Rembrandt. the New Hollstein Dutch & Flemish Etchings, Engravings
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BR.OCT.pg.proof.corrs_Layout 1 16/09/2014 11:55 Page 675 massive undertaking and the broadest and brief sketch to a finished piece but more often Books most detailed survey of the artist’s prints to merely adjusted the shading or removed date, comprising seven volumes (two text, excess background lines. It is clear that some three of plates, and two with plates of copies). of the reworkings of his early plates were The authors of the New Hollstein took full carried out by others in the studio, among advantage of the array of technological them the Leiden printmaker Jan van Vliet, advances available to present-day scholars – known for having reproduced some of the relative facility of travel and the ability to Rembrandt’s paintings in print. Several produce high-quality digital images of prints anonymous printmakers appear to have also and X-radiographs of watermarks. They had a hand in reworking light sketches Rembrandt. The New Hollstein looked at works together and apart, sharing produced by the master around 1630 and Dutch & Flemish Etchings, Engravings large digital images that revealed changes dif- 1631. The authors were able to perceive these and Woodcuts 1450–1700. By Erik ficult if not impossible to identify with the underlying sketches thanks to enlarged digital Hinterding and Jaco Rutgers. 7 vols. 2,210 naked eye or a magnifying glass. details; such prints, extensively re-etched pp. incl. numerous col. + b. & w. ills. Their methods and findings are described in by another hand, are identified by a ‘w’ for (Sound and Vision Publishers, Ouderkerk the introduction to the first volume. A second workshop after the catalogue number. In aan den IJssel, 2013), 465 per volume. essay, in the first volume of plates illustrating most of the other entries for which early ISBN 978–94–91539–01–5/02–2/03–9/€ the copies after the prints, surveys the many states by Rembrandt do exist, the authors 04–6/05–3/06–0/07–7. forms that these have taken. The catalogue have introduced in the entries a horizontal describes all the prints and copies, cites the line that divides the state changes made by Reviewed by NADINE ORENSTEIN locations of all the impressions examined and Rembrandt from those created by another their particularities, and describes in detail all hand. This clear demarcation, which in many REMBRANDT’S CONTEMPORARIES WERE well the changes made in each state, along with the instances indicates which impressions were aware of the artist’s habit of repeatedly corresponding state numbers from White’s printed during the artist’s lifetime and which reworking his printing plates. Arnold and Boon’s catalogue. In addition, the entries were not, is sure to cause a stir among dealers Houbraken’s biography of Rembrandt (1718) are accompanied by the mention of relevant and auction houses because the division recounts that collectors attempted to assem- watermarks and small photographs of details between the two categories has never been ble his prints in the various states identifiable illustrating state differences. so definitively pronounced. Perhaps the most by specific changes, for example the Medea: During their research for the catalogue, interesting find among the early prints is that or the Marriage of Jason and Creusa without Hinterding and Rutgers examined prints in the authors were able to demonstrate that and with the crown (NH 241). The artist’s many more collections than any of their Rembrandt cut up large, unsuccessful print- unveiling of his working process through the predecessors: fifty-two in all, including print- ing plates in order to re-use them for small, many states that he produced still holds a rooms in Eastern Europe and the United unrelated etchings. They did so by matching certain fascination for scholars because it States. As a result, they discovered an enor- areas of stray hatching visible in the first provides some insight into the artist’s thought mous number of previously unrecognised states of two early prints, Ragged peasant with process that is not as accessible in the same states. Since White and Boon did not describe his hands behind him, holding a stick and Peasant way through his paintings or drawings. The the changes to posthumous editions in any with his hands behind his back (NH 17 and 23), market also pays close attention to which detail, a good number of the new states they with the very same marks that appear in the states were created during the artist’s lifetime describe are later ones. However, they also large St Jerome kneeling: large plate (NH 3), an and which ones may have been created found many among the artist’s earliest image that the artist must have decided to after. Rembrandt’s contemporaries