Young Rembrandt

Starred review from June 1, 2020
Art critic Blom (The Scar of Death) employs Rembrandt’s early works and the history of his hometown of Leiden, Netherlands, to trace the Dutch painter’s artistic evolution from student to legendary master in this thoughtful, illuminating work. Filled with illustrations of Rembrandt’s early etchings, sketches, and paintings, the book examines the artist through his surroundings, with the author, also from Leiden, stating,
“I built my sentences from the stones of my city.” Self-assured and determined, young Rembrandt (1606–1669) combined the three-stage process of “translation, imitation and emulation” in studying and interpreting others’ works before creating more accomplished paintings of his own. Rembrandt studied Latin and classic art in school and at Leiden University; observed Leiden’s religious battles and foreign travelers, apprenticed with respected painters including Jacob van Swanenburg and Pieter Lastman; and shared a studio and competed with fellow painter Jan Lievens. Once established on his own, Rembrandt attracted the attention of influential patrons like Constantin Huygens and devised elaborate etchings filled with images of himself—or historic “selfies” (as seen in The Laughing Man)—that helped establish his reputation as a creator of intimate and emotionally naked works (Andromeda) and led to his renown with history paintings (The Militia Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq, more commonly known as The Night Watch). This portrait will delight both casual art fans and connoisseurs alike.

June 1, 2020
A Dutch biographer and literary critic re-creates the textures of Rembrandt's world. Drawing on the significant resources of the Rembrandt Research Project, Rembrandt Documents Project, and the multivolume Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings as well as histories and archival material, Blom offers an assured, discerning biography. The author illuminates the esteemed artist's early life, beginning in Leiden, where Rembrandt was born in 1606, and ending in Amsterdam, where he painted his "breakthrough" work, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp, in 1632. Blom creates a multifaceted view of Leiden, which had emerged from political siege, famine, and plague to become Holland's prosperous second city and was the place where Rembrandt grew up, studied, and worked until he moved to the Dutch capital in 1631. The son of a malt-miller, Rembrandt was restless, strong-willed, and ambitious; enrolled in the University of Leiden when he was 14, he left after two years, possibly because of religious strife besetting the institution. His parents supported his art apprenticeships in Leiden and briefly in Amsterdam, where he focused on history painting, copying his teacher's works. Blom follows Rembrandt's artistic evolution, honing a style of etching notable for its "looseness, bravura, and ostensible nonchalance" and experimenting with self-portraits "to see how different emotions, moods and temperaments were expressed in the face." Included among more than 100 illustrations are many self-portraits, images that serve as "a kind of autobiography." Along with social, cultural, political, and religious contexts for Rembrandt's life, Blom details the nitty-gritty of making art, such as the complicated, time-consuming process of grinding pigments and improvising paint tubes from knotted pig bladders. As Rembrandt became increasingly well-known and admired, his work was purchased and commissioned by members of the court. The author notes, however, that he died alone and destitute; by 1669, his work had gone out of fashion. A fresh, well-researched, nuanced portrait. (100 illustrations)

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