The five senses

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The five senses (Rembrandt van Rijn)
The five senses
Rembrandt van Rijn , 1624/1625
5 paintings, one of which is missing, oil on oak

The five senses is a five-part cycle of oil paintings by the Dutch painter Rembrandt van Rijn . The pictures were created in 1624 or 1625 and are the earliest known works by Rembrandt, who is just 18 or 19 years old. At this pointhe was studyingwith Pieter Lastman for half a yearor had just finished it.

Four of the paintings were rediscovered in the 20th and 21st centuries, three of which are in the Leiden Collection in New York City and one in the De Lakenhal Museum in Leiden . The fifth painting is lost, and although almost nothing is known about its appearance, its earlier existence as part of the cycle is beyond doubt.

The panel paintings are made in portrait format on oak and originally had dimensions of around 21.5 × 17.7 centimeters. At a later time, parts were added all around so that the formats reached around 32 × 25 centimeters. The new margins and adjacent parts of the originals were painted over in such a way that the representation was expanded to fit the larger format. The additions to three pictures were removed during restorations. The removed parts of one of these pictures are still preserved and stored. The fourth painting was simply provided with a frame that hides the additions.

The originality of the paintings has been questioned again and again for decades. The Rembrandt Research Project included the then known pictures in 1982 as the first three paintings in group B of their catalog raisonné, as Rembrandt's authorship could neither be proven nor refuted. Later dendrochronological investigations could show that the wooden panels came from the early 17th century. Even before the fourth painting was discovered, the pictures were attributed to Rembrandt. The signature of Rembrandt on the fourth painting found in 2015 is the earliest known signature of Rembrandt and it dispelled all doubts about the authenticity of the entire cycle.

Picture descriptions

The three singers (listening) (Rembrandt van Rijn)
The three singers (listening)
Rembrandt van Rijn , 1624/1625
Oil on oak
21.6 x 17.8 cm
The Leiden Collection , New York City

The three singers (listening)

The painting shows three people, a middle-aged couple and a young man, singing together. In the right foreground sits at a wooden table a man with balding hair and no headgear. He wears a blue-gray cloth coat, the edges of which are trimmed with fur, a light-colored scarf and small reading glasses on his nose. Only the upper half of the body is visible. On the table is a large open book, the right side of which rests flat on the table and the left side on the man's arm to make it easier for his companions to read. The man's right hand is raised slightly, as if to set a beat or to draw attention to something with a gesture. On his right, in the middle of the picture, sits a woman of about the same age, leaning forward. She is dressed in a white wool dress and a brightly colored turban. Her two hands are placed one on top of the other to the right of the book, the proportions are unnaturally distorted, so that the hands can almost be assigned to a person standing outside the picture. Behind the couple is a dark-clad young man with a black beret, who is covered except for his face and part of his left chest, and who looks over the woman into the book. He was identified as Jan Lievens , with whom Rembrandt worked repeatedly.

The wooden panel has the format 21.6 × 17.8 cm and is painted with oil paint on Baltic oak wood with vertical grain, which could be dendrochronologically dated to the early 17th century. The wood comes from the same tree as that for The Head Operation (Feeling) . At the time the picture was discovered, parts were pieced all around to form a frame and bring the overall dimensions to 31.6 × 25.0 cm . 8.6 cm at the top, 1.4 cm at the bottom and 3.6 cm at the sides were added. The resulting enlarged base was painted on the back and the painting expanded to include the attached parts. The young man was given a right arm pointing outside the picture, a candlestick with a burning candle at the bottom left and a curtain at the top left. In the background a window opening, a wooden bookshelf, a lute and a large recorder were added to the wall, and a chair back to the right behind the man. The additions also extended to the original painting as overpainting, as the painter wanted to convincingly combine his work with the original. In 1988 the painting was largely restored to its original state, the removed additions are still in the Leiden Collection.

