Balaam and the donkey

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Balaam and the Donkey (Rembrandt van Rijn)
Balaam and the donkey
Rembrandt van Rijn , 1626
Oil on oak
63.2 x 46.5 cm
Musée Cognacq-Jay , Paris

Balaam and the Donkey or Balaam's Donkey is an oil painting by the Dutch painter Rembrandt van Rijn from 1626 depicting a scene from the story of the prophet Balaam in the Book of Moses . The painting is executed in portrait format on oak wood and is chronologically and stylistically closely related to Rembrandt's paintings Christ drives the money changers out of the temple , history paintings with a self-portrait of the painter and The stoning of St. Stephen . The work was only known at the turn of the 20th century and has since been recognized as an original by Rembrandt's hand.

description

presentation

A Polish nobleman with a command baton , Rembrandt, 1637, oil on oak, 96.8 × 66 cm, National Gallery of Art , Washington, DC

In the center of the picture is an old man with long white hair and a beard, the biblical prophet Balaam. He is dressed in a magnificent yellow robe with elaborate brocade trimmings and a fur trim . Over it he wears a red and green striped waist band and a wide red cape, his head covering is a blue and red striped turban . Despite his sumptuous clothes, he is barefoot. He sits on his collapsed donkey, his face twisted with anger . He pulls the reins with his left hand and has raised a club over his head with his bent right arm to strike.

The donkey is provided with a yellowish harness and carries a red pannier. It is open, from its top and from the side pocket there are documents, one of which shows four and three apparently Hebrew characters in two lines . A yellow command staff with a metal cap protrudes from the pocket . The donkey has taken its left course, the right one is buckled and looks as if the animal is about to get up. He has turned his head back and turned towards his rider. His eyes are wide open, his ears are set back and his mouth is open so that the rows of teeth in the upper and lower jaw are clearly visible.

Behind the donkey and its rider is an angel emerging from a dark cloud . The figure occupies the left background with its broadly spreading gray feathered wings. The angel has medium-length blonde hair and looks youthful, he is only clothed with a white cloth thrown over his right shoulder, which leaves the left shoulder free. The angel has turned to Balaam, he is carrying a sword in his right hand . His right arm is also raised above the head for a blow, and his left arm with the clenched fist is stretched forward in a balancing movement.

On the right above Balaam, two magnificently dressed men on horseback are shown in the middle distance. They wear purple and yellow robes and feathered turbans and watch the scene. Behind Balaam's raised hand, two more heads with turbans can be seen, most of which are covered. At the right edge of the picture, to the right of the old man and to the right under the two riders, there are two young figures, possibly servants of the old man. Both wear plain dark clothing, the larger one on the right with a light-colored waist band. The servant on the left holds a large object in front of his stomach that looks like a vessel in the manner of a jug or goblet. A tower-like rock formation occupies the background in the middle, to the left and right of it the cloudy sky is drawn down to below the center of the picture. The left foreground is almost free as part of the path, in the right foreground there are plants with large leaves that look like lettuce or cabbage.

The monogram and the year RH 1626 are painted on the stone in the foreground with thin gray-brown brushstrokes . The monogram and the year are considered authentic.

Technical inspection

The painting has the format 63.2 × 46.5 cm and is painted with oil paint on an approximately four millimeter thick oak panel with vertical grain. It is reinforced by a second panel, which is painted on the back. The front panel consists of two boards, the left one is 24.5 cm wide and the right one 22 cm. The lower edge of the right board, 16.3 cm from the right edge, is about 19 cm deep. The format of the panel largely corresponds to that of Rembrandt's early works, Baptism of the Chamberlain and the Music-Making Society , both also from 1626.

The light yellow primer appears only in a few places with a very thin application of paint. The paint layer is in good overall condition, only a few areas show paint losses. Overpainting can be seen in some places and the layer of paint has very fine and regular craquelure .

Rembrandt's father

Balaam and the donkey , detail
Study for an Oriental Prince , formerly attributed to Rembrandt, oil on panel, 22 × 18 cm, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum , Glasgow

Wilhelm Bode stated in 1905 that the left rider, like Rembrandt's David, plays the harp for Saul in the Städel Art Institute, goes back to the illustrated study for an oriental prince . This small-format wooden panel was considered a work of Rembrandt at the time, but was later copied. At most it comes from his circle. According to Cornelis Hofstede de Groot, this left rider bears the facial features of Rembrandt's father. However, his statement has found no echo in art historical literature.

