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Lot Essay
More than any other plate in Rembrandt’s oeuvre, The Entombment has been the object of his experimental approach to printmaking in the later years. Not only did he choose different supports, from European paper to Chinese and Japanese papers to vellum, from one impression to another - a thin whitish Chinese paper for the present impression - he also altered the plate so drastically between the present first and the second state that it seems hard to believe they are just different versions of the same print.
Within the biblical narrative, The Entombment follows on from the The Three Crosses, where we faintly see the figure of a man in the foreground, possibly Joseph of Arimathea or Nicodemus, hurrying towards the right (see lot 29). In the present image, Joseph has brought the dead Christ to his own tomb, here depicted as a vaulted cave or chapel, where the body is now being lowered into the grave.
The first state is in pure etching, the shading and modelling of the space and the figures rendered in regularly and openly spaced hatchings, with strong lines of equal weight. Although darkness and light are suggested, the whole scene is clearly discernible. We see Joseph of Arimathea standing at left above the sunken grave, the Virgin is sitting to his feet, her hands clasped in sorrow, a group of other grieving women is huddled behind her. Three men are lowering the body into the grave, a fourth one has climbed down to support it from below. The light seems to come from a lamp covered by the foremost figure – or perhaps is emanating from the dead Christ Himself. Above this mournful scene – pushed into the lower left corner of the image, thereby reflecting the act of the entombment – we see the arch of the cavern, with two skulls resting on a ledge. Behind this gruesome memento mori, the space recedes into darkness. The silken surface of the China paper bathes the scene in a shimmering, unsteady light, which is also suggested by the loose line structure of the whole etching and the sketch-like quality of the figures.
Already in the second state, Rembrandt obscured the composition considerably with dense hatching in drypoint and engraving, turning it into a truly nocturnal scene, and made it even darker in the subsequent states. In a few impressions, including one in the Josefowitz Collection, he printed it with so much plate tone as to resemble a monotype and took this experiment to the edge of the possibilities of printmaking.
The print belongs to a small group of mid-sized prints, all created in or around 1654, on the Life of Christ. It may be that Rembrandt had envisaged a larger series, but he realised only four subjects: The Presentation in the Temple, in the dark Manner (B. 50; New Holl. 285), The Descent from the Cross by Torchlight (B. 83; New Holl. 286), The Entombment and Christ at Emmaus: the larger Plate (87; New Holl. 283). In all of them, the depiction of light is the formal challenge that Rembrandt set himself, be it the supernatural light emanating from the apparition of Jesus in Christ at Emmaus, the barely lit internal spaces in the Entombment and the Presentation in the Temple, or the torchlight in the Descent from the Cross.
New Hollstein records at total of 23 impressions of the first state, of which about half are printed on China paper, including the present one. This example has always been considered of the highest quality and beauty, as the descriptions in the collection sale catalogues of several illustrious earlier owners - Liphart, Schlösser, Davidsohn, amongst others - testify. It is another sheet from the impeccable collection of Felix Somary that Sam Josefowitz was able to secure for his own.
Within the biblical narrative, The Entombment follows on from the The Three Crosses, where we faintly see the figure of a man in the foreground, possibly Joseph of Arimathea or Nicodemus, hurrying towards the right (see lot 29). In the present image, Joseph has brought the dead Christ to his own tomb, here depicted as a vaulted cave or chapel, where the body is now being lowered into the grave.
The first state is in pure etching, the shading and modelling of the space and the figures rendered in regularly and openly spaced hatchings, with strong lines of equal weight. Although darkness and light are suggested, the whole scene is clearly discernible. We see Joseph of Arimathea standing at left above the sunken grave, the Virgin is sitting to his feet, her hands clasped in sorrow, a group of other grieving women is huddled behind her. Three men are lowering the body into the grave, a fourth one has climbed down to support it from below. The light seems to come from a lamp covered by the foremost figure – or perhaps is emanating from the dead Christ Himself. Above this mournful scene – pushed into the lower left corner of the image, thereby reflecting the act of the entombment – we see the arch of the cavern, with two skulls resting on a ledge. Behind this gruesome memento mori, the space recedes into darkness. The silken surface of the China paper bathes the scene in a shimmering, unsteady light, which is also suggested by the loose line structure of the whole etching and the sketch-like quality of the figures.
Already in the second state, Rembrandt obscured the composition considerably with dense hatching in drypoint and engraving, turning it into a truly nocturnal scene, and made it even darker in the subsequent states. In a few impressions, including one in the Josefowitz Collection, he printed it with so much plate tone as to resemble a monotype and took this experiment to the edge of the possibilities of printmaking.
The print belongs to a small group of mid-sized prints, all created in or around 1654, on the Life of Christ. It may be that Rembrandt had envisaged a larger series, but he realised only four subjects: The Presentation in the Temple, in the dark Manner (B. 50; New Holl. 285), The Descent from the Cross by Torchlight (B. 83; New Holl. 286), The Entombment and Christ at Emmaus: the larger Plate (87; New Holl. 283). In all of them, the depiction of light is the formal challenge that Rembrandt set himself, be it the supernatural light emanating from the apparition of Jesus in Christ at Emmaus, the barely lit internal spaces in the Entombment and the Presentation in the Temple, or the torchlight in the Descent from the Cross.
New Hollstein records at total of 23 impressions of the first state, of which about half are printed on China paper, including the present one. This example has always been considered of the highest quality and beauty, as the descriptions in the collection sale catalogues of several illustrious earlier owners - Liphart, Schlösser, Davidsohn, amongst others - testify. It is another sheet from the impeccable collection of Felix Somary that Sam Josefowitz was able to secure for his own.