The passed out patient (smelling) (Rembrandt van Rijn)
The passed out patient (smelling)
Rembrandt van Rijn , 1624/1625
Oil on oak
31.7 x 25.4 cm
The Leiden Collection , New York City

The passed out patient (smelling)

The painting shows three people, in the foreground a young man wrapped in a brightly striped dressing gown, who has apparently passed out and is sitting on a chair leaning backwards. His right arm is bared and rests in the hand of a barber or bath, covered with a white cloth, who apparently wanted to perform a bloodletting . The barber is dressed in a gray-blue and lavender striped doublet. He wears a purple headgear with a white lower edge, and two gold chains hang around his neck. In the background between the two actors stands an old woman dressed in a dark fur-trimmed hooded coat. She looks extremely worried and holds a white cloth under the unconscious youth's nose, which is apparently soaked with a strong-smelling solution and is supposed to bring the patient out of his fainting. In the background there is a wooden shelf with numerous barber's tools on the left and a cupboard with a half-open door on the right. On its side is a slightly wavy portrait of a man in a fur hat. This portrait bears the signature RHF (for Rembrandt Harmenszoon Fecit , German: Rembrandt, Sohn des Harmen, made it ) on its upper left corner .

The wooden panel has the format 20.6 × 17.8 cm and is painted with oil paint on Baltic oak wood with vertical grain, which could be dated to the early 17th century. The wood comes from the same tree as that of the head surgery (feel) . At the time the picture was discovered, parts were pieced all around to form a frame and bring the overall dimensions to 31.75 × 25.4 cm . 9.5 cm at the top, 1.6 cm at the bottom and 3.8 cm on each side were added. The back of the new base was varnished and the painting was expanded to include the attached parts. As with the other three well-known pictures of the cycle, independent motifs have been added to the unconscious patient , and the figures of the barber and the youth are no longer cut off on the left and right. There is now a bust on a table to the left of the barber. The open shelf with the barber's utensils has been enlarged significantly upwards and a reptile, probably a crocodile, hangs on the wall above in the middle of the background. The cupboard on the right in the picture has been enlarged so that it is now visible in full height. The chair on which the patient is sitting has been given a backrest. The color of the additions has darkened more than that of the original picture and when the picture was discovered the most extensive damage to the paint layer was on them.

Overall, the painting was covered with a thick layer of dirt and heavily darkened varnish, and in numerous places there had been peeling and loss of color. In 2016 the painting was restored. The parts added in the 18th century were not removed. For the exhibition, they were covered with a frame that can be opened if necessary and then reveals the additions.

Taste
Rembrandt van Rijn , 1624/1625
Oil on oak
lost

Taste

In the professional world there is no doubt that Rembrandt's cycle was painted with depictions of all five senses and that all paintings have the same format, depict three main characters and are similar in color. The representation of taste is lost. The surprising discovery of the fourth painting from the cycle in US private ownership feeds the hope that the motif of tasting has survived the centuries and will be found again at some point.

The glasses seller (seeing) (Rembrandt van Rijn)
The glasses seller (seeing)
Rembrandt van Rijn , 1624/1625
Oil on oak
21.0 x 17.8 cm
Museum De Lakenhal , Leiden

The glasses seller (seeing)

Like its counterparts, the painting shows three people in the foreground. The representation is dominated by the half-figure of a glasses salesman standing on the right and facing his customer to the left. He is dressed in a pink doublet with yellow stripes on the upper arm and wears a multi-colored striped scarf wrapped around his head in a turban-like manner. He carries a voluminous vendor's tray on wide straps, in which there are numerous lorgnons , lorgnets or glasses with red, yellow and white striped ribbons. He holds his left hand behind his back, with his right hand he gives the person opposite, an old man with a bulbous nose, a gray beard and a fur hat, a pince-nez , that is, iron-on glasses. The customer takes it in his right hand and points to his nose with his left hand. Between these two men, slightly pushed into the background, stands an old woman. Apart from the black headscarf, all that can be seen of her is her face with a badly fitting pince-nez on her nose and still squinted eyes and the hand raised as if to grope in the direction of the dealer. The scene gives the impression that the ineffectiveness of the glasses on offer should be made clear (or as if the man were wondering whether the pince-nez would even fit his bulbous nose). In the background two other men are depicted in a shadowy manner, but they seem to have no relation to the motif in the foreground.

