While the world pays respectful tribute to Rembrandt the artist, it has
been compelled to wait until comparatively recent years for some small
measure of reliable information concerning Rembrandt the man. The
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries seem to have been very little
concerned with personalities. A man was judged by his work which
appealed, if it were good enough, to an ever-increasing circle. There
were no newspapers to record his doings and, if he chanced to be an
artist, it was nobody's business to set down the details of his life.
Sometimes a diarist chanced to pass by and to jot down a little gossip,
quite unconscious of the fact that it would serve to stimulate
generations yet unborn, but, for the most part, artists who did great
work in a retiring fashion and were not honoured by courts and princes
as Rubens was, passed from the scene of their labours with all the
details of their sojourn unrecorded.
Rembrandt was fated to suffer more than mere neglect, for he seems to
have been a light-hearted, headstrong, extravagant man, with no
capacity for business. He had not even the supreme quality, associated
in doggerel with Dutchmen, of giving too little and asking too much.
Consequently, when he died poor and enfeebled, in years when his
collection of works of fine art had been sold at public auction for a
fraction of its value, when his pictures had been seized for debt, and
wife, mistress, children, and many friends had passed, little was said
about him. It was only when the superlative quality of his art was
recognised beyond a small circle of admirers that people began to gather
up such fragments of biography as they could find.
Shakespeare has put into Mark Antony's mouth the statement that "the
evil that men do lives after them," and this was very much the case with
Rembrandt van Ryn. His first biographers seem to have no memory save
for his undoubted recklessness, his extravagance, and his debts. They
remembered that his pictures fetched very good prices, that his studio
was besieged for some years by more sitters than it could accommodate,
that he was honoured with commissions from the ruling house, and that in
short, he had every chance that would have led a good business man to
prosperity and an old age removed from stress and strain. These facts
seem to have aroused their ire. They have assailed his memory with
invective that does not stop short at false statement. They have found
in the greatest of all Dutch artists a ne'er-do-well who could not take
advantage of his opportunities, who had the extravagance of a company
promoter, an explosive temper and all the instincts that make for loose
living.
[Illustration: PLATE II.--A PORTRAIT OF SASKIA
Rembrandt's portraits of his wife Saskia are distributed fairly equally
throughout the world's great galleries, but this one from the Brera in
Milan is not so well known as most, and on this account it is reproduced
here. It is called "Portrait of a Woman" in the catalogue, but the
features justify the belief that the lady was the painter's wife.]
Alas for these poor biographers, who, had they but taken the trouble to
trust to the pictures rather than to the lies that were current, would
have seen that the artist's life could not have been nearly as bad as
they imagined. Happily, to-day, we have more than the testimony of the
painted canvas, though that would suffice the most of intelligent men.
Further investigation has done a great deal to remove the blemishes from
Rembrandt's name; MM. Vosmaer and Michel have restored it as though it
were a discoloured picture, and those who hail Rembrandt master may do
so without mental reservation. His faults were very human ones and his
merits leave them in the shade.
Rembrandt was born in the pleasant city of Leyden, but it is not easy to
name the precise year. Somewhere between 1604 and 1607 he started his
troubled journey through life, and of his childhood the records are
scanty. Doubtless, his youthful imagination was stirred by the sights of
the city, the barges moving slowly along the canals, the windmills that
were never at rest, the changing chiaroscuro of the flooded, dyke-seamed
land. Perhaps he saw these things with the large eye of the artist, for
he could not have turned to any point of the compass without finding a
picture lying ready for treatment. Even when he was a little boy the
fascination of his surroundings may have been responsible in part for
the fact that he was not an industrious scholar, that he looked upon
reading and writing as rather troublesome accomplishments, worth less
than the labour involved in their acquisition. And yet his father was a
wealthy man, he would seem to have had no occasion to neglect his
studies, and the best one can find to say about these early years is
that they may have been directed badly by those in authority. In any
case, it is well-nigh impossible to make rules for genius. The boy who
sits unmoved at the bottom of his class, the butt of his companions, the
horrible example to whom the master turns when he wishes to point a
moral, may do work in the world that no one among those who attended the
school since its foundation has been able to accomplish and, if
Rembrandt did not satisfy his masters, he was at least paving the way
for accomplishment that is recognised gratefully to-day wherever art has
found a home.
