Rembrandt

It took some 150 years before, gradually, the 19th century experienced Rembrandt becoming the subject of more serious scholarship. Research began with the recording of anecdotes about his life, but increasingly a more factual approach on his work was adopted. As early as 1810 the first catalogue raisonné of Rembrandt’s etchings was published by William Esdaile. A first catalogue of… Read More »2020-04-doc5 Do we know what a Rembrandt painting looks like?

Early this year I reported the transmission on English TV of the documentary ‘Looking for Rembrandt‘. It contains a programma, with three separate films of 60 minutes, see blog/2019-03-doc13-looking-for-rembrandt. The third programme contains some lines of an interview I gave (in September 2018) regarding Rembrandt’s financial troubles. Simply because it only came to my attention just a few days ago,… Read More »2019-12-doc2 Looking for Rembrandt on Dutch TV

All aspects of the life and work of Rembrandt (1606-1669) have been celebrated this year. At least twenty exhibitions have been organised in the Netherlands as well as in many other museums and galleries in the world. It was a golden year for new books and TV programmes, such as ‘Looking for Rembrandt’ (BBC 4, April 2019; blog/2019-03-doc13-looking-for-rembrandt) and September/October… Read More »2019-10-doc2 R.I.P. Rembrandt – 4 October 1669

Yesterday, Thursday 27 June 2019, ‘Operation Night Watch’ kicked off in the Amsterdam Rijksmuseum. The painting will undergo a major cleaning-up and restoration. It’s last restauration was over 40 years ago, following an attack on the painting with a knife in 1975. During the Rijksmuseum’s continued monitoring program, it has been discovered that parts the Night Watch have changed over… Read More »2019-06-doc4 The Night Watch in the Dutch courts?

‘I doubt you will find any new document on Rembrandt, as all written documents, all notarial deeds, all registrations, all shreds of evidence on any aspct of his life is known and docemented’, an American art historian and Rembrandt specialist told me a year and a half ago. In science you never can predict: this week (on 4 June 2019)… Read More »2019-06-doc2 Rembrandt studied in Leiden in 1620. But also in 1622?

In September last year I reported about my research into the bankruptcy (cessio bonorum) of Rembrandt. In the Netherlands, Rembrandt is hot as this year it is 350 years that he passed away. Also abroad there is interest and I was interviewed last year for a BBC programme. See blog/2018-09-doc3-the-bankruptcy-of-rembrandt-interview-bbc. Rembrandt (1606-1669) lived from 1606 till around 1631 in Leiden… Read More »2019-03-doc13 Looking for Rembrandt

In Autumn 2017, I started my research into the financial distress of Dutch Golden Age painter Rembrandt. More specifically I am interested in the cessio bonorum proceedings, which started in 1656. See blog/2017-11-05-rembrandt. The BBC intends to broadcast a 3 times 60 minutes programme and it was with great pleasure that I was interviewed yesterday by Tim Niel and his… Read More »2018-09-doc3 The ‘bankruptcy’ of Rembrandt – interview BBC

After having published two books in my series Insolvency Law (Wessels Insolventierecht) and a large report for the European Law Institute on Business rescue in insolvency law (with my German colleague Stephan Madaus) this year, I head to something (not completely) different, the well-known Dutch painter Rembrandt (or: Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669)). Rembrandt? Evidently, his paintings and etchings are admired… Read More »2017-11-doc5-Rembrandt