The wooden panel has the format 21.0 × 17.8 cm and is painted with oil paint on Baltic oak wood with vertical grain from the early 17th century. An X-ray examination of the painting revealed that the base initially carried the female nude by an unknown painter, which Rembrandt had painted over. In the 18th century, parts were pieced all around to enlarge the picture to 32.8 × 25.3 cm . 10.3 cm at the top, 1.5 cm at the bottom and 3.8 cm on each side were added. The back of the enlarged base was varnished and the painting expanded to include the attached parts. The half-figure of the customer, only two-thirds visible on the left in Rembrandt's original, was shown with the addition in full width, including the angled right arm. Above him, at the top left, is a dark curtain gathered to the left and hanging diagonally. Behind the glasses salesman, on the right edge of the picture, a table with an oval framed mirror was added. For one of the shadowy figures in the background it can be seen that she is leaving the room through a door on the right in the picture. Here, too, the additions ran as overpainting into the original painting. In the upper area of ​​the additions, large areas of the paint application, including the primer, had fallen off so that the substrate was exposed. In the course of a restoration in 1992, the additions and overpaintings from the 18th century were removed again.

The head operation (feeling) (Rembrandt van Rijn)
The head operation (feeling)
Rembrandt van Rijn , 1624/1625
Oil on oak
21.5 x 17.7 cm
The Leiden Collection , New York City

The head operation (feeling)

The picture shows the half-length of an older man with a bald head and pronounced whiskers, who is sitting on a chair tilted slightly backwards. He wears dark clothes and no headgear; a white cloth is wrapped around his upper body. His face is contorted with pain and he holds his clenched hands in front of his chest. Behind him stands a barber , dressed in a pink tappert with blue stripes and a purple turban. He makes an incision with a scalpel above the patient's left ear . On the right of the picture is the barber's assistant who is also wearing a pink tappert. As headgear he wears a multi-colored striped turban, the loose end of which hangs down over his left shoulder. The helper looks intently at the operating area and lights it up with a candle holder. In front of his arm with the candlestick is a quiver-like container with various surgical instruments.

The painting in the format 21.5 × 17.7 cm is painted with oil paint on Baltic oak wood with vertical grain, which could be dendrochronologically dated to the early 17th century. At the time the picture was discovered, parts were broken up all around, so that a total of 31.7 × 25.3 cm was achieved. The top was 8.6 cm, the bottom 1.6 cm and 3.8 cm on the sides. As with the other paintings in the cycle, new elements were added to the expansion of the picture, a pot on a stove on the left edge of the picture, behind it a cupboard shelf with bottles and other objects, in the background a niche and a wooden shelf with a jug, pots and other bottles . The figure of the assistant was completed on the right edge of the picture and the patient's left lower leg was lengthened. In contrast to The Three Singers (Hearing) , the lighting and the shadows were not fundamentally changed, but only slightly increased, since the light source was already in Rembrandt's original. In 1988, the painting was largely restored to its original state, the additions that were removed have been lost.

interpretation

The paintings each represent one of the classic five human senses . Allegories of the five senses were popular motifs in Dutch painting in the early 17th century. One of the most important representations is a five-part cycle painted between 1617 and 1618 by Jan Brueghel the Elder and his friend Peter Paul Rubens , in which Brueghel was responsible for the scenery and Rubens for the figures. The completely preserved cycle is in the Museo del Prado in Madrid.

Compared to Brueghel and Rubens, Rembrandt finds his own form for the representation of the allegories, each with three figures acting in a very small space, whose surroundings are almost meaningless and barely visible. However, the individual representations also have deeper meanings that were obvious to the contemporary observer, but are no longer understood today.

  • The five senses by Jan Brueghel the Elder and Peter Paul Rubens

  • Hear , 1617-1618

  • Smell , 1617-1618

  • Taste , 1618

  • See , 1617

  • Feel , 1618

The glasses seller , Adriaen van Ostade , etching, around 1646
Removal of the Madness Stone , Jan Steen , 1655–1675, Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum , Rotterdam

The three singers (listening)

In his portrayal of the singing trio of different ages, Rembrandt mocks this age difference. Contemporary proverbs highlight the discrepancy between lovely music and the discordant sounds produced by the throat of an old woman singing.