His family soon knew that he had the makings of an artist and, in 1620,
when he could hardly have been more than sixteen, and may have been
considerably less, he left Leyden University for the studio of a
second-rate painter called Jan van Swanenburch. We have no authentic
record of his progress in the studio, but it must have been rapid. He
must have made friends, painted pictures, and attracted attention. At
the end of three years he went to Lastman's studio in Amsterdam,
returning thence to Leyden, where he took Gerard Dou as a pupil. A few
years later, it is not easy to settle these dates on a satisfactory
basis, he went to Amsterdam, and established himself there, because the
Dutch capital was very wealthy and held many patrons of the arts, in
spite of the seemingly endless war that Holland was waging with Spain.
The picture of "St. Paul in Prison" would seem to have been produced
about 1627, but the painter's appearance before the public of Amsterdam
in the guise of an accomplished artist whose work had to be reckoned
with, may be said to have dated from the completion of the famous
"Anatomy Lesson," in 1631 or 1632. At this time he was living on the
Bloemgracht. Rembrandt had painted many portraits when the picture of
the medical men and the cadaver created a great sensation and, if we
remember that he could not have been more than twenty-seven years old,
and may have been no more than twenty-five, it is not difficult to
understand that Amsterdam was stirred from its usual reserve, and
greeted the rising star with enthusiasm. In a few weeks the entrance to
the painter's studio was besieged by people wishing to sit for their
portraits, by pupils who brought 100 florins, no small sum in those days
for the privilege of working for a year in the master's studio. It may
be mentioned here that even in the days when the painter's popularity
with the general public of Holland had waned, there was never any lack
of enthusiastic students from many countries, all clamouring for
admission to the studio.
Many a man can endure adversity with courage; success is a greater
trial. Bad times often avail to bring out what is best in creative
genius; success tends to destroy it. Rembrandt did not remain unaffected
by the quick response that Amsterdam made to his genius. His art
remained true and sincere, he declined to make the smallest concession
to what silly sitters called their taste, but he did not really know
what to do with the money and commissions that flowed in upon him so
freely. The best use he made of changing circumstances was to become
engaged to Saskia van Uylenborch, the cousin of his great friend
Hendrick van Uylenborch, the art dealer of Amsterdam. Saskia, who was
destined to live for centuries, through the genius of her husband, seems
to have been born in 1612, and to have become engaged to Rembrandt when
she was twenty. The engagement followed very closely upon the patronage
of Rembrandt by Prince Frederic Henry, the Stadtholder, who instructed
the artist to paint three pictures. There seemed no longer any need to
hesitate, and only domestic troubles seem to have delayed the marriage
until 1634. Saskia is enshrined in many pictures. She is seen first as a
young girl, then as a woman. As a bride, in the picture now at Dresden,
she sits upon her husband's knee, while he raises a big glass with his
outstretched arm. Her expression here is rather shy, as if she
deprecated the situation and realised that it might be misconstrued.
This picture gave offence to Rembrandt's critics, who declared that it
revealed the painter's taste for strong drink and riotous living--they
could see nothing more in canvas than a story. Several portraits of
Saskia remained to be painted. She would seem to have aged rapidly, for
after marriage her days were not long in the land. She was only thirty
when she died, and looked considerably older.
[Illustration: PLATE III.--SYNDICS OF THE CLOTH MERCHANTS' GUILD
This fine work, of which so much has been written, is to be seen to-day
in the Royal Museum at Amsterdam. It is one of the finest examples of
the master's portrait groups, and was painted in 1661.]
In the first years of his married life Rembrandt moved to the Nieuwe
Doelstraat. For the time he had more commissions than he knew how to
execute, few troubles save those that his fiery temperament provoked,
and one great sorrow, arising out of the death of his first-born. There
can be no doubt at all that he spent far too much money in these years;
he would attend the sales of works of art and pay extravagant sums for
any that took his fancy. If he ever paused to question himself, he would
be content to explain that he paid big prices in order to show how great
was his respect for art and artists. He came to acquire a picture by
Rubens, a book of drawings by Lucas van Leyden, and the splendid pearls
that may be seen in the later portraits of Saskia. Very soon his rash
and reckless methods became known to the dealers, who would push the
prices up with the certain knowledge that Rembrandt would rush in where
wiser buyers feared to tread. The making of an art collection, the
purchase of rich jewels for his wife, together with good and open-handed
living, soon began to play havoc with Rembrandt's estate. The artist's
temperament offended many of the sober Dutchmen who could not understand
it at all, his independence and insistence upon the finality of his own
judgment were more offensive still, and after 1636 there were fewer
applications for portraits.