Biblical background

The biblical background of the painting is the story of Balaam in the 4th book of Moses ( Num 22-24  EU ). During their forty years of wandering through the desert , the Israelites led by Moses pitched their camp in the steppe of Moab , across the Jordan near Jericho . Balak king of Moab sent messengers to the prophet Balaam . He should come to him to curse the Israelites so that he could defeat them militarily. When the elders of Moab and Midian arrived at Balaam, he let them stay the night with the promise that the next day he would bring them the word that God had spoken to him. God came to Balaam and told him not to go with the messengers and not to curse the Israelites, for they were blessed . When his messengers returned without Balaam, Balak sent out more and more distinguished courtiers as messengers who offered Balaam a higher wage. Again he let the messengers stay the night to hear God's word. God allowed Balaam to follow the messenger, but he should only do what he told him ( Num 22 : 1-20  EU ).

When Balaam set out on his donkey, accompanied by two young men, to see Balak, God was angry. An angel with a raised sword, which only Balaam's donkey could see, blocked the way twice, whereupon Balaam struck the donkey with his stick. The third time there was no way to avoid the angel, the donkey knelt under Balaam. When he hit her the third time, God let her speak: What have I done to you that you hit me the third time? Balaam accused the donkey of mocking him and that he would have killed her if he had a sword with him. Then God opened his eyes and showed him the angel with his sword. Balaam realized that he had sinned ( Num 22,21-34  EU ).

Even in early Christianity, Balaam was valued for one of his prophecies. In chapter 24 of the book of Numbers Balaam prophesies: I see him, but not now, I see him, but not nearby: a star rises in Jacob, a scepter rises in Israel. He smashes the temples of Moab and the skulls of all of Set's sons ( Num. 24.17  EU ). This prophecy of the rising star in Jacob has always been understood as an announcement of the coming of Christ and as a reference to the star of Bethlehem . The confrontation of Balaam with the angel is a reference to the following messianic prophecy.

The story of Balaam and the donkey is also of great importance in Judaism , but with a different focus. Balak entrusts Balaam to curse the Israelites because he believes he is able to curse like Moses himself. In fact, Balaam can only tell when God is angry every day because of the idolaters in the world. By pronouncing his curses at precisely this point, Balaam brings the wrath of God upon his victims and gives the impression of power. Without taking advantage of this moment of divine wrath, Balaam's curses could not have any effect. By opening the donkey's mouth, God demonstrates to Balaam that only he himself is the master of mouth and language and that no one can bless or curse without his consent. In the further course of the story of Balaam, he blesses the people of Israel instead of cursing them.

The first line of the Jewish prayer Ma Touzu is a quotation from Balaam's blessing. Regardless of this, in Judaism Balaam was mostly portrayed as a malicious or weak character. Balak is the fortieth Parasha of the Torah , which includes the story of Balaam. Since this parasha causes great difficulties for the students when teaching Torah, it has entered the Yiddish saying with someone to learn bolok , which means to torment someone .

Rembrandt's painting depicts the moment when the donkey kneels under Balaam, the latter strikes again in anger and the donkey turns around to him and begins to speak ( Num. 22 : 27-28  EU ). Deviating from the text of the Bible, the angel does not block Rembrandt's way, but appears behind the main characters in the clouds. The two riders and the two figures covered except for parts of the heads are the messengers sent by Balak. The young men on the right edge of the picture are the two servants accompanying Balaam.

Art historical classification

Christ drives the money changers out of the temple , 1626, oil on panel, 43.1 × 32 cm, Pushkin Museum , Moscow

Rembrandt's early work

After training with Jacob Isaacsz van Swanenburgh, which he began in 1620, Rembrandt went to Amsterdam in 1624 to study with Pieter Lastman for six months . In 1625 he returned to Leiden and opened a workshop with Jan Lievens . The painting was created under the influence of history painting by his teacher Pieter Lastman, who was trained in Rome on the works of Elsheimer and Caravaggio . The “bright, almost garish choice of colors” on the southern stage, but also the even lighting against a light background and the still somewhat stiff depiction of the figures are typical of these early works by Rembrandt. Balaam and the Donkey is a continuation of Rembrandt's endeavors to bring human emotions into focus. The picture thus follows the cycle The five senses , the expulsion of the money changers from the temple and the stoning of St. Stephen . The Balaam was created before Tobias suspected his wife of theft , where Rembrandt's efforts are also clearly visible. Similarities in the type and size of the board used and in the painting style, as well as the composition of the picture and parallels, such as the arms raised to blow Balaam and Christ when the money changers were driven out of the temple , indicate that Balaam and the donkey are in the row of Works by Rembrandt from 1626. The execution of the still life elements such as Balaam's panniers and the plants in the right foreground appear more advanced than the expulsion of the money changers . There is also a greater stylistic similarity to the history painting with a self-portrait of the painter and the music-making society .

