Wieneke Archive Book 4g : Art in Brisbane Presscuttings

THE MASTER HIMSELF - Titled "Rembrandt Leaning on a Stone -Sill," this is one 'of 140 rare etchings by Rembrandt now installed at the Norton Simon Museum. Rare Rembrandt etchings installed One hundred forty rare etchings by Rembrandt van Rijn have been installed at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasade- na. The collection of etchings was pains- takingly assembled over a period of years and has never before been shown to the public. The etchings, combined with Rem- brandt paintings from the Norton Simon collections, constitute one of the most comprehensive displays of Rembrandt's works on view in any museum in the world. They include works from every phase of Rembrandt's career, beginning with early eatched portraits of his family, as well as powerful late biblical scenes. Rembrandt's etchings were very popu- lar during his lifetime. By the early 18th century they were esteemed as important individual works of art for their fertility of imagination, technical mastery and emotional and spiritual strength. Rembrandt 11606-16691, son of a miller in Leiden, began his work as an etcher very early in his prodigious career. At the age of 25, he moved to Amsterdam and rapidly became the most fashionable painter in the economic and art capital of the new republic. At the same time he was producing large pictorial etchings such as "Angel Appearing to the Shepherds." In 1642, the year he painted "The Night - watch,"' his wife Saskia died, leaving him to raise their only child, Titus, whose portrait is also in the museum's collec- tion. At that time he began landscape etch- ings. a subject which he was to fully ex- plore in the ensuing decade. Nearly all of these etchings are included in the current exhibition. By the 1650s Rembrandt was in great financial difficulty, which was to culmi- nate in his bankruptcy in 1658. During those years, however, he produced many of his most moving and deeply felt reli- gious works. Rembrandt's etchings do not consist of carefully planned series or cycles. Aside from a few portraits and book illustra- tions, each of his etchings originated from an inner impulse, a need to make that particular etching.