Rembrandt statue and the sculptures of The Night Watch in 3D at the Rembrandtplein in Amsterdam
Rembrandt statue in Leiden
Rembrandt and Saskia

Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606–1669) is one of the most famous,[1][2] controversial, and best expertly researched (visual) artists in history.[3][4]

His life and art have long attracted the attention of multidisciplinary scholarship such as art history, social history,[5] cultural history, history of ideas, education, humanities, aesthetics, philosophy, psychology, sociology, literary studies, anatomy, medicine, religious studies, theology, Jewish studies,[6] Oriental studies (Asian studies),[7] globalization studies,[8][9] and art market research. In Rembrandt scholar Stephanie Dickey's words:

[Rembrandt] earned international renown as a painter, printmaker, teacher, and art collector while never leaving the Dutch Republic. In his home city of Leiden and in Amsterdam, where he worked for nearly forty years, he mentored generations of other painters and produced a body of work that has never ceased to attract admiration, critique, and interpretation. (...) Rembrandt's art is a key component in any study of the Dutch Golden Age, and his membership in the canon of artistic genius is well established, but he is also a figure whose significance transcends specialist interest. Literary critics have pondered "Rembrandt" as a "cultural text"; novelists, playwrights, and filmmakers have romanticized his life, and in popular culture, his name has become synonymous with excellence for products and services, ranging from toothpaste to self-help advice."[4]

For a visual artist in general and an Old Master in particular, Rembrandt (i.e. his life, art, and circle) has been the subject of a vast amount of literature that includes both fiction and nonfiction works. The field of Rembrandt studies (study of Rembrandt's life and work, including works by his pupils and followers)—as an academic field in its own right with many noted Rembrandt connoisseurs and scholars—has been one of the most dynamic research areas of Netherlandish art (or art of the pre-1830 Low Countries) history.[3][10] In the history of the reception and interpretation of Rembrandt's art, the great 'rediscovery' of the Dutch master in 19th-century France and Germany decisively helped in establishing his lasting fame in subsequent centuries.[11][12]

The following is a list of works about Rembrandt. A longer bibliography is at [13]

Nonfiction works

Books, dissertations and theses

Biography

General studies

Including exhibition catalogues (exh. cat.)

Others

Journal articles, scholarly papers, essays, and book chapters

Literary works (e.g. poetry and fiction)