The occasion for painting certain works is a theme particularly in Rembrandt's early works. The history painting and the stoning of St. Stephen , which is sometimes regarded as its counterpart, are mostly regarded as commissioned work, although the client cannot be grasped. In other cases, such as Two Old Men in Conversation and Balaam and the Donkey , it is assumed that Rembrandt created the paintings of his own accord. Such paintings were sold to visitors to his workshop without a client. In the case of Balaam, it was the art collector Alfonso López, an agent of Cardinal Richelieu . The possibility that López had commissioned Balaam was also discussed . López was in the Netherlands by 1628 at the latest. The motif of the heathen Balaam, who prophesies the coming of the Lord on behalf of God, could have been particularly attractive for López as a Jew of Spanish origin who converted to Catholicism .

Speculum Humanae Salvationis , healing mirror from Westphalia or Cologne, around 1360, ULB Darmstadt , Hs 2505, fol. 7r
The Prophet Balaam , Hermann tom Ring , 1570, oil on wood, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen , Munich

Balaam in Christian Art

The earliest depictions of the Balaam motif are early Christian wall paintings in Roman catacombs. As early as the late 4th century, the biblical motif appeared as a mural in a catacomb in Via Latina in Rome , which was only discovered in 1955 . These early depictions consider the scene with the angel and Balaam's prophecy that a star would rise in Jacob, still separate from one another. Since then, the Balaam story has been an element of Christian art that has been depicted again and again , as ornament on column capitals or marble wall reliefs, as illumination in psalteries , mirrors of salvation or Schedel's world chronicle, and finally on paintings and in prints. In the Middle Ages, a type of image appears on column capitals and in book illustrations in which both motifs are combined. The unusually large star depicted stands in the middle above the figures, as in the illustration on the right from a healing mirror from Cologne or Westphalia. This connection was also shown in performances in churches at Christmas and on Epiphany. Here Balaam appeared on his donkey and announced that a star would rise from Jacob. Over time, this connection was lost. Balaam was only shown in his encounter with the angel, the miracle of the speaking donkey was in the foreground, and the reference to the messianic prophecy disappeared.

The focus on Balaam and the donkey suited the early modern artists. It could be carried out in the style of history painting, which is considered the most important genre of painting, the motif was dramatic, and there was the possibility of depicting human and animal emotional states. One of the first depictions in which the Balaam motif appears dramatically executed is one by Dirk Jacobsz around 1523 . Vellert made drawing in the Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum in Braunschweig. This drawing is Vellert's draft for a round glass window that was later cut. A 1554 by Dirck Volkertsz. Coornhert's print based on a drawing by Maarten van Heemskerck takes over some of Vellert's elements. In a glass window created by Dirck Crabeth around 1566 for the Sint Janskerk in Gouda , on the one hand, a step backwards due to a loss of dynamism can be observed; on the other hand, the representation of the angled arm of Balaam and the raised sword of the angel follows older models.

An unusual representation of Balaam comes from the Münster painter Hermann tom Ring . In his cycle of 15 panel paintings of sibyls and prophets, painted in 1570 , he depicts Balaam frontally in the bust, just as he is trimming his pen. He is surrounded by writing utensils and books, a strip of parchment hangs in front of him over a parapet. The background is a seascape that cannot be interpreted satisfactorily. The panel is signed with the complete Bible verse of the Balaam prophecy in Latin. With regard to Rembrandt's Balaam and the donkey, it is significant that tom Ring endowed his Balaam with the attributes of the prophet more than half a century before Rembrandt.

Models for Rembrandt's Balaam

Balaam and his donkey , Pieter Lastman , 1622, oil on panel, 41.3 × 60.3 cm, Israel Museum , Jerusalem
Laocoon group , 1st century BC BC, antique marble copy (original made of bronze), Vatican Museums

The question of which models Rembrandt used in his portrayal has repeatedly been raised. The Dutch art historian Cornelis Hofstede de Groot saw Dirk Jacobsz in a drawing. Vellerts the template from which Rembrandt took the depiction of Balaam and the donkey. He was followed by Kurt Bauch in his 1933 monograph The Art of Young Rembrandt . There is no evidence that Rembrandt knew this almost 100 year old drawing. In addition, very similar representations are known from early Christian times. There were repeated representations that show a striking resemblance to the pictures of Rembrandt or his teacher Lastman. Lastman's merit consists at least in the fact that he adopted the Balaam motif, which was previously limited to book illumination and graphic art, into panel painting .