In 1638 we find Rembrandt taking an action against one Albert van Loo,
who had dared to call Saskia extravagant. It was, of course, still more
extravagant of Rembrandt to waste his money on lawyers on account of a
case he could not hope to win, but this thought does not seem to have
troubled him. He did not reflect that it would set the gossips talking
more cruelly than ever. Still full of enthusiasm for life and art, he
was equally full of affection for Saskia, whose hope of raising children
seemed doomed to disappointment, for in addition to losing the little
Rombertus, two daughters, each named Cornelia, had died soon after
birth. In 1640 Rembrandt's mother died. Her picture remains on record
with that of her husband, painted ten years before, and even the
biographers of the artist do not suggest that Rembrandt was anything but
a good son. A year later the well-beloved Saskia gave birth to the one
child who survived the early years, the boy Titus. Then her health
failed, and in 1642 she died, after eight years of married life that
would seem to have been happy. In this year Rembrandt painted the famous
"Night Watch," a picture representing the company of Francis Banning
Cocq, and incidentally a day scene in spite of its popular name. The
work succeeded in arousing a storm of indignation, for every sitter
wanted to have equal prominence in the canvas. They had subscribed
equally to the cost, and Rembrandt had dared to compose the picture!
It may be said that after his wife's death, and the exhibition of this
fine work, Rembrandt's pleasant years came to an end. He was then
somewhere between thirty-six and thirty-eight years old, he had made his
mark, and enjoyed a very large measure of recognition, but henceforward,
his career was destined to be a very troubled one, full of
disappointment, pain, and care. Perhaps it would have been no bad thing
for him if he could have gone with Saskia into the outer darkness. The
world would have been poorer, but the man himself would have been spared
many years that perhaps even the devoted labours of his studio could not
redeem.
Saskia's estate, which seems to have been a considerable one, was left
to Rembrandt absolutely, in trust for the sole surviving child Titus,
but Rembrandt, after his usual free and easy fashion, did not trouble
about the legal side of the question. He did not even make an inventory
of the property belonging to his wife, and this carelessness led to
endless trouble in future years, and to the distribution of a great part
of the property into the hands of gentlemen learned in the law. Perhaps
the painter had other matters to think about, he could no longer
disguise from himself the fact that public patronage was falling off. It
may be that the war with Spain was beginning to make people in
comfortable circumstances retrench, but it is more than likely that the
artist's name was not known favourably to his fellow-citizens. His
passionate temperament and his quick eye for truly artistic effects
could not be tolerated by the sober, stodgy men and women who were the
rank and file of Amsterdam's comfortable classes. To be sure, the
Stadtholder continued his patronage; he ordered the famous
"Circumcision" and the "Adoration of the Shepherds." Pupils continued to
arrive, too, in large numbers, many of them coming from beyond Holland;
but the public stayed away.
Rembrandt was not without friends, who helped him as far as they could,
and advised him as much as they dared; but he seems to have been a man
who could not be assisted, because in matters of art he allowed no
outside interference, and he was naturally impulsive. Money ran through
his hands like water through a sieve, though it is only fair to point
out that he was very generous, and could not lend a deaf ear to any tale
of distress.
Between 1642, when Saskia died, and 1649, it is not easy to follow the
progress of his life; we can only state with certainty that his
difficulties increased almost as quickly as his work ripened. His
connection with Hendrickje Stoffels would seem to have started about
1649, and this woman with whom he lived until her death some thirteen
years later, has been abused by many biographers because she was the
painter's mistress. Some have endeavoured to prove, without any
evidence, that he married her, but this concession to Mrs. Grundy seems
a little beside the mark. The relations between the pair were a matter
for their own consideration, and it is clear that Hendrickje came to the
painter in the time of his greatest trouble, to serve him lovingly and
faithfully until she passed away at the comparatively early age of
thirty-six.
She bore him two children, who seem to have died young, and, curiously
enough, her position in the house was accepted by young Titus Rembrandt,
who, when he was nearing man's estate, started, in partnership with her,
to deal in pictures and works of art--a not very successful attempt to
support the establishment in comfort.
