Case 2 2013/14: a painting by Rembrandt van Rijn, Rembrandt Laughing Expert adviser’s statement Reviewing Committee Secretary’s note: Please note that any illustrations referred to have not been reproduced on the Arts Council England website EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Rembrandt van Rijn (Leiden 1606-1669 Amsterdam) Rembrandt Laughing, ca. 1628 Oil on copper 23.75 x 17 cm signed with monogram upper left (RHL in ligature) This delicately painted yet compelling work by Rembrandt van Rijn, the most inventive and influential Dutch artist of the seventeenth century, is an important new addition to the artist’s early career. The manner of painting and the format of the signature suggest a date of about 1628, three years prior to the artist’s move from Leiden to Amsterdam in 1631. Rembrandt Laughing represents a genre of painting known as a tronie, a head study intended to depict a particular emotional state or figure type rather than a specific identifiable person, although we can recognise the features as Rembrandt’s own. Although countless other sixteenth- and seventeenth century artists executed tronies, the format was ideal for demonstrating Rembrandt’s penetrating investigations of human character and emotion. Painted, etched, and drawn tronies—including ones incorporating his own features—comprise some of the artist’s most intriguing works. With remarkable spontaneity, Rembrandt Laughing captures a moment of pure, joyous laughter. This is a particularly well-preserved painting in oil on copper (an unusual choice of support for the artist), and demonstrates Rembrandt’s supreme facility with the painted medium. Objection to the export of this painting is raised under Waverly Criteria two and three. Waverly II. Is it of outstanding aesthetic importance? The painting is a strikingly beautiful example of Rembrandt’s early work, dating to his years in Leiden prior to his move to Amsterdam in 1631. The delicate vigour of the brushwork and the sophisticated play of light and shadow, figure and void, give this work a power that belies its diminutive size. Even on this small scale, the painting conveys Rembrandt’s characteristically daring and assured brushwork. Waverly III. Is it of outstanding significance for the study of some particular branch of art, learning or history? From both a technical and art historical perspective, the painting is of extraordinary importance for the study of Rembrandt’s work and especially his early career, a period of constant change and experimentation. While Rembrandt’s mature work is well represented in UK public collections, paintings from his Leiden period (before 1631) are almost nonexistent in this county. The present painting is one of only a handful of paintings the artist made on copper and demonstrates how he adapted his style to suit this particular support. Provenance Although the composition has been known via a reproductive print made in the early 19th century (see below), the painting was unknown to modern scholars before its emergence to the art market in late 2007. (possibly) Private collection, France (an old inscription in French on the back of the panel identifies the subject as the philosopher Democritus); Private collection, England, for at least two and possibly three generations prior to Sale Moore Allen & Innocent, Norcote (Cirencester), 26 October 2007, lot 377, ill. (£2,200,000; as ‘A Follower of Rembrandt, “The Young Rembrandt as Democrates [sic] the Laughing Philosopher”, a portrait study, half length oil on copper, bears monogram top left “HL?” and lengthy French hand written inscription verso’) Literature Ernst van de Wetering, ‘Rembrandt Laughing, c. 1628 – a painting resurfaces’, Kroniek van het Rembrandthuis 2007, pp. 19-40 The following sources mention Lambert Anthonie Claessen’s (1763-1834) print after the composition and assume the existence of a painted original by Rembrandt: E. W. Moes, Iconographia Batavia, vol. 2 (Amsterdam, 1905), no. 6693, 6 Cornelis Hofstede de Groot, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century, vol. 6 (London, 1916), p. 291, no. 601a Kurt Bauch, Rembrandt Gemälde (Berlin, 1966), pp. 30-31, cat. A25 H. Perry Chapman, Rembrandt’s Self Portraits: A Study in Seventeenth-Century Identity (Princeton, 1990), p. 38 DETAILED CASE Rembrandt van Rijn (Leiden 1606-1669 Amsterdam) Rembrandt Laughing, ca. 1628 Oil on copper 23.75 x 17 cm signed with monogram upper left (RHL in ligature) This small but striking painting by Rembrandt van Rijn presents a young male figure at half length, dramatically situated before a wall washed in light. He strikes a jaunty pose, elbow jutting into space and head cocked back in spontaneous laughter. He wears a metal gorget over a purple jacket and loosely wrapped cloak; his hair tumbles to his shoulders in carefree waves. Light emanating from the upper left sculpts the features of the young man’s face, scatters glittering highlights across his gorget, and imprints his shadow upon the wall at lower right. The painting was reproduced in an engraving by Lambert Anthonie Claessens (1763-1834), with an inscription erroneously identifying