Neither Hofstede de Groot nor Bauch knew the painting Balaam and his donkey by Pieter Lastman , which he painted only two years before Rembrandt's apprenticeship. In 1960, after the discovery of this work, Kurt Bauch emphatically took the view that Lastman's Balaam was the model of Rembrandt. Lastman's and Rembrandt's paintings have so many similar elements that there is no doubt that Rembrandt adopted Lastman's original. However, Rembrandt did not simply copy the original, but converted it from landscape to portrait format, which he preferred, enlarged the figures and thus condensed the plot into a smaller space. In addition, he placed greater emphasis on the interaction of the characters and the drama of the scene.

More recently, the art historian Jürgen Müller tried again to derive the Balaam motif from earlier implementations. He sees the Laocoon group in the Vatican Museums as a model for the editing by Lastman and Rembrandt . Soon after the group of figures was rediscovered in 1506, the motif began to influence the visual arts. The incorrect reconstruction with the arm extended upwards was used as a basis. One of the early adaptations is the caricaturing drawing by Dirk Jacobsz. Vellert from 1523. Several prints of the Balaam motif were based on this, which are also understood as an adaptation of the Laocoon group and which Pieter Lastman was familiar with. After all, Rembrandt himself owned a three-dimensional representation of the group of figures, which was recorded in his inventory on July 25 and 26, 1656 as Een antieckse Laechon . Nothing is known about the material, the size and the circumstances when and how they came into Rembrandt's possession. In any case, Rembrandt had the opportunity to study the group extensively.

In his Lastman monograph from 1911, the German art historian Kurt Freise (1884–1916) made extensive reference to Rembrandt's Balaam . He confirms his colleagues' finding that Rembrandt's Balaam was created by Lastman. He also developed a theory to explain that with Rembrandt the angel does not block the way, but approaches Balaam and the donkey from behind. Freise assumed that Rembrandt's Balaam is only a fragment, and that the angel was added in the “wrong” place after the loss of the left part of the picture. The original composition corresponded to that of Gerrit Claesz's painting The Donkey with the Prophet Balaam stopped by the angel . Bleker from the year 1634. In the light of more recent research, especially into Rembrandt's procurement of wooden panels in similar formats, this speculation proves to be baseless. However, it is certain that Bleker was based on Rembrandt's Balaam .

The pannier and its contents

Balaam and the donkey , detail

The bag shown was in his inventory of props and was repeatedly depicted by Rembrandt, for example on his Paulus in the prison of 1627 to the left of Paul, with the Two Old Men in Conversation (1628) in the lower right corner and on Jeremiah lamenting the destruction of Jerusalem ( 1630) on the right edge of the picture. The bag is a double bag made of flexible leather with two large compartments, each of which is closed by an overhanging leather flap. On at least one side there is an attached side pocket, which is also provided with a flap. On this side pocket, in turn, two small coin pockets, each with a fastening strap, are attached or incorporated. The flaps of the large compartments fall over the sides of the pannier, including the side pocket, and can be closed with a buckle at the bottom. On the narrow sides of the bag, a long strap is passed through two tabs. It is a shoulder bag that, slightly modified, functions as a pack bag on the Balaam . Such bags were probably the usual means of transport for documents and documents in Rembrandt's time, just as briefcases are nowadays, so that Rembrandt repeatedly painted them as attributes of scholars.

In Rembrandt's depiction of the pannier on the Balaam , it is noticeable that both the documents protruding from the bag and the staff are painted too large in relation to the bag. Rembrandt wanted to emphasize them and draw the viewer's attention to them. Characters recognizable on one of the documents were interpreted as biblical details. Since Rembrandt belonged to the small group of artists who used Hebrew characters in their paintings not only as a visual reference to Judaism, but also to carry meaning, the so far unsuccessful decoding could bring new knowledge.