The passed out patient (smelling)

It was not uncommon in the 17th century for barbers to have an assortment of strong-smelling substances that were used to wake passed out patients. These olfactory salts or solutions were mostly based on ammonium carbonate and were widely used from the 17th to the early 20th century. Rembrandt's portrayal of the unconscious patient was interpreted in the literature as a fainting after a phlebotomy , which occurred frequently and was regarded as a sign of the success of the treatment. The absence of a wound and a wound dressing, the absence of traces of blood on the white cloth, and other indications that treatment has already been carried out suggest that the patient passed out before treatment began. Rembrandt mocks both the barber and quack profession as well as the youth who fainted for fear of the upcoming treatment.

The glasses seller (seeing)

The Dutch idiom to put glasses on someone's nose (“Ymamd een bril op den neus zetten”) meant in the 17th century to play badly or torment someone, in the sense of also joking deception, but also in the sense of fraud . The phrase selling glasses to someone ("Verkopen Ymand glasses"), which simply meant cheating on someone, had an even more negative connotation . They gave the widespread view that the mostly peddling glasses salesmen are fraudsters. The glasses seller was part of everyday life, so that he was often made the subject of contemporary prints.

The head operation (feeling)

In the Dutch vernacular of the 17th century, “en kei in het hoofd” (literally: a pebble in the head ) describes the state of mental illness. A multitude of representations in the visual arts thematize the wandering quack, who appears to be performing a head operation and then presents patients and the audience with an allegedly removed insane stone . A treatment of the subject by the Dutch painter Jan Steen clearly shows the deception: A boy brings the quack's helper, who shows the audience the stones that were supposedly removed after the operation, a basket with new pebbles. In addition, the procedure and its name stone cutting can also have a medical background. Boils are called in Dutch "Steenpuist" and its opening for pressure relief is a useful therapy.

background

Old woman looking at a coin in the light of a lantern (sight or greed) , Gerrit van Honthorst , 1623, The Kremer Collection

After eight years of schooling in Leiden , Rembrandt began studying at the philosophical faculty of the University of Leiden , which he broke off after a short time. In 1620 he began a three and a half year training with the painter Jacob Isaacsz van Swanenburgh from Leiden , who himself had been trained in Italy and is known for his depictions of hell . Thematically, he left no traces in Rembrandt's work. It is possible that he learned from him the expressive chiaroscuro , the play with light and shadow that later characterized his work. In 1624 Rembrandt went to Amsterdam to study with Pieter Lastman . Although this second apprenticeship only lasted half a year, Lastman exerted a greater artistic influence on Rembrandt than van Swanenburgh.

Ernst van de Wetering speculated that the cycle was created during or shortly after Rembrandt's training with his first teacher Jacob Isaacsz van Swanenburgh in Leiden, at least before he moved to Amsterdam and continued his training under Pieter Lastman. Rembrandt and Jan Lievens may have been running a joint studio at the time. Lievens, who was a year older than him, had finished his training with Pieter Lastman in 1620, four years before Rembrandt started his there. In comparison with Rembrandt's Christ drives the money changers out of the temple of 1626, the more carefully worked ears, forehead wrinkles and hands in that picture are striking. The same applies in comparison with the figures of the music making society in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, also painted in 1626 . These small flaws in the details, the overall well thought-out but coarse composition and the imbalanced application of paint lead to the conclusion that this is a very early work by Rembrandt. Parallels to work by the Utrecht School from the first half of the 1620s are also striking. The multi-colored striped cloth wrapped around the woman's head like a turban and the lighting are reminiscent of some portraits of women by Gerrit van Honthorst painted around 1623 . With its inconspicuously attached monogram RHF , The Impotent Patient (Smelling) is the earliest work signed by Rembrandt.

