50 Fun Facts About Rembrandt

In which Dutch city was Rembrandt born in 1606?

He was the ninth child of a well-to-do family; his mother was Catholic and his father Dutch Reformed.

What was the trade of Rembrandt's father?

The surname 'van Rijn' indicates the family lived near the Rhine.

After leaving university in 1620, Rembrandt spent three years apprenticed to which painter?

He had attended a Latin school as a boy but was always more inclined towards painting.

Rembrandt's brief but important six-month apprenticeship in Amsterdam was with which history painter?

Lastman's influence dominates his small, detail-rich early paintings of 1625 to 1631.

With which friend did Rembrandt share his first studio in his home town from 1625?

He began taking pupils in 1627, among them Gerrit Dou.

Which statesman 'discovered' Rembrandt in 1629 and won him commissions from the court in The Hague?

Prince Frederik Hendrik kept buying his paintings as a result; Rembrandt's only surviving statement of artistic aims was written to Huygens.

On moving to Amsterdam in 1631, Rembrandt lodged with which art dealer, whose cousin he later married?

He married Saskia van Uylenburgh in 1634 without any of his own relatives present.

Saskia's father Rombertus had been burgomaster of which Frisian city?

He was a lawyer; the couple wed at St. Annaparochie.

How much did the Breestraat house Rembrandt bought in 1639 cost, saddling him with a ruinous mortgage?

The neighbourhood was becoming the Jewish quarter, and he often asked Jewish neighbours to model for Hebrew Bible scenes.

How many of Rembrandt and Saskia's children survived into adulthood?

Three died within weeks of birth; only Titus, born in 1641, lived to grow up.

Saskia died in 1642, probably of what?

His drawings of her on her sickbed and deathbed are among his most moving works.

Geertje Dircx, Titus's nurse and Rembrandt's lover, sued him in 1649 for what?

She pawned Saskia's diamond ring to pay her lawyer; Rembrandt later had her committed to a house of correction in Gouda.

Hendrickje Stoffels, who became Rembrandt's partner in 1649, had first come to the house as what?

She was 23; in 1654 the Reformed Church summoned her for living 'as a whore with Rembrandt the painter' and barred her from communion.

Why did Rembrandt never marry Hendrickje?

Their daughter Cornelia was born in October 1654.

Which 1654 nude, now in the Louvre, did Rembrandt paint the year Hendrickje was summoned by the church?

Hendrickje is generally thought to have been the model.

In what year did Rembrandt declare insolvency and surrender his assets?

He sought a court arrangement called cessio bonorum; the bankruptcy was not forced and he had already transferred the house to Titus.

How many items were on the 1657-58 sale list of Rembrandt's possessions?

They included Old Master drawings by Raphael and Mantegna, busts of Roman emperors, two globes, armour, two lion skins and a bird of paradise.

What was Rembrandt permitted to keep after his insolvency so he could earn a living?

He lost guardianship of Titus, and the family moved to modest lodgings on the Rozengracht in 1658.

After the bankruptcy, Hendrickje and Titus set up what to let Rembrandt keep working?

He received board and lodging from it; in 1661 it won a major commission for the new town hall.

What happened to Rembrandt's town-hall painting The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis?

The surviving fragment is in Stockholm; it was his last secular history painting.

Which grand duke visited Rembrandt twice and took a self-portrait home to Florence?

By then Rembrandt was working on The Jewish Bride and struggling with rent arrears.

Where was Rembrandt buried after his death in October 1669?

He had outlived both Hendrickje and Titus.

Rembrandt's daughter Cornelia emigrated in 1670 to which colonial city?

She went with an obscure painter and her mother's inheritance; Titus's estate passed to his only child, Titia.

Roughly how many paintings does modern scholarship credit to Rembrandt?

Early 20th-century connoisseurs had counted well over 600; his prints are stable at just under 300.

Why were about 90 paintings once counted as Rembrandt self-portraits, since reduced to just over 40?

He also etched 31 self-portraits, some in fancy dress, some pulling faces.

In a Rembrandt portrait, which feature nearly always marks the line between light and shadow?

