ARTIST IN HIS STUDIO.

An important subject for artists in almost any culture is the human face and figure. What is it that sums up a person, that is the essence of personality or importance? When artists represent human beings, they may be saying something about themselves, about those they know well, or simply about what it is to be a person. Do they need to show exactly what a person looks like? Might they show where a man or woman lives or what they do for a living? How do they tell us what a person is thinking or feeling?

In this painting, Rembrandt shows us what it was like to be a young painter in Holland in the 1600s.

The Artist

Rembrandt was about twenty-two and still living in Leiden, where he grew up, when he painted this small painting. After his early schooling, he was apprenticed in his mid-teens to a local painter. Later, he spent six months in Amsterdam studying with Pieter Lastman, an accomplished artist known for his dramatic Biblical scenes. Rembrandt returned to Leiden to begin his career, but in a very few years, he had achieved enough renown to move to Amsterdam, the largest city in the Netherlands.

Unlike most painters of his day, Rembrandt did not specialize--he painted portraits, scenes from history, the Bible, daily life, and even a few landscapes. He made etchings as well as paintings. And in all of his works, he showed a great freshness of observation, a subtle feeling for human psychology, and an ability to use his materials very expressively.

Dutch Artists in the Seventeenth Century

The seventeenth century in the Netherlands brought great opportunities for painters, but also great challenges. Merchants and bankers in cities like Amsterdam were making their fortunes through worldwide trade--bringing spices and exotic goods from the Indies and grain from Eastern Europe, as well as fishing the northern seas. They were building fine townhouses and looking for ways to invest their money. Not only wealthy people, but also those in the rapidly expanding middle class wanted paintings to hang in their homes.

In earlier centuries, most art in Europe had been made for the Roman Catholic Church, to which most people belonged. Paintings and statues showing sacred figures and Bible stories were commissioned by the Church and by wealthy parishioners as an act of devotion. But in the Republic of the Netherlands in the 1600s, the most influential members of society belonged to the new Protestant churches, denominations that had broken away from Catholicism to worship in a simpler way. Protestants did not believe churches needed the elaborate altar-pieces and other artwork that filled the Catholic churches. So artists had to find new subjects to paint, images that people would buy for other reasons.

Format and Technique

What does this painting tell us about a seventeenth-century artist's situation? This painter is young and probably not yet very successful. His simple studio contains only the essential tools of the artist's trade. If you look closely, you can see that he holds a palette and brushes, as well as a long mahlstick on which to brace his hand while painting. Extra palettes hang on the wall. Beneath them is a low stone for grinding the minerals and other materials the artist uses to make his pigment. On the table are jars that probably hold oil to mix with his pigments and spirits like turpentine to thin his paints. The painting on the easel is not a stretched canvas but a thin wooden panel with a brace at top and bottom. How might an artist's studio look different today?

As a very young artist, Rembrandt had the imagination to stage his scene in a thought-provoking way and the skill to paint it in rich detail. The textures of crumbling plaster and brick are beautifully rendered in paint; Rembrandt formed the grain of the floorboards by scraping the thick paint with the butt end of his paintbrush. The bold, dark shapes of the easel contrast with the rich, soft colors of the painter's robes.

What makes the little painting powerful and mysterious are the ways Rembrandt used light and the placement of forms in space to create a relationship between the small painter and his big painting. The panel looms up in the foreground, almost seeming to intimidate the small figure standing at the edge of the shadows. What is he seeing? Is he deciding what area to work on next or whether the work is finished? Or is he looking at a blank panel and deciding how to start? Perhaps he is grappling with the new challenge of increased artistic freedom--what subject does he want to paint? How shall he paint it? It could be that the painting illustrates a story that demonstrates a theory of art, a tale later recorded in a book by one of Rembrandt's pupils. He described a painting contest that was won by the artist who "first formed an idea of the entire work before placing paint on panel."

Activities

Elementary School 

In this painting by Rembrandt, he chose to place the young artist in his studio, the room where he created his artwork. Discuss the idea that, to many artists, studios are private spaces to think and work, where they like to be as much as possible. Ask students to imagine a favorite place where they enjoy some special activity, and create a self-portrait composing them in that place. Perhaps it is their bedroom, a private corner in their home, a park or playground, or the home of a friend or relative. Draw or paint the scene and figures separately, using cardboard for the background and heavy paper for the characters. Cut around the figures and attach a stick or stand to create puppets.

Middle School

Rembrandt depicted the artist's tools and studio quite accurately, though in this painting, he romanticized the artist's clothing with a slightly old-fashioned style. Explore students' ideas on how the unusual clothing influences this portrait and discuss how clothing and costumes can enhance and define a portrait. Ask students to imagine themselves in clothing that describes their personality or in a costume that conveys a particular characteristic that they would like to communicate. Have students sketch or photograph themselves, full-figure in costume, and incorporate the image into a mixed-media collage that places the figure in a compatible or unexpected setting.

High School

One of Rembrandt's strengths as an artist was his ability to communicate subtle psychological feelings within the narrative of a painting. Discuss students' thoughts on how Rembrandt used light, composition, pose, and expression to create mood in this work. Investigate ways to convey various moods using different types of lighting on the same subject, such as a spotlight, candlelight, and bright daylight. Set up painting stations that have simple still lifes with different lighting for students to choose. Ask students to create a painting that incorporates light to convey mood and that places a figure, perhaps sketched from a student model or from a magazine image, within the setting.

Barbara T. Martin is associate director for Interpretation in the Department of Education and Public Programs, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Maureen Albano is an artist and educator in the Department of Education and Public Programs, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.