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It was the most frequently asked question in art history and museum circles. When the painters of his day died, anything vaguely resembling a Rembrandt was declared as being by the master himself. To this day the controversy and confusion over the many so-called Rembrandts has not been cleared, says B. N. Goswamy
Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669), was not just the most talented Dutch painter of the 17th century. He appears also on everybody’s list of the 10 top painters of all times, as someone has said: regardless of who the other nine painters are. For few can remain unmoved by this extraordinary artist’s deep compassion, his understanding of the human condition; and few who are not seduced by his lush colouring: that drenched in gold light, those velvety blacks. For centuries together, Rembrandt has remained an icon of art, a master in a class of his own. What is unusual about his career is that, unlike so many other artists of the past, he was celebrated in his own time, and very early on. When he was barely 20, he had a studio of his own; in fact, at that age he was taking in apprentices, who were paying for the privilege of studying under him. He did have his share of problems, both personal and financial, but his genius was always acknowledged; his fame never dimmed. If anything, it has been steadily growing with the passage of time. Some of his works – his unblinking Self-portraits, the Anatomy Lesson of Dr Tulp, the Man in a Golden Helmet, The Nightwatch (which, after recent cleaning, turned out to be a ‘Daywatch’!), Bathsheba – have been the fare on which all students of art grow up. But, for quite some time, there has been trouble in Rembrandt-scholarship land. For, in the case of a painter, with fame come copies and forgeries. His funeral was barely over when works attributed to him or bearing a false signature, started to appear. Soon, it got worse. When the painters of his day died, anything vaguely resembling a Rembrandt was declared as being by the master himself. Names of other painters would be scratched out and replaced with fake Rembrandt signatures. For with those signatures was associated money, very serious money sometimes. All of this copying and faking assumed alarming proportions, and by 1860, between the US and Europe, as many as 15,000 collectors and institutions believed they owned an original and authentic Rembrandt painting! Sober scholars believed, however, that no more than 600 Rembrandts were in existence. Even this number being astounding, something needed to be done to check things out, as it were. This is when, in the tricentennial year of the artist’s death – 1969 – a Rembrandt Research Project (RRP) was set up, with substantive funding from the Netherlands Organization for the Advancement of Pure Research and the Prince Bernhard Foundation. The aim was to review all the works attributed to Rembrandt, as well as those attributed to his students, followers and studio. The project was entrusted to a committee of six highly regarded scholars – art historians and museum persons – who had before them the daunting task of looking at all the 600 works scattered across the globe. One can imagine what followed. The RRP becoming, very quickly, "the most public of art historical endeavours" ever, there was a sense of great anticipation, panic mixing with excitement seizing all who owned, or thought they owned, a Rembrandt. It was as if a cat had been set among pigeons. On its own part, the committee went about its work with enormous diligence, using every possible method known to it, or to others, for establishing authenticity. These included radiography (X-radiography, infra-red photography, reflectography and UV fluorescence), analysis of the painting support (dendrochronology, canvas study, and the like), examination of paint samples, and research into provenance and iconography. It was going to take long years, and the committee decided to keep making public its findings slowly in several volumes, each titled: A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. Every work, and the research conducted on it, was meant to be published in extenso. Three categories were created: A, comprising of those which were now certified as being by Rembrandt; B, being those on which there was no agreement yet; and C, those that were found to be as being not by Rembrandt. Understandably, reactions to these findings varied: uncertainty, disappointment, anger, jubilation, disbelief, and mistrust. Quite suddenly, some institutions found that a Rembrandt that they had had in their collection was not a Rembrandt at all; equally suddenly, a work that had been lying in obscurity was pronounced to be a genuine Rembrandt. Museum curators were forced to issue statements; private owners went into a huddle, discussing how to meet the new situation. "Rembrandt or not?" was the most frequently asked question in art history and museum circles. Issues were raised, even by those who were not directly affected by these findings since they did not own, or claimed to own, works by Rembrandt. Doubt was cast on the methods, or the tests, employed by the committee. The committee did not help its own cause by declaring some work to be by Rembrandt first, and then changing its mind a few years later, assigning it to a different category. Or, conversely, a work that had been put in the C category before was reinstated later into the A category. And so on. Quite naturally, reasons were assigned for this change of perception, or view. But it was not easy to convince everyone. The RRP was meant originally to complete its work in 10 years. It has been close to 40 years now since it started. In the course of these years, some members of the committee resigned; others moved on. The latest volume, IV, was published towards the end of 2005 (it weighs nearly four kilograms; is priced at 1,200 US dollars); the next one, the new President of the RRP says, might be the last in the series. So, in respect of authentication, and related matters, where does all this leave us? Confused, but richer in terms of scholarship? Or, richer but confused in respect of authentication? |
