Baroque and Rococo

 

Rembrandt



 

The Mystery of the Revealed Form

 

The search for life in the picture:




The Return of the Prodigal Son



 

A retrospective look at Rembrandt's work reveals the extent to which he remained true to his beginnings. The history paintings, the portraits, and also the few landscapes, are all structured as happenings, as events. However, this character of an event changes: it becomes illustrative itself. The path taken to reach this point has been described with reference to the drawing. Its lines may be experienced as a process, and thus lead the observational activity to the performance of particular characteristic dynamic forms, which correspond to the inner development of the happening. The later and final works reveal how the bright-dark factor and pictorial colour are also structured as such a temporary element. We are concerned here with an observation of the large compositions, such as Jacob Blessing the Sons of Joseph, in which the scene takes on a quiet appearance as the old man gives his blessing. Reference should also be made to The Conspiracy of Claudius for Julius) Civilis, a fragment, the large conception of which reminds one of the many-figured scenes from Rembrandt's early days and middle period; here, however, the picture focusses completely upon the uniting act of the conspiracy. Finally, attention should be drawn to the last history painting, The Return of the Prodigal Son.
 

Jacob Blessing the Children of Joseph
1656
Oil on canvas, 173 x 209 cm
Staatliche Museen, Kassel

 

The Conspiration of the Bataves
1661-62
Oil on canvas, 196 x 309 cm
Nationalmuseum, Stockholm

 

The Return of the Prodigal Son
1669
Oil on canvas, 262 x 206 cm
The Hermitage, St. Petersburg

 

The Return of the Prodigal Son (detail)
c. 1669

 

The Return of the Prodigal Son (detail)
c. 1669
 

The Return of the Prodigal Son (detail)
c. 1669

 

Aristotle with a Bust of Homer
1653
Oil on canvas, 143.5 x 136.5 cm
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

 

Homer Dictating to a Scribe

 

Homer Dictating to a Scribe