.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
This magnificent sheet has everything Rembrandt achieved as a printmaker in his later, experimental years: effortless draughtsmanship and compositional skills, complete command of the etching technique, daring and extensive use of drypoint, sulphur tinting and plate tone, a virtuoso combination of highly finished elements with rapidly sketched passages, perfectly realised here in one of the earliest pulls, charged with burr and printed on a beautiful piece of Japan paper.
Saint Jerome (circa 341- 420) was one of the four Fathers of the Roman Church, and translator of the Old and New Testaments into Latin. His translation, known as the Vulgate, was declared the official Latin Bible by the Council of Trent eleven centuries later. Saint Jerome, the scholar and the hermit saint, held a lifelong fascination for Rembrandt. He chose to depict him no less than seven times in etching alone, beginning in Leiden around 1629, and ending in the 1650's with the present plate.
Whereas the attributes of the penitent, skull and crucifix, were still evident in Saint Jerome beside a Pollard Willow (see lot 30), there is no reference to guilt or awareness of sin in the present work. This final Jerome is a contented old man, absorbed in his reading, shaded from the late afternoon sun by his wide-brimmed hat, with one of his slippers cast aside.
The buildings in the background, which gave this print its title, are reminiscent of those in Giorgione's and Titian's landscapes, of a type Rembrandt may have know from drawings or an engraving by Giulio and Domenico Campagnola. The lion, functioning here as the last and only attribute to identify the saint, is probably derived from an engraving by Cornelis Cort after Titian. Both these references show Rembrandt's knowledge of Venetian art.
Over the centuries, there has been a debate as to whether the print is finished or not, or rather whether the unfinished appearance was intentional. Comparison with a preparatory drawing suggests that he intended the foreground to be veiled in shadow, but as the etching developed, he decided to leave it light, thus keeping the tension between the swiftly drawn saint and the deep black shadows under the tree, in the dale below the farm buildings, and the heavy, almost abstract drypoint accent of the lion's mane. The burr, especially in this superbly rich and early impression, takes on a non-descriptive, compositional role, guiding the eye across the image from the lower left, across the saint to the lion and finally to the figures on the bridge.
In the 1650s, Rembrandt was using small supplies of exotic papers to explore the atmospheric effects different supports would have on the printed image. Nowhere is this more evident than in early impressions of Saint Jerome reading in an Italian Landscape. All 14 recorded impressions of the first state are printed on Japanese paper, but of different varieties and tones. The present impression, printed on a warm-toned, light brown sheet evokes a late afternoon, as the heat of the day is beginning to dissipate and the sunlight has shifted from bright white to warm yellow.
Saint Jerome (circa 341- 420) was one of the four Fathers of the Roman Church, and translator of the Old and New Testaments into Latin. His translation, known as the Vulgate, was declared the official Latin Bible by the Council of Trent eleven centuries later. Saint Jerome, the scholar and the hermit saint, held a lifelong fascination for Rembrandt. He chose to depict him no less than seven times in etching alone, beginning in Leiden around 1629, and ending in the 1650's with the present plate.
Whereas the attributes of the penitent, skull and crucifix, were still evident in Saint Jerome beside a Pollard Willow (see lot 30), there is no reference to guilt or awareness of sin in the present work. This final Jerome is a contented old man, absorbed in his reading, shaded from the late afternoon sun by his wide-brimmed hat, with one of his slippers cast aside.
The buildings in the background, which gave this print its title, are reminiscent of those in Giorgione's and Titian's landscapes, of a type Rembrandt may have know from drawings or an engraving by Giulio and Domenico Campagnola. The lion, functioning here as the last and only attribute to identify the saint, is probably derived from an engraving by Cornelis Cort after Titian. Both these references show Rembrandt's knowledge of Venetian art.
Over the centuries, there has been a debate as to whether the print is finished or not, or rather whether the unfinished appearance was intentional. Comparison with a preparatory drawing suggests that he intended the foreground to be veiled in shadow, but as the etching developed, he decided to leave it light, thus keeping the tension between the swiftly drawn saint and the deep black shadows under the tree, in the dale below the farm buildings, and the heavy, almost abstract drypoint accent of the lion's mane. The burr, especially in this superbly rich and early impression, takes on a non-descriptive, compositional role, guiding the eye across the image from the lower left, across the saint to the lion and finally to the figures on the bridge.
In the 1650s, Rembrandt was using small supplies of exotic papers to explore the atmospheric effects different supports would have on the printed image. Nowhere is this more evident than in early impressions of Saint Jerome reading in an Italian Landscape. All 14 recorded impressions of the first state are printed on Japanese paper, but of different varieties and tones. The present impression, printed on a warm-toned, light brown sheet evokes a late afternoon, as the heat of the day is beginning to dissipate and the sunlight has shifted from bright white to warm yellow.