Later enlargements

Young woman on a balcony, in the background the Blauwpoort in Leiden, Gerrit Dou and his workshop, around 1664, oil on oak, 38.0 × 29.5 cm, National Gallery, Prague. Left section of the insert measuring 18.8 × 14 cm. Young woman on a balcony, in the background the Blauwpoort in Leiden, Gerrit Dou and his workshop, around 1664, oil on oak, 38.0 × 29.5 cm, National Gallery, Prague. Left section of the insert measuring 18.8 × 14 cm.
Young woman on a balcony, in the background the Blauwpoort in Leiden , Gerrit Dou and his workshop, around 1664, oil on oak, 38.0 × 29.5 cm, National Gallery, Prague . Left section of the insert measuring 18.8 × 14 cm.

The four surviving images of the cycle and the expulsion of the money changers from the temple from the Pushkin Museum were supplemented in the early 18th century by adding wooden strips of different widths all around and painting the back of the enlarged base. The original paintings were expanded at the edges, some of them were painted over so that a coherent overall picture emerged from the existing painting and the additions. The carpentry and painting were done by the same people on all five paintings, and at least the wood for the extension of the three paintings on display in the Leiden Collection today came from the same tree. In the course of restorations, the additions to three paintings in the Senses cycle were removed; some of them are stored in the Leiden Collection. The removal of the overpainting was a great challenge for the Dutch restorer Menno Dooijes, one problem was the much stronger adhesion of the overpainting to the original paint compared to their adhesion to the primer. The fourth picture, discovered in 2015, was left in its enlarged state, but in the exhibition the additions are hidden by a frame.

Before dendrochronology made it possible to date the wood of paintings, individual art historians believed that the extensions had been painted by Rembrandt himself. The view was taken that the enlarged paintings were an implementation of a composition by Rembrandt that was planned from the start. Other art historians saw changes by Rembrandt's hand in the enlargements, but these were made later. A third, now refuted assessment was that the paintings as a whole were not by Rembrandt. In the 17th century painting in Leiden, pictures were repeatedly painted on a wooden surface consisting of a small wooden plate with a surrounding frame. Examples of such composite documents have come down to us from Rembrandt's pupil Gerrit Dou and in particular from his pupil Frans van Mieris the Elder . Nothing certain is known about the reasons for such enlargements; it may have been about adapting an existing work to a changed aesthetic perception. With regard to Rembrandt's five senses and the similarly increased expulsion of money changers from the temple , the question was raised whether the additions made in the 18th century were replacing parts already added by Rembrandt. Then the pictures would be early examples of the technique of assembled documents later used by Dou and van Mieris .

  • The five senses as they were before the restoration, with additions made later

  • The three singers (listening)

  • The passed out patient (smelling)

  • The glasses seller (seeing)

  • The head operation (feeling)

reception

The foot operation , Rembrandt, 1628/29, private collection

The three singers (hearing) was discovered as the first picture in the cycle by the Swiss art historian Hans Schneider . This was followed by the first publication on one of the paintings in the cycle, a mention by the art historian Vitale Bloch in an essay on the early Rembrandt published in January 1933. Bloch was absolutely convinced of the authenticity of the work, which is truly not a masterpiece , and realized that the singing is part of a series with representations of the five senses. He also recognized the shortcomings, so he pointed out the additions made later and the strange figure of the young man. In 1935 Abraham Bredius included the picture in his catalog raisonné, titled it as reading by candlelight and classified it in the cycle of the five senses with Rembrandt's foot operation , which was supposedly painted about five years later .

The authenticity of the five senses was repeatedly questioned, especially since the first three known works were neither signed nor dated. The art historian Jakob Rosenberg rejected the attribution of the Three Singers to Rembrandt, and his colleague Kurt Bauch suggested Gerard Dou as the author.

The members of the Rembrandt Research Project (RRP) classified the three paintings of the 1982 cycle known at the time in the first volume of their corpus in group B; this was the first publication for the glasses seller . Group B includes works for which Rembrandt's authorship can neither be proven nor refuted. According to the RRP, the paintings could only be considered authentic if they were made very early on, but in the absence of comparative material from this period these can only be hypotheses.