In the year when Hendrickje joined Rembrandt, he could no longer pay
instalments on the house he had bought for himself in the Joden
Breestraat. About the following year he began to sell property, hoping
against hope that he would be able to tide over the bad times. Three
years later he started borrowing on a very extensive scale. In 1656 a
fresh guardian was appointed for Titus, to whom his father transferred
some property, and in that year the painter was adjudged bankrupt. The
year 1657 saw much of his private property sold, but his collection of
pictures and engravings found comparatively few bidders, and realised no
more than 5000 florins. A year later his store of pictures came under
the hammer, and in 1660, Hendrickje and Titus started their plucky
attempt to establish a little business, in order that they might restore
some small part of the family fortune.
[Illustration: PLATE IV.--PORTRAIT OF AN OLD MAN
Rembrandt painted very many portraits of men and women whose identity
cannot be traced, and it is probable that the original of this striking
portrait in the Pitti Palace at Florence was unknown to many of the
painter's contemporaries. This is one of Rembrandt's late works, and is
said to have been painted about 1658.]
For a little time the keen edge of trouble seems to have been turned.
One of Rembrandt's friends secured him the commission to paint the
"Syndics of the Drapers' Guild," and this is one of the last works of
importance in the artist's life, because his sight was beginning to
fail. To understand why this fresh trouble fell upon him, it is
necessary to turn for a moment to consider the marvellous etchings he
produced between 1628 and 1661. The drawings may be disregarded in this
connection, though there are about a thousand undisputed ones in
existence, but the making of the etchings, of which some two hundred are
allowed by all competent observers to be the work of the master, must
have inflicted enormous strain upon his sight. When he was passing from
middle age, overwhelmed with trouble of every description, it is not
surprising that his eyes should have refused to serve him any longer.
One might have thought that the immortals had finished their sport with
Rembrandt, but apparently their resources are quite inexhaustible. One
year after the state of his eyes had brought etching to an end, the
faithful Hendrickje died. A portrait of her, one of the last of the
master's works, may be seen in Berlin. The face is a charming and
sympathetic one, and moves the observer to a feeling of sympathy that
makes the mere question of the Church's participation in her relations
with Rembrandt a very small affair indeed.
In the next seven years the old painter passed quietly down towards the
great silence. A few ardent admirers among the young men, a few old
friends whom no adversity could shake, remained to bring such comfort as
they might. With failing sight and health he moved to the Lauriergracht,
and the capacity for work came nearly to an end. The lawyers made merry
with the various suits. Some had been instituted to recover money that
the painter had borrowed, others to settle the vexed question of the
creditors' right to Saskia's estate. In 1665 Titus received the balance
that was left, when the decision of the courts allowed him to handle
what legal ingenuity had not been able to impound.
In the summer of 1668, when he was about twenty-seven years old, Titus
married his cousin Magdellena, and this little celebration may be
supposed to have cheered the elder Rembrandt a little, but his pleasure
was brief, for the young bridegroom died in September of the same year,
and in the following year a posthumous daughter was born.
By this time the immortals had completed their task, there was nothing
left for them to do; they had broken the old painter's health and his
heart, they had reduced him to poverty. So they gave him half a year to
digest their gifts, and then some word of pity seems to have entered
into their councils, and one of the greatest painters the world has seen
was set free from the intolerable burden of life. From certain documents
still extant we learn that he was buried at the expense of thirteen
florins. He has left to the world some five or six hundred pictures that
are admitted to be genuine, together with the etchings and drawings to
which reference has been made. He is to be seen in many galleries in the
Old World and the New, for he painted his own portrait more than a score
of times. Saskia, too, may be seen in several galleries and Hendrickje
has not been forgotten.
[Illustration: PLATE V.--THE COMPANY OF FRANCIS BANNING COCQ
Generally known as the "Night Watch." This famous picture, now to be
seen in the Royal Museum at Amsterdam, is the best discussed of all the
master's works. It has been pointed out that it is in reality a day
scene although it is known to most people as the "Night Watch." The
picture was painted in 1642.]
There is no doubt that many of Rembrandt's troubles were self-inflicted;
but his punishment was largely in excess of his sins. His pictures may
be admired in nearly all great public collections; they are distributed,
too, among private galleries. Rembrandt's art has found a welcome in all
countries. We know now that part of his temporary unpopularity in
Holland was due to the fact that he was far in advance of his own time,
that the conventions of lesser men repelled him, and he was perhaps a
little too vigorous in the expression of his opinions. Now, in the years
when the voice of fame cannot reach him and his worst detractors are
silent, he is set on a pedestal by the side of Velazquez and Titian.