Command staff of the governor of the Dutch West India Company , 17th century, ivory and gold, 37.2 × 3.8 cm, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam

The staff offered Rembrandt the opportunity to reconnect the motif of Balaam and the donkey , as in earlier Christian art, with Balaam's prophecy: a star rises in Jacob, a scepter rises in Israel . For Rembrandt, unlike his medieval predecessors, depicting a star was out of the question because the scene takes place during the day. What remained was the representation of a scepter , with Rembrandt based on a translation of the Bible that did not use the word scepter . In the Vulgate the term is virga ( Num 22.17  VUL ). The term was translated by Martin Luther with scepter and included in the Luther Bible . All Reformed Bible editions of the 16th century also used the term scepter . This also includes the Deux Aes Bible, which appeared in Emden in 1562 and of which Rembrandt is said to have had an edition, and the state translation published in 1637 . The 1548 published Catholic Louvain Bible of Nicolaas van Winghe based on the Vulgate, and the Louvain Bible published in 1599 Moerentorf Bible was derived. Both Dutch Bibles do not translate virga with scepter , but with roete , i.e. stick . This translation is also appropriate in connection with the Bible text, because Balaam's prophecy is not about royal representation, but about a military victory. In the 17th century, the staff was a common insignia of state power, as the command staff of military leaders or the governors of the Dutch West India Company . Portraits from this period repeatedly show the person depicted with a command baton, including Rembrandt's painting A Polish Nobleman from 1637.

The Dutch art historian Pieter JJ van Thiel , one of the founders of the Rembrandt Research Project, published an essay in 2008 with an iconological interpretation of Balaam's panniers and their contents. Van Thiel emphasized that Rembrandt reconnected Balaam's encounter with the angel and Balaam's messianic prophecy, which was previously represented by a star. As a result, he has significantly enriched the centuries-old Balaam iconography .

reception

The donkey with the prophet Balaam stopped by the angel , Gerrit Claesz. Bleker , 1634, oil on canvas, 95.5 × 128.5 cm, Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum , Rotterdam
Balaam and his donkey , Barent Fabritius , 1672, oil on canvas, 49.0 × 39.5 cm, private collection

Since Rembrandt's Balaam and the Donkey were hidden from the public eye for several centuries, there are probably no derivative works. Later adaptations of the Balaam motif by Dutch painters reveal no compelling references to Rembrandt's work. Balaam and the donkey did not appear on the art market and in art historical literature until the beginning of the 20th century. The painting was always considered authentic by the leading art historians and Rembrandt connoisseurs of the early 20th century, Wilhelm Bode, Wilhelm Reinhold Valentiner , Wilhelm Martin and Abraham Bredius, the iconography is clear and the provenance is incompletely but conclusively documented. Only Cornelis Hofstede de Groot questioned Rembrandt's authorship until Rembrandt's signature was discovered on the painting. He then added the painting with the numbers 26 and 26a to his catalog raisonné. For 26a he only gave the reference to a document about the auction in December 1641 and left open the possibility that this report referred to another picture. The painting with the number 437 is listed in Abraham Bredius' catalog raisonné from 1935. Kurt Bauch awarded number 1 in 1966 for the earliest known work at the time. Horst Gerson took number 437 in his editing of the new edition of Bredius' directory and included the picture in his own catalog with number 6. Christian Tümpel lists the Balaam as number 1 in his catalog published in 1986.

In 1982, Balaam and the Donkey were named by the members of the Rembrandt Research Project in the first volume of their Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings as a well-preserved, characteristic work from the year 1626 that was reliably signed and dated. The assessment was confirmed in the sixth volume in 2015.

Provenance

Portrait of François Langlois , Claude Vignon , ca.1621, oil on canvas, 80 × 67 cm, Davis Museum at Wellesley College , Massachusetts, USA

In November 1641, the Parisian painter and art dealer Claude Vignon wrote a letter to his friend, the Parisian publisher and art dealer François Langlois , who was on a journey at the time. Vignon informed Langlois that the day before he had valued Alfonso López's collection, which was due to be auctioned in mid-December. He asked his friend, the painter Cornelis van Poelenburgh and - if he met him there - Anthonis van Dyck in London, Moses van Uyttenbroeck in The Hague, Gerrit van Honthorst in Utrecht and Rembrandt in Amsterdam to convey his greetings and some pictures by van Uyttenbroeck and to bring something from Rembrandt. He should inform him that Vignon had valued his painting of the prophet Balaam the day before, which López had bought from him and which would also be auctioned in December. Alfonso López was a Sephardic cloth and diamond dealer and served Cardinal Richelieu as a financial and secret agent in the Netherlands. He also appeared as an art collector and in 1639 acquired the Balaam painted 13 years earlier from Rembrandt . No copy of the printed catalog for auction has survived. Nothing is known about the following owners until the early 20th century. When Vignon's letter was first published in 1894, Ernst Wilhelm Moes concluded his contribution by asking where Rembrandt's Balaam had gone.

