Introduction

 

Rembrandt Harmensz van Rijn of Leyden, the second youngest son of a miller, was born in 1606. He attended a Latin school for seven years. In 1620, he entered Leyden University; however, due to lack of painters, he left for Amsterdam in 1624. Upon arriving in Amsterdam, he studied under Pieter Lastman for six months. Lastman, who studied with well-known artists like Caravaggio and Adam Elsheimer, and passed on his extensive knowledge about Italian art to Rembrandt(Nash 33). Rembrandt learned the “fundamental skills” of painting on which his painterly style developed.  

Group portraits were unique to Holland’s culture in the 1600s (Rosenberg 132). There was no court to give commissions to artists so “corporation portraits” became “official” Dutch paintings. Rembrandt quickly surpassed all of the other Dutch painters in terms of talent with his “group” portraits. His paintings contained and displayed a certain glow and vitality that his fellow painters’ works did not which are beautifully demonstrated in The Anatomy of Dr. Tulp and Night Watch.

 

 

 

Home| The Anatomy of Dr. Tulp| Night Watch| Conclusion