Rembrandt was a well known artist who lived between 1606 and 1669. He was brought up in the Netherlands. His work of artifact displays a brilliant individual with an independent mind. This is more so on the fact that he ventured into making the self portraits in large numbers. This was not the case during that time. Apart from the self portraits, Rembrandt did much work on prominent personalities on his time and even before. He is known as a historical artisan. This paper focuses on his biography, his self portraits that he made and the portraits of other people and events.
Autobiography of Rembrandt
The life history of Rembrandt
Rembrandt was a renowned artist who lived in the 17th century. He was born in Leiden in the year 1606 in the Netherlands. Rembrandt’s father was a miller who was interested in raising the young Rembrandt to become a scholar. Rembrandt studied in the University of Leiden for a short while. However, Rembrandt was not good in academic life. He therefore left the academic life so quickly in a few months after joining the university to start apprenticeship as a painter. He was not very much talented in artistic life either, and therefore he did not accomplish a lot in his first few years of painting. Nevertheless, Rembrandt did not give up but moved on from his first artistic teacher who was a local painter to join Pieter Lastman in Amsterdam in 1624 which was barely three years after he left Leiden University (The National Gallery, n.d. Para. 2).
Rembrandt returned shortly to Leiden where he started his personal painting. He was faced with challenges in his work since the local churches could not provide commissions to artists as the Roman Catholic Church was doing in other countries. Nonetheless, this did not deter him from his work for he majored in historical paintings which earned him both a good name and money from private individuals. Rembrandt was dedicated to his artistic work and often disregarded the advice of first studying in Italian art before becoming an independent painter. This was commonly regarded as a mandatory procedure for young painters (Rijn & Wetering, 2005).
In the year 1631, Rembrandt found his new home in Amsterdam. This is the city where he was at the peak of his career as an art dealer and a painter. He also taught art and painting at some point. In Amsterdam, he met a beautiful young lady called Saskia who would later become his wife. They married and had a happy family as their own paintings suggest. His wife’s cousin Hendrick van Uylenburgh was also an art dealer who introduced Rembrandt to wealthy patrons. These patrons paid for the paintings which made him a wealthy person. Though he seemed to prosper professionally, his family life was a complete contrast. The three children that he gave birth to with Saskia died in infancy. Rembrandt and his wife Saskia moved and settled in a grander house which was near to van Uylenburgh in 1639 (The National Gallery, n.d. Para. 7). They had another child in 1641 and named him Titus (The National Gallery, n.d. Para. 7).
It was shortly after the birth of Titus that Saskia begun to be unwell. Her illness persisted for a period of time. Rembrandt made several portraits of Saskia looking weary and spent most of her time drawn in bed. It is reported that she did not live long after she developed complications. She died thereafter at the age of thirty. Fortunately, Titus survived to adulthood under the care of his father and the help of two other women (Rijn & Wetering, 2005).
Following economic depressions that occurred in Amsterdam in 1650s, Rembrandt became bankrupt. Most of his possessions were sold off which included his paintings for a pittance. This compelled him to move to a poorer district where they could afford a living. He continued with his paintings but without getting much from it. His son got married in 1668 only to die after seven months. He too passed on in 1669 and his life became history (The National Gallery, n.d.).
Rembrandt’s work of art
Rembrandt did much work in designing and producing self portraits than any other artist had done. The number of self portraits is not known but it is estimated to be about forty to fifty extant. This is said to be a mystery to most artists and even scholars who study his work. It is speculated that Rembrandt did this as a way of self examination. He portrayed himself with different facial expressions in varied situations and circumstances. The portraits depict a man communicating to himself through the work of art and paintings. Moments of sorrow and laughter as well inexplicable times of Rembrandt’s life are clearly seen in his self portrayals. Scholars believe that Rembrandt purposely made self portraits with a view of understanding himself. It is by the use of this approach that he perceived that he could penetrate and understand the problems of man’s inner life (Burt, 2001).
Another speculation as to why Rembrandt spent much of his time in painting and drawing self portraits was to make himself famous. Through the portraits, he could become a public figure. Instead of using the famous faces of his time Rembrandt used his facial outlook because it was easier and affordable. He made himself into a celebrity since the people who bought his artifacts came from all sorts of life. These included the clerical patrons and the aristocratic people as well as the general public. These paintings and prints made Rembrandt a reputable artist of his time (The National Gallery, n.d.).
He accomplished his works of different facial expression paintings by the use varied patterns of light and shadow. An example is a portrait of shadows that are put around the eyes of one of his paintings reflecting a thinking mind. The ability to put these expressions in different styles of artifacts is perhaps what makes him a renowned artist of the 17th century (Rijn & Wetering, 2005).
Besides the self portraits that Rembrandt made, there are several others of varied backgrounds and personalities. It is said that, during the time he lived in the poor district away from Amsterdam, Rembrandt made portraits of people on the streets, circus, beggars, and women especially the portrait of one bathing in a stream, and even children. His diversity in a number of paintings showed the talented artist whose skills and knowledge were to be appreciated much later in life (Burt, 2001).
Rembrandt also produced a number of portraits and paintings of the stories from the bible. There are many of such paintings like that of Joseph being sold to Egypt by his brothers. Samson and Delilah are among those produced and Belshazzar’s feast. These paintings are a portrayal of Rembrandt as a believer who often read the bible unlike most of his colleagues and age mates. This period is said to have been a time when people had doctrines of temperament and disposition as well as Christianity and humanistic ethics. The personalities and people or figures that were used in such paintings were considered to be exemplary. This meant that, they were figures worth of emulating or those that were used as examples for the society to learn from. It was also the time of renaissance where it is believed that man became a spiritual personality with such recognitions of being able to understand the inner man (Durham, 2005).
Inclusive of the Christian portrays are the Jewish Bride, which explained the life of Christians and the Jewish people concerning marriage. It reflects the belief of this doctrine in the life of a family. The Syndics of the Cloth Guild is another famous portrait by Rembrandt. Also Bathsheba and the one of Jacob blessing the sons of Joseph are included. These portraits saw much success of the art industry especially the talent of Rembrandt and his closeness to the study of Christian life (Durham, 2005).
Rembrandt’s life surrounded about art and unlike his father, he made a living through doing what he liked and enjoyed doing. Much of his work of portraits is kept in several artistic archives but the majority of them is found in the Amsterdam museum. There are also portraits of prominent men and men of renown that lived in the 17th century and before that time. These people were depicted by Rembrandt as role models worthy to be emulated for their achievements and the great things that they did for the society (Durham, 2005).
Conclusion
In essence, Rembrandt is a renowned artist who is well understood to have violated the laws and regulations governing artisans in his era. Instead of following the channel that many did before venturing into art, Rembrandt refused some of those methods such as being taught Italian artisan in the first place. He did a lot of painting and drawing of self portraits which was not common in the 1650s. He displayed splendid works of his hands in drawings and portraits through exploring different lifestyles of people and religions and communicated very much through his portraits.
References:
Burt, D. S. (2001). The Biography Book: A Reader's Guide to Nonfiction, Fictional, and Film Biographies of More Than 500 of the Most Fascinating Individuals of All Time. Westport, CT: Oryx Press.
Durham, J. I. (2005). The Biblical Rembrandt Human Painter in a Landscape of Faith. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Rijn, R. M. & Wetering, E. (2005). A Corpus of Rembrandt paintings. 4, the Self Portraits. Dordrecht, BV: Springer Publishers.
The National Gallery. N.d. Rembrandt 1606-1669. Retrieved on 25 April 2012 from<http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/artists/rembrandt>