the image as ‘Le rieur’, by Frans Hals. The image has been recognised as a self portrait by Rembrandt for over a century, but until this painting appeared at auction in late 2007, Claessens’ engraving was the only known record of the composition. Born in Leiden in 1606, Rembrandt van Rijn was one of the most influential, inventive and versatile artists of the seventeenth century. Equally gifted as a painter, draftsman and printmaker, his work in all media is marked by a creative, often experimental approach to technique and subject matter. His manifold interests are reflected in the broad range of subjects he treated: landscape, portrait, still life, genre, religious and secular history and mythology. Rembrandt Laughing has been termed a self portrait of the artist, but the issue of its identification cannot be so concisely defined. Ernst van de Wetering has made a convincing case for Rembrandt himself having been the model for the painting, but rightly refrains from calling it a ‘self portrait’.1 There are numerous points of comparison with accepted self portraits of around the same date in painting and print (for example, Self Portrait in a Gorget of about 1629 in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg), yet the question of whether it represents the artist’s own features or those of another is secondary to its significance as an accomplished study of the effects of light and fleeting expression. Rembrandt Laughing is an example of a tronie, a head study intended to depict a particular emotional state or figure type rather than a specific identifiable person. Although already popular in the 16th century, the format found vigorous and vibrant expression in Rembrandt’s assiduous investigation of human character and emotion. Painted, etched, and drawn tronies—including those incorporating his own features— comprise some of the artist’s most lively, spontaneous and intriguing works.2 Like many of his most audacious tronies, Rembrandt Laughing was painted during the artist’s early years in Leiden. This phase of Rembrandt’s career, from about 1626 to 1631, yielded some of his most fascinating and challenging works. During these years, he experimented with an especially wide array of pictorial means and developed in 1 Ernst van de Wetering, ‘Rembrandt Laughing, c. 1628 – a painting resurfaces’, Kroniek van het Rembrandthuis 2007, pp. 19-40 2 Most recently on Rembrandt’s tronies, see: Dagmar Hirschfelder, Tronie und Porträt in der niederländischen Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 2008), pp. 42-44, 119-130; and idem., ‘Portrait or Character Head: The Term Tronie and its Meaning in the Seventeenth Century,’ in Ernst van de Wetering et al., The Mystery of the Young Rembrandt (exh. cat. Staatliche Museen Kassel, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, and Museum het Rembrandthuis, Amsterdam, 2001), pp. 82-91. several direction simultaneously, making it nearly impossible to identify a single technique or style as characteristic. For example, though Rembrandt usually painted on panel or canvas, Rembrandt Laughing is painted on a small copper panel: an unusual choice, and indeed only a handful of paintings on copper by the artist have been identified.3 Three of these works on copper, executed within a year or two of the present painting (ca. 1629- 30), exhibit astonishingly diverse techniques. They were apparently painted in deliberately contrasting manners to create a sophisticated practical and theoretical demonstration of the artist’s virtuosity.4 In Rembrandt Laughing, he also employed a variety of techniques to apply the paint: bold dabs of thick pigment to emphasize the fall of light on the face and around the eyes; short, scrubby strokes to create texture in the background wall; and longer sweeping strokes to define garment folds. Examples of Rembrandt’s painted work can be found in several British galleries including the National Gallery, Wallace Collection, Dulwich Picture Gallery, and Kenwood House (Iveagh Bequest), London; National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh; Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum (Burrell Collection), and Hunterian Museum, Glasgow; as well as the Royal Collection and other private collections. Although the artist is well represented in UK public collections, the vast majority of these works postdate his move to Amsterdam in 1631 and, whether portrait or subject piece, give an impression of a mature and confident artist. What is lacking among Rembrandt paintings in UK public collections is evidence of the quixotic youthful explorations that fostered such breathtakingly rapid developments during the early years of his career. This period is represented in private collections in the UK solely by the Judas Returning the Thirty Pieces of Silver of 1629 (collection Baron Mulgrave). Although painted after Rembrandt’s move to Amsterdam, and far more restrained in aspect and execution, the diminutive Portrait of Jacques de Gheyn of 1632 (oil on panel, 29.9 x 24.9 cm; Dulwich Picture Gallery) is perhaps the closest comparison to Rembrandt Laughing currently in a public collection.