must etchings of 1629–31, often in unique impres- abandon early on. The number of similar have consulted lists of his prints, but it was sions. Some of these state changes are minor, areas of unrelated hatching observable among not until 1751 that the first catalogue of the a few touches added here or there or the plate the early small prints suggest that there must etched work was compiled by Edmé- edges filed down (White and Boon did not have been other plates cut down in this way François Gersaint. Since then students of count the latter as a state change), but and no doubt other pieces of these puzzles Rembrandt’s prints, among them Adam through these early, often messy impressions will be identified. Bartsch (1797), Dimitri A. Rovinski (1890), we can witness the halting steps of a creative Better photography of the posthumous Arthur M. Hind (1912) and Ludwig Münz young printmaker making his way in a new impressions has revealed that many more (1952), have carried on the quest to perfect medium. This is wonderfully illustrated in plates than was previously thought were the listing of the printed œuvre by refining the plate volumes where an image of each reworked with a mezzotint rocker, a clear its parameters and the identification of states. state of every one of his prints is shown. In indication that the reworking took place after In 1969 Christopher White and Karel Boon his early etchings he rarely worked from a Rembrandt’s lifetime and most probably produced a catalogue as volumes XVIII during the first half of the eighteenth century. and XIX in the Hollstein series that has served Enlarged details in the introduction illustrate as the primary reference tool for almost the marks created by the serrated and smooth five decades. Their catalogue was the first rockers, which are just visible in the prints to list systematically individual impressions if one knows what to look for. The authors and identify which ones were printed on have also identified more prints that carry the special supports such as japan paper or ‘two dot’ marking first identified by Krzysztof vellum, as well as which ones were printed Kruzel, which appears to have been added by with a significant amount of tone. In order a later publisher in order to subtly indicate the to publish the books during the anniversary states that he produced. celebrations of Rembrandt’s three-hun- The two final volumes compile the dredth birthday in 1969, their catalogue was known copies, as many as the authors could produced in some haste and an improved identify, although they admit that there version has long been a desiderata among are no doubt more to discover. Captain print scholars. William Baillie’s addition of two lightning 44. The three trees, by Captain William E. Baillie after Erik Hinterding and Jaco Rutgers took on Rembrandt. 1758. Etching with plate tone; third state bolts to his own version of the Three trees is that task, and their long-awaited catalogue in of six, 21.5 by 28.5 cm. (Metropolitan Museum of Art, well known (NH 214 copy a); we can add the New Hollstein series is welcome. It is a New York). here another state in which a single bolt of the burlington magazine • clvi • october 2014 675 BR.OCT.pg.proof.corrs_Layout 1 16/09/2014 11:55 Page 676 BOOKS lightning is visible in the sky, between the Coornhert (1522–90), both as printmaker and catalogue’s state II and III (MMA inv. Hendrick Goltzius, The New Hollstein designer. He designed and engraved for no.2011.521.3; Fig.44). While many of the Dutch & Flemish Etchings, Engravings Coornhert several series that embodied the copies are exact reproductions in the same and Woodcuts 1450–1700. Compiled humanist’s moral and ethical philosophy. direction or reverse, some ‘improve’ on by Marjolein Leesberg. Edited by Huigen Between 1577 and 1581 he engraved some Rembrandt’s original, for instance the mezzo- Leeflang. 4 vols. 1,482 pp. incl. 79 col. ninety copperplates, partly after his own tint after Jan Uytenbogaert (‘The Goldweigher’) + 1,203 b. & w. ills. (Sound and Vision designs, for the Antwerp print publishers by Jan van der Bruggen, who added a monkey Publishers, Ouderkerk aan den IJssel, in Philips Galle and Aux Quatre Vents. Another eating from a fruit basket in the foreground collaboration with the Rijksprentenkabinet, aspect of his early work is the many (mostly (NH 172 copy a). Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, 2012), 1,860. small) portraits engraved in silver and gold as Hinterding and Rutgers have chosen to ISBN 978–90–77551–95–0/96–7/97–4/98–1.€ medallions and in copper for printing. Only a organise the prints chronologically, in con- few of the medallions have survived, whose trast to White and Boon who organised them Reviewed by JAN PIET FILEDT KOK impressions show the inscription in reverse.