holding a palette, brushes, and maulstick in the right hand, and the brush in the left hand, raised in a way that suggests he was working on the canvas. As a result, his reflection in the mirror extended down to his hips. He made significant changes to the original design, though it appears that he rejected the mirror image in this particular case. As he stroked and dabbed, he moved the palette, brushes, and maulstick to his left hand and blurred his right hand. In the mirror, the right hand appears to be a left hand, which undoubtedly prompted his decision to do so.

2. Self-Portrait in a Plumed Hat, 1629.

The portrait shows a young Rembrandt in a feathered hat. It was painted in the same period as the raw and freely handed Munch self-portrait. The artist used a careful implementation of color with a slick, lacquered glossiness to showcase the softness and smoothness of the materials of Rembrandt’s dressing with the three-quarter length and low viewpoint, accentuating the lofty formality of the pose. It is normally said that many early self portraits by Rembrandt turn out to be copies painted by other hands, possibly his first students, Isaac Jouderville and Gerard Dou. There is only one distinguishing physiognomic characteristic between them – he has a rounded jowly chin, an exuberant nose, and a heroic proboscis that he will sculpt over the course of his next forty years.

3. Self-Portrait, 1660.

The painting belongs to the time when Rembrandt was fifty-four and showed the signs of aging on his own face. He built up the paint in high relief to convey his furrowed brow, the heavy aging pouches below his eyes, and a double chin. In recent years, Rembrandt’s working method has been revealed more and more, such as the way he flipped the brush to incise the rough curls spilling out of his cap with the butt end, which we can see in his self-portrait of 1660. This Rembrandt self portrait is different from others as it successfully shows wrinkles and pale, puffy skin with the gray hair of Rembrandt proudly as evidence of the humane quality of self-acceptance and fine age knowledge.

4. Self-Portrait in a Gorget, 1629.

Rembrandt always liked to wear his gorget, a hinged collar-piece, covering the base of the neck and collarbone, as well as the upper back, lying beneath a silken stock or scarf; a touch of steel lest he be considered too dandy. The gleaming studs on Rembrandt’s forget gave him the appearance of a soldier with no obligations. Here, Rembrandt’s self-portrait from 1629 showcased himself with warm and soft colors in this gorget. The self-portrait has a backstory relating to the artist’s life and the historical context. Early in August 1629, an invading imperial army caused a lot of panic among the residents of Amersfoort, nearly forty miles from Amsterdam city. Despite not lasting for long periods of time, the crisis was real. Several part-time militia groups- brewers and dyers- were now being sent to frontier towns in the east, men who, for years, had not done anything more threatening than parade around in fancy boots and gaudy sashes or tow wooden parrots atop poles on Sundays. The university students still slept through Sallust’s lectures and brayed at the shutters of respectable houses in the evenings. Despite this, Leiden did not escape the war completely. A patriotic press issued propaganda prints reminding citizens of the horrors endured fifty years ago when Holland’s towns were themselves besieged. And in this course of events, this self portrait by Rembrandt was a product of the provocation showing himself as a military person.

5. Self-Portrait With Soft Hat and Gold Chain, 1630.

This self portrait by Rembrandt was inspired by one of the very few self-portraits of Rubens, where he adorned himself with the great golden chain. He sent it to Charles Stuart as a gift, when he was still Prince of Wales in 1623. The portrait shows a few links of a heavy chain at the base of Rubens’s collar. And not to forget, he carried it in such a way that it looked modest and principled. This chain is not just an ornament but is a sign of esteem from princes to their most honored subjects. These also linked together the sovereign and servant in a mutual bond. Very few painters were awarded this honor to remain the favorite of his Lord. Before Rubens, Titian was given this chain by Emperor Charles V, and then Philip II gave another chain to his favorite Flemish painter, Anthonis Mor of Antwerp. Hence, the golden chain embarked on respect and paramount esteem.

Now, Rembrandt was never given such thing as there were no kings in Holland, and the Stadholders were neither won’t nor entitled to award such grandiose ornamentation. But costume hardware was not strenuous to come by, and Rembrandt knew how to portray himself in a similar chain as well. Hence, he gave himself a chain of honor in the fanciful self-portrait, which he gave to Ancrum, unapologetically painting himself into gentility.

6. Self Portrait With Saskia (The Prodigal Son With a Whore), 1635.

For many years, it was assumed that it was this painting in Dresden depicting a mustachioed gallant with a long sword trailing from his bandolier, guffawing toothily, as Rembrandt placed his arm around the waist of a richly dressed girl whose plump, silky-modeled derriere was perfectly placed on his lap. A mid-eighteenth-century etching after the painting, made by the Inspector of the Elector of Saxony’s art collection, came to be called La Double jouissance, and as a result of its unapologetic representation of the couple’s notorious appetite for high-roller living: sex, wine, and peacock pie, an ancestral tradition grew up around it. As the Romantic biographers saw it, Rembrandt’s painting’s hedonism perfectly matched their need for an image of his shameless dissipation: his moment of hubris before he fell into debt, widowerhood, and bankruptcy. Saskia’s Frisian relatives complained later about the squandering of her share of Rombertus van Uylenburgh’s estate, reinforcing the notion that she was heedless. Now, this is a little relevant to the painting.

Unlike other self portraits by Rembrandt, the artwork isn’t autobiographical in the straightforward kind to display his marriage with Saskia, rather Rembrandt posed as the prodigal son, frittering away his fortune in an ill-reputated place, showcasing Saskia as dimple whore** rather than a role of the wife of an ambitious artist. How do we know this? One of the iconographic traditions tells that the prodigal son shows himself carousing his one hand around the prostitute and the other around a wine glass, which Rembrandt portrayed exactly in this artwork.