The first proven owner in the 20th century was the Dutch painter and later art dealer Simon Maris , who, according to Abraham Bredius, bought the painting in an Amsterdam maison galante , i.e. a brothel , for 100 guilders, possibly for an even lower price. Maris initially thought the painting was a work by Pieter Lastman. From Bredius, then director of the Mauritshuis , he learned that he had acquired an original by Rembrandt. Because of the poor condition of the painting, the two agreed that Bredius should bring the picture to Alois Hauser , the chief restorer of the Berlin Gemäldegalerie . Wilhelm Bode saw it there , who was also convinced of Rembrandt's authorship. During the restoration, Maris sold the painting to the Amsterdam art dealer Eduard Goudstikker for 8000 guilders .

Goudstikker sold the picture to Gustav Ritter Hoschek von Mühlheim in Prague, who was named by Bode as the owner in 1905. It was listed in the catalog of Hoschek's collection in 1907 with the number 101. In 1909 the painting with the collection of the late Hoschek was auctioned by the Viennese art salon Gustav Pisko , but it was not listed in the catalog of the public auction in March 1909. The next proven owner was the Parisian art dealer François Kleinberger, whose company specialized in the transatlantic art trade. Kleinberger sold the painting to the New York banker and art collector Ferdinand Hermann. After Hermann's death, his collection was auctioned on January 15, 1918 by the American Art Association . The buyer was the married couple Ernest Cognacq and Marie-Louise Jaÿ . Cognac bequeathed the art collection, including Balaam and the donkey , to the city of Paris in 1928. In accordance with the wishes of the donor couple, the Musée Cognacq-Jay was opened in 1929 , and the painting has been in their possession ever since.

Exhibitions (chronological)

  • Rijksmuseum Amsterdam , Netherlands. Rembrandt tentoonstelling (German: Rembrandt exhibition ), July 13 to October 13, 1935, catalog no. 1.
  • Louvre , Paris, France. Rembrandt. Étude photographique et radiographique (German: Rembrandt. Photographic and radiographical study ), 1955 to 1956, catalog no. 11.
  • Museum De Lakenhal , Leiden, Netherlands. Exhibition Rembrandt als leermeester (German: Rembrandt als Lehrmeister ), June 1 to September 1, 1956, catalog no. 7th
  • Petit Palais / Musee des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris, France. Exhibition Le siècle de Rembrandt. Tableaux hollandais des collections publiques françaises (German: Rembrandt's Century. Dutch panel painting from public collections in France ), November 17, 1970 to February 15, 1971, catalog no. 167.
  • Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Netherlands. Hollandse schilderijen uit Franse musea (German: Dutch paintings from French museums ), March 6, 1971 to May 23, 1971, catalog no. 7th
  • Grand Palais , Paris, France. Exhibition De la Bible à nos jours. 3000 ans d'art. 96e exposition Société des artistes indépendants (German: From the Bible to our time. 3000 years of art. 96th exhibition of the Société des Artistes Indépendants ), June 6th to July 28th 1985, catalog no. 234.
  • Musee Cognacq-Jay , Paris, France. Exhibition La patine du temps (German: The Traces of Time ), September 11th to December 30th, 2012.
  • Musée Jacquemart-André , Paris, France. Exhibition Rembrandt intime , September 16, 2016 to January 23, 2017, catalog no. 2.