Films

Documentaries

Lectures and conferences

Visual arts

See also

References

  1. ^
    • Solman, Paul (21 June 2004). "Rembrandt's Journey". PBS.org. Retrieved 19 August 2019. Paul Solman (2004): "[Rembrandt] The most famous brand name in western art. In America alone it graces toothpaste, bracelet charms, restaurant and bars, counter-tops and of course the town of Rembrandt, Iowa just halfway around the world from the Rembrandt Hotel in Bangkok, Thailand. Funny thing is Rembrandt might have been quite pleased with such widespread notoriety."
    • Crawford, Amy (12 December 2006). "An Interview with Stephanie Dickey, author of "Rembrandt at 400"". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved 19 August 2019. Rembrandt scholar Stephanie Dickey (2006): "One thing that really surprises me is the extent to which Rembrandt exists as a phenomenon in pop culture. You have this musical group call the Rembrandts, who wrote the theme song to Friends—"I'll Be There For You." There are Rembrandt restaurants, Rembrandt hotels, art supplies and other things that are more obvious. But then there's Rembrandt toothpaste. Why on Earth would somebody name a toothpaste after this artist who's known for his really dark tonalities? It doesn't make a lot of sense. But I think it's because his name has become synonymous with quality. It's even a verb—there's a term in underworld slang, 'to be Rembrandted,' which means to be framed for a crime. And people in the cinema world use it to mean pictorial effects that are overdone. He's just everywhere, and people who don't know anything, who wouldn't recognize a Rembrandt painting if they tripped over it, you say the name Rembrandt and they already know that this is a great artist. He's become a synonym for greatness."
    • Valiunas, Algis (25 December 2006). "Looking at Rembrandt". The Weekly Standard. Retrieved 19 August 2019. Algis Valiunas (2006): "Alongside Leonardo and Michelangelo, Rembrandt is one of the three most famous artists ever, with whom the public is on a first-name basis; and the name Rembrandt has lent the cachet of greatness and the grace of familiarity to sell everything from kitchen countertops to whitening toothpaste to fancy hotels in Bangkok and Knightsbridge."
  2. ^
    • Rodin, Auguste: Art: Conversations with Paul Gsell. Translated from the French by Jacques de Caso and Patricia B. Sanders. (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984), p. 85. Originally published as Auguste Rodin, L'Art: Entretiens réunis par Paul Gsell (Paris: Bernard Grasset, 1911). When a critic referred to Auguste Rodin's busts in the same vein as Rembrandt's portraits, the French sculptor responded: “Compare me with Rembrandt? What sacrilege! With Rembrandt, the colossus of Art! What are you thinking of, my friend! We should prostrate ourselves before Rembrandt and never compare anyone with him!” [Original in French: “Me comparer à Rembrandt, quel sacrilège! À Rembrandt, le colosse de l'Art! Y pensez-vous, mon ami! Rembrandt, prosternons-nous et ne mettons jamais personne à côté de lui!”]
    • Golahny, Amy (2001), 'The Use and Misuse of Rembrandt: An Overview of Popular Reception,'. Dutch Crossing: Journal of Low Countries Studies 25(2): 305–322
    • Cecil B. De Mille Foundation. "The Legacy of Cecil B. DeMille". Cecil B. De Mille Foundation (cecilbdemille.com). Retrieved 1 November 2018. In The Film Daily's biographical sketches of directors (July 1, 1928), DeMille was already being credited with "the first developments in lighting and photography." While shooting The Warrens of Virginia (1915), DeMille had experimented with lighting instruments borrowed from a Los Angeles opera house. When business partner Sam Goldwyn saw a scene in which only half an actor's face was illuminated, he feared the exhibitors would pay only half the price for the picture. DeMille remonstrated that it was Rembrandt lighting. "Sam's reply was jubilant with relief," recalled DeMille. "For Rembrandt lighting the exhibitors would pay double!"
    • Rivette, Kevin G.; Kline, David: Rembrandts in the Attic: Unlocking the Hidden Value of Patents. (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1999)
    • Sax, Joseph L.: Playing Darts with a Rembrandt: Public and Private Rights in Cultural Treasures. (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999) ISBN 0-472-11044-6
    • Laszlo, Andrew; Quicke, Andrew: Every Frame a Rembrandt: Art and Practice of Cinematography. (Boston: Focal Press, 2000)
    • Amore, Anthony; Mashberg, Tom: Stealing Rembrandts: The Untold Stories of Notorious Art Heists. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012) ISBN 9780230108530
    • Bush, George W.: Portraits of Courage: A Commander in Chief's Tribute to America's Warriors. (New York: Crown Publishers, 2017) ISBN 9780804189767, p. 12. In George W. Bush's own words, "I told Laura and our artist friend Pam Nelson that I might like to take up painting. They were surprised – I had been an art-agnostic all my life. Laura said, “You ought to try it.” It seemed like she was slightly skeptical. Pam suggested I hire her friend Gail Norfleet, a notable and talented Dallas artist, as my instructor. Several days later, Gail came over to the house and asked me what my objectives were. “Gail, there's a Rembrandt trapped in this body,” I told her. “Your job is to liberate him.”"
  3. ^ a b Slive, Seymour: Rembrandt and his Critics, 1630–1730. (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1953)
  4. ^ a b Franits, Wayne (ed.): The Ashgate Research Companion to Dutch Art of the Seventeenth Century. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2016)
  5. ^ Negri, Antonio: The Savage Anomaly: The Power of Spinoza's Metaphysics and Politics. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1991). Translated from the Italian by Michael Hardt. Originally published as L'anomalia selvaggia. Saggio su potere e potenza in Baruch Spinoza (Milano: Feltrinelli, 1981). Antonio Negri (1981): "Kolakowski, as we will see, has clearly depicted the religious life and the forms of community constructed by the cultured strata of the Dutch bourgeoisie. Spinoza lives in this world, with a vast network of simple and sociable friendships and correspondences. But for certain determinate strata of the bourgeoisie the sweetness of the cultured and sedate life is accompanied, without any contradiction, by an association with a capitalist power ('potestas'), expressed in very mature terms. This is the condition of a Dutch bourgeois man. We could say the same thing for the other genius of that age, Rembrandt van Rijn. On his canvases the power of light is concentrated with intensity on the figures of a bourgeois world in terrific expansion. It is a prosaic but very powerful society, which makes poetry without knowing it because it has the force to do so."
  6. ^ Nadler, Steven: Rembrandt's Jews. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003)
  7. ^ Schrader, Stephanie; et al. (eds.): Rembrandt and the Inspiration of India. (Los Angeles, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2018)
  8. ^ Scallen, Catherine B. (2009), 'The Global Rembrandt,'. In: Crossing Cultures: Conflict, Migration and Convergence: The Proceedings of the 32nd International Congress in the History of Art, edited by Jaynie Anderson. (Carlton: Miegunyah Press, 2009), pp. 263–267
  9. ^ Chung, Jina: Rembrandt Redefined: Making the “Global Artist” in Seventeenth-Century Amsterdam. (MA thesis, University of Texas at Austin, 2011)
  10. ^ Dickey, Stephanie: Rembrandt and his Circle: Insights and Discoveries. (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2017)
  11. ^ McQueen, Alison: The Rise of the Cult of Rembrandt: Reinventing an Old Master in Nineteenth-Century France. (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2003)
  12. ^ Scallen, Catherine B.: Rembrandt, Reputation, and the Practice of Connoisseurship. (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2004)
  13. ^ Royalton-Kisch, Martin (2012). "The Drawings of Rembrandt: a revision of Otto Benesch's catalogue raisonné". Retrieved 10 May 2021.
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