A Rembrandt face is 'partially eclipsed', with the nose thrusting into the halftones.

Rembrandt's dramatic use of light and shadow derives from which Italian painter?

The technique is called chiaroscuro; Rembrandt never went abroad himself.

Rembrandt's 1632 group portrait for the Amsterdam surgeons is called The Anatomy Lesson of Dr…?

It hangs in the Mauritshuis in The Hague, painted with occasional help from Uylenburgh's workshop.

Which 1636 painting shows Rembrandt emulating Rubens with a scene of a hero losing his eyes?

Belshazzar's Feast and Danaë date from the same high-contrast, large-format years.

What is the formal title of The Night Watch?

It was commissioned for the new hall of the Kloveniersdoelen, the musketeers' branch of the civic militia.

Why does The Night Watch look like a night scene?

It is not a watch or patrol either, but a ceremony, and the action turns on the firing of a musket.

Which Raphael fresco does The Night Watch allude to, according to scholars?

Joseph Manca reads the calm of the two foreground officers as a sign of their 'moral excellence'.

How did the Hundred Guilder Print get its name?

Its proper title is Christ Healing the Sick; he reworked it in stages through the 1640s.

Which year, marked by the Geertje Dircx crisis, produced no dated Rembrandt paintings or etchings at all?

He was forced to sell his printing press in 1660 and practically gave up etching.

On what unusual imported material did Rembrandt often print his mature etchings?

He also printed on vellum and left a thin film of ink on the plate for 'surface tone'.

Rembrandt drew versions of some 23 miniatures from which Asian tradition in the 1650s?

They included portraits of Shah Jahan, Akbar and Jahangir and may have influenced costumes in his work.

What did Rembrandt add to his signature in 1633 that he then kept for life?

'Rembrant' became 'Rembrandt'; documents of the time mostly kept the old spelling. Signing with a first name alone followed Raphael, Leonardo and Michelangelo.

Which later Dutch painter followed Rembrandt's habit of signing works with his first name alone?

The habit itself was probably inspired by Raphael, Leonardo and Michelangelo, known then as now by first names.

Which country holds the largest number of Rembrandt paintings, with 86?

Germany has 69, the UK 51 and the Netherlands 49, including The Night Watch and The Jewish Bride in the Rijksmuseum.

How many of Rembrandt's original copper etching plates still existed in 1986?

Others kept printing from his plates into the 19th century, reworking them as they wore.

The Polish Rider, whose Rembrandt attribution was once questioned, hangs in which museum?

Josua Bruyn tentatively gave it to pupil Willem Drost; the Frick never changed its label and most scholars now back Rembrandt.

Simon Schama has argued that the Met's Aristotle with a Bust of Homer actually depicts which ancient figure?

He drew on the scholarship of Paul Crenshaw to challenge the curators' retitling.

Which toxic arsenic yellow pigment was found in the sleeve of The Jewish Bride's groom?

He very rarely used pure blues or greens; Belshazzar's Feast is the great exception.

Which English court painter appears among the many pupils and followers of Rembrandt?

The list also includes Ferdinand Bol, Carel Fabritius, Nicolaes Maes and Aert de Gelder.

Which 1669 painting in the Hermitage is one of Rembrandt's last?

He also painted a Prodigal Son in the Tavern around 1635, thought to show himself with Saskia on his lap.

Rembrandt's chief later biblical subjects shifted from the Hebrew Bible to what?

From 1640 his work grew more sober, possibly reflecting personal tragedy.

What does the 'van Rijn' in Rembrandt's name indicate about his family?

His patronymic Harmenszoon simply records that his father was called Harmen.

Rembrandt was which child, in birth order, of the miller Harmen Gerritszoon and his wife Neeltgen?

His mother was a baker's daughter and a Catholic, while his father belonged to the Dutch Reformed Church.

What did the 'L' most likely stand for in the 'RHL' monogram Rembrandt used from 1629?

He briefly signed 'RHL-van Rijn' in 1632 before switching to his first name alone.

In which year was Rembrandt forced to sell his printing press, effectively ending his etching career?

He had produced etchings since 1626 and was so hands-on that he must have printed early impressions himself.