literature

Web links

Commons : Balaam and the Donkey  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. I. , pp. 79-80.
  2. ↑ a b c d Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. I. , p. 76.
  3. ↑ a b c Wilhelm Bode: Newly discovered Rembrandt pictures . In: Zeitschrift für bildende Kunst 1905/06, New Series Volume 17, pp. 8-14, ZDB -ID 202971-6 .
  4. ↑ a b c d e Cornelis Hofstede de Groot: Descriptive and critical directory of the works of the most outstanding Dutch painters of the XVII. Century. Sixth volume. Paul Neff, Esslingen a. N. - Paris 1915, works 26 and 26a (both related to this painting), p. 20, digitized, Heidelberg University Library .
  5. ↑ Cornelis Hofstede de Groot: Descriptive and critical directory of the works of the most outstanding Dutch painters of the XVII. Century. Sixth volume, work 262, p. 137, digitized, Heidelberg University Library .
  6. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Peter JJ van Thiel: De bijzondere iconografie van Rembrandt's Balaam . In: Oud Holland. Quarterly for Dutch Art History 2008, Volume 121, No. 4, pp. 197-214, doi: 10.1163 / 187501708788426684 .
  7. ↑ Arthur Spanier : BILEAM . In: Georg Herlitz and Bruno Kirschner (eds.): Jüdisches Lexikon , Volume 1 AC. Jüdischer Verlag, Berlin 1927, column 1042-1043, digitized version . http: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fsammlungen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de%2Ffreimann%2Fcontent%2Fpageview%2F362874~GB%3D~IA%3D~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ% 3D ~ double-sided% 3D ~ LT% 3D ~ PUR% 3D
  8. ↑ David Sander : BALAK . In: Georg Herlitz and Bruno Kirschner (eds.): Jüdisches Lexikon , Volume 1 AC. Jewish publishing house, Berlin 1927, column 688, digitized version . http: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fsammlungen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de%2Ffreimann%2Fcontent%2Fpageview%2F362655~GB%3D~IA%3D~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ% 3D ~ double-sided% 3D ~ LT% 3D ~ PUR% 3D
  9. ^ Ernst van de Wetering: Rembrandt, a biography. In: Gemäldegalerie der Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (Ed.): Rembrandt. Genius in search. DuMont Literature and Art, Cologne 2006, ISBN 3-8321-7694-2 , pp. 21–49.
  10. ^ Christian Tümpel: Rijn, Rembrandt Harmenszoon van (1606–1669) . In: Gerhard Müller et al. (Ed.): Theological real encyclopedia. Volume XXIX. : Psychology of Religion - Samaritans . Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York 1998, ISBN 3-11-016127-3 , pp. 200-208, especially pp. 202-203.
  11. ↑ a b Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. VI. Rembrandt's Paintings Revisited. A Complete Survey. Springer Science + Business Media, Dordrecht 2015, ISBN 978-94-017-9173-1 , pp. 483-484.
  12. ^ Chapter I. Towards a reconstruction of Rembrandt's art theory. The advantage of the small-scale history paintings. In: Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. V. The Small-Scale History Paintings . Springer, Dordrecht 2011, ISBN 978-1-4020-4607-0 , pp. 3-14.
  13. ↑ Balaam & the star of Bethlehem , Early Church History website (English, with illustrations), accessed October 10, 2019.
  14. ^ William Horbury: Scenes from the Old Testament. Balaam and the Angel . Lecture at Trinity College of the University of Cambridge , February 14, 2016 digitizedhttp: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Ftrinitycollegechapel.com%2Fmedia%2Ffilestore%2Fsermons%2F2016-2-14-WilliamHorbury.pdf~GB%3D~IA%3D~MDZ%3D%0A~ SZ% 3D ~ double-sided% 3D ~ LT% 3D ~ PUR% 3D .
  15. ↑ Marta Poza Yagüe: La burra de Balaam . In: Revista Digital de Iconografía Medieval 2011, Vol. III, Nº 5, pp. 1–9, digitizedhttp: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3Dhttps%3A%2F%2Fwww.ucm.es%2Fdata%2Fcont%2Fdocs%2F621-2013-11-21-3.%2520Balaam.pdf~GB%3D~IA%3D ~ MDZ% 3D% 0A ~ SZ% 3D ~ double-sided% 3D ~ LT% 3D ~ PUR% 3D .
  16. ↑ a b c Jürgen Müller: Een antieckse Laechon . In: the same: The Socratic artist. Studies on Rembrandt's Night Watch . Brill, Leiden and Boston 2015, ISBN 978-90-04-28525-5 , pp. 167-178.
    Jürgen Müller: Albrecht Dürer's Peasant Engravings: A Different Laocoön, or the Birth of Aesthetic Subversion in the Spirit of the Reformation . In: Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art 2000, Volume 3, No. 1, doi: 10.5092 / jhna.2011.3.1.2 .
  17. ^ A b Franklin W. Robinson: A Note on the Visual Tradition of Balaam and his Ass . In: Oud Holland 1969, Volume 84, No. 2/3, pp. 238-244, JSTOR 42712355 .