7. Self-Portrait as a Beggar Seated on a Bank, 1630.

Rembrandt’s etching shows him as a beggar and is perhaps the most memorable of his self-portraits. However, there is a story behind this portrait. In a series of panels, Amsterdam artist Werner van den Valckert documented exactly how the destitute became proper wards of the civic and religious communities. In some cities, a limited number of indigents had permission to beg. The policy of confinement, correction, and expulsion was so successful that foreigners often commented enviously on the absence of beggars in Dutch cities.

“It is rare to meet a beggar here,” wrote James Howell, “just as rare to see a horse on the streets of Venice.” 

And it was precisely because of this relative invisibility of Dutch beggars that they became objects of exotic fascination and perhaps an artistic subject. Hence, in 1622, the great Lorraine graphic artist Jacques Callot started his series of prints, Gueux for his beggars, which inspired Rembrandt. Since Rembrandt owned some of Callot’s prints, he tried making them with more humanization. He has transformed them into something more than blunt moral correction tools or picaresque curiosities. Unmistakably, they are kinder spirits. All of van de Venne’s nightmarish deformities, which turn his types into repellant rat-men, have been eliminated. In contrast to van den Valckert’s panels, in which indigents are satisfactorily converted into grateful recipients of Christian alms, he avoided that self-congratulatory style as well. Rembrandt found authentically heroic the spectacle of human ruin, which is at the opposite end of the spectrum from the classical hero. In fact, he was so heroic that he appeared with beggars in more than one etching, including this portrait, where he appeared as a beggar.

8. The Artist in Oriental Costume, With Poodle, 1631.

At the same time, after Rembrandt created Self-portrait as A Beggar Seated on a Bank, he went to another reproductive print, made by Lucas Vorsterman. This time, it was Adoration of the Magi. What Rembrandt did was extract the figure of an oriental potentate and swathed in a robe of glistening satin, tied at the waist with a sash in another canvas to portray himself. He already had this figure in front of him, so this time, he didn’t use any mirrors. Setting one arm at the hip, the other on a cane, he planted his feet in elegant and virile contrapposto. One must understand that the dog was only added later, perhaps by another hand. With prideful eyes, satin-draped elbows, and a prosperous belly catching the light, this self portrait by Rembrandt shows him as the warrior, Magnus.

9. Self-Portrait as St. Paul, 1661.

According to one theory, when an artist paints himself as a saint, the boundary between saints and sinners collapses. But Rembrandt painted this portrait with a different course of reason. In Calvinist culture, Paul had a kind of precedence among saints and apostles because he relentlessly preached salvation by grace alone. With his face and fortunes crumbling into humility, Rembrandt must have heard two articles of Pauline doctrine with special power and eloquence. First was when Paul repeatedly reiterated not just that the law was irrelevant to salvation, but also that its authority was a fraud and a curse, compared to the compassion of God. Rembrandt must have felt vindicated by this message, given his bitter experience with institutions of every kind. However, he also had to acknowledge that he had self-inflicted many of his problems with the law. Consequently, Paul’s second point, that grace is unmerited, and that it can be bestowed even on the least deserving, may have been especially poignant. Hence, Rembrandt portrayed himself as a saint.

10. Self-Portrait Frowning, 1630.

The etching belonged to the early career of Rembrandt when he showed himself with different expressions. He was no exhibitionist, and his self-inspection must not be confused with his compulsive self-exposure. In fact, Rembrandt’s self-portraits from early life are more remarkable for what they conceal than for what they disclose. The viewer can look into the artist’s eyes. As Van Mander suggested if the eyes were the window to the soul, then Rembrandt would have closed the shutters.

In this self-portrait, we see a deep shadow falling across his brow, as frowning, which Perry Chapman reads as a declaration of melancholy, the physiognomic signature of creative genius.

There is no doubt that Rembrandt was a little short-tempered and that he was prone, especially in his later life, which fits his cranky irritability. Through this portrait, one can certainly acknowledge the fact. Also, the pose of the melancholic genius is the most striking part of Rembrandt self-portrait, which also conforms to his natural genius. The picture suggests poetic moodiness with the chiaroscuro technique.

11. Self Portrait, 1628.

The self-portrait of 1628 is the most mesmerizingly beautiful image of Rembrandt in the Rijksmuseum. He gazes with all the acts of staring with a trial expression of strength. We can assume that the more direct and unflinching gaze, the stronger the person behind it, which we can look at the portrait. One interesting fact about this painting is that one minute, you can see the subject, and at another second, you don’t, because of the fine chiaroscuro Rembrandt used. He couldn’t position himself in deep obscurity, necessary to produce such effect of shadows over the eyes and upper face, still creating a legit image. Whichever way he used to paint this portrait, one thing is sure it is not just a simple mirror image. The author of Rembrandt’s Eyes, explains it,

“In fact, it is the antithesis of the icon vera, the true image, associated with the mysteriously spontaneous apparition of Christ’s face on shrouds and cloths, which Joseph Leo Koerner has seen as the dominant source for Albrecht Durer’s great self-portrait of 1500. Even while it borrows from the Savior-face, Durer’s self-portrait is unflinching in its precision, as though no hand had fashioned it, as though the icon, like the artist’s persona, were itself of a higher Agent.”

Final Words.

The pictures of Rembrandt Self Portrait are special because of their aliveness, stories, and more importantly, the thought of how he looked at himself through different stages of life. Of course, the beautiful journey of Rembrandt tells us his tastes, life experiences, and politics alongside his intimate see-throughs of his personal life. If you wish to read more about these self-portraits, as any nerd would do, you can refer to the references below.

Resources.

1. Rembrandt: The Painter at Work by Ernst van de Wetering.

2. Rembrandt’s Eyes by Simon Schama.

3. Rembrandt by Himself.

Frequently Asked Questions.

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