  18. ↑ No. 169. Rembrandt's inventory . In: Cornelis Hofstede de Groot (ed.): The documents about Rembrandt (1575-1721) . The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff 1906, pp. 189–211, inventory no. 329, digitized . http: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3D~GB%3D~IA%3Dgri_33125001748371~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ%3Dn217~ double-sided%3D~LT%3D~PUR%3D
  19. ↑ Nicolaas Beets: Dirick Jacobsz. Vellert. Signs of Antwerp. IV. Teekeningen after 1520 . In: Onze Kunst. Voortzetting van de Vlaamsche School 1912, part XXII, pp. 133–152, digitizedhttp: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3D~GB%3D~IA%3Donzekunst22antw~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ%3Dn191~ double-sided%3D~LT%3D~PUR%3D .
  20. ^ Kurt Freise: Pieter Lastman. His life and his art. A contribution to the history of the Dutch. Painting in the XVII. Century. Klinkhardt and Hermann, Leipzig 1911, pp. 261–263, digitizedhttp: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3D~GB%3D~IA%3Dpieterlastmansei00freiuoft~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ%3D261~ double-sided%3D~LT%3D~PUR%3D .
  21. ↑ Mirjam Alexander-Knotter: An Ingenious Device: Rembrandt's Use of Hebrew Inscriptions . In: Studia Rosenthaliana 1999, Volume 33, No. 2, pp. 131-159, JSTOR 41482409 .
  22. ↑ Hans-Martin Rotermund: Rembrandt's Bible . In: Netherlands Yearbook for History of Art / Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 1957, Volume 8, No. 1, pp. 123–150, doi: 10.1163 / 22145966-90000305 .
  23. ^ Wilhelm Reinhold Valentiner: Opmerkingen over enkele schilderijen van Rembrandt . In: Onze Kunst. Voortzetting van de Vlaamsche School 1907, Part XI, pp. 157-168, digitizedhttp: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3D~GB%3D~IA%3Donzekunst11antw~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ%3Dn201~ double-sided%3D~LT%3D~PUR%3D .
  24. ↑ a b c Abraham Bredius: Rembrandt's Balaam. In: The Burlington Magazine 1913, Vol. 23, No. 121, p. 59, JSTOR 859375 .
  25. ↑ a b Abraham Bredius: Rembrandt. Schilderijen. W. de Haan, Utrecht 1935, digitized version, Heidelberg University Library . German: Rembrandt. Painting. Phaidon-Verlag, Vienna 1935. English: The Paintings of Rembrandt. London 1937, plant no.437.
  26. ↑ Kurt Bauch : Rembrandt. Painting. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1966, Reprint 2018, ISBN 978-3-11-005007-3 , No. 1.
  27. ↑ Abraham Bredius: Rembrandt. The complete edition of the paintings. Third edition. Revised by Horst Gerson. Phaidon, London 1969, ISBN 0-7148-1341-9 , work no.437.
  28. ^ Horst Gerson: Rembrandt paintings. Meulenhoff International, Amsterdam 1968. German: Rembrandt paintings. Complete works. Vollmer, Wiesbaden 1968, work no.6.
  29. ^ Christian Tümpel : Rembrandt. Myth and Method. With contributions by Astrid Tümpel . Mercatorfonds, Antwerp 1986, ISBN 90-6153-165-9 .
  30. ↑ No. 90. Rembrandt's prophet Balaam assessed in Paris . In: Cornelis Hofstede de Groot (ed.): The documents about Rembrandt (1575-1721) . The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff 1906, pp. 116-118, digitized . http: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3D~GB%3D~IA%3Dgri_33125001748371~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ%3Dn183~ double-sided%3D~LT%3D~PUR%3D
  31. ^ Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. I. , pp. 80-81.
  32. ^ Ernst Wilhelm Moes: A letter from art historical Beteekenis . In: Oud Holland - Journal for Art of the Low Countries 1894, Volume 12, No. 1, pp. 238-240, doi: 10.1163 / 187501794X00224 .
  33. ↑ Steven Nadler: Rembrandt's Jews . University of Chicago Press, Chicago 2003, ISBN 0-226-56736-2 , pp. 77-78.
  34. ↑ a b American Art Association (Ed.): Illustrated catalog of the very valuable paintings by ancient and modern masters collected by the late Ferdinand Hermann . American Art Association, New York 1918, lot no.165, digitizedhttp: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3D~GB%3D~IA%3Db1507163~MDZ%3D%0A~SZ%3Dn134~ double-sided%3D~LT%3D~PUR%3D (auction catalog January 8, 1918).
  35. ↑ a b Rembrandt. Balaam and the ass, 1626 gedateerd on the website of the RKD - Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis , accessed on October 9, 2019.
  36. ^ Wilhelm Martin: Galerie Gustav Ritter Hoschek von Mühlheim in Prague. Descriptive directory of ancient paintings . Self-published, Prague 1907, No. 101.
  37. ^ Art Salon G. Pisko (Ed.): Paintings of old masters. Collection Gustav Ritter Hoschek von Mühlheim †, Prague , auction catalog. Self-published, Vienna 1909, digitized version, Heidelberg University Library .