In 1984, the art historian Gary Schwartz expressed the presumption, which is now repeatedly refuted by dendrochronological investigations, that Rembrandt himself made the enlargements of the paintings in the cycle after their completion. Christian Tümpel regarded all three paintings in the cycle known at the time as works by an unknown early successor to Rembrandt. In the fourth volume of the Corpus published in 2005 , the RRP only briefly stated in a correction notification that after the restoration that had taken place in the meantime (which included a reduction to the original state), no doubts about the authenticity of the images were justified. In the sixth volume, Ernst van de Wetering gave a somewhat more detailed expression in 2015 and confirmed the attribution to Rembrandt, which is now generally recognized.

Provenances

The three singers (listening)

A calm sea with ships close to the beach , Jan van de Cappelle , oil on canvas, 57 × 66 cm, 17th century, private property

In 1930 the hitherto completely unknown painting was seen in Dieren by Vitale Bloch, presumably in the possession of the Dutch art dealer Nathan Katz . In January 1933, when it was first published, it was in the collection of the Dutch banker Cornelis Johannes Karel van Aalst in Hoevelaken . He bequeathed it to one of his sons, Nicolaas Johannes van Aalst, in 1939. From 1965 to 1979 the painting was offered for sale by the Gustav Cramer Gallery in The Hague .

The Dutch businessman, art historian, art collector and philanthropist Willem van Dedem acquired the painting on July 22, 1984 from the van Aalst family. He initiated a restoration, which was interrupted several times from the first examination in 1985 until 1991. The added parts and the overpainting were removed and ultimately the assumption that it could be an early work by Rembrandt became a certainty.

In spring 2001, at the European Fine Art Fair in Maastricht , van Dedem discovered the painting A Calm Sea with Ships near the Beach by Rembrandt's contemporary Jan van de Cappelle , which Otto Naumann offered for sale there. In order to be able to afford to buy it, van Dedem sold the picture. First it was in the permanent exhibition of Museum De Lakenhal in Leiden in 2006 , and in the following year it was sold to the Leiden Collection in New York City through the mediation of the art dealer Johnny Van Haeften in London . In an interview conducted in 2010, van Dedem stated that it was difficult for him to sell his Rembrandt. But he passed on a great name and a moderate work for the high point of Dutch marine painting.

The passed out patient (smelling)

The painting was only discovered in 2015. It was probably already in the private ownership of Phillip Joshua Rappoport (1887–1961) and his wife Minnie Shelkowitz Rappoport (1894–1974) from Paterson , New Jersey (USA) in the 1930s . The painting came in 1974 by inheritance to a daughter of the couple, Lila Rappoport Landau (1929-2010), and her husband Walter Landau (1928-2011) in Teaneck , New Jersey. Her three sons, Nathaniel, Roger, and Steven Landau, had known the painting since childhood, but because it was so nondescript, they never asked their parents and grandparents for details about the painting. After their parents died, they cleared their house. They temporarily stored silver, porcelain and the painting found in the household effects, the painting was stowed in a cardboard box under a table tennis table in the cellar of one of the brothers. It wasn't until 2015 that they brought the items to the Nye & Company auction house in neighboring Bloomfield .

At this point the painting was in a gold-colored Florentine frame, the varnish layer was heavily discolored, the wood of the substrate was cracked and the paint had peeled off in several places. The auction house estimated the painting to be worth just $ 500 to $ 800. The picture with lot number 216 was offered for the auction as an oil on wood, triple portrait with an unconscious lady ("Oil on Board, Triple Portrait with Lady Fainting"). The lot description consisted of two lines, indicating a European origin from the 19th century and pointing out paint losses, traces of restoration and the cracked wood.

At the auction date, September 22, 2015, three telephone bidders from Great Britain, France and Germany had registered for this lot. From the starting price, $ 250, the price rose rapidly to $ 5,000. Subsequently, a bidding war broke out between the telephone bidders from Germany and France, which the Parisian gallery Talabardon & Gautier won with a bid of 870,000 US dollars (including premium 1,087,500 US dollars). Only when the losing bidder informed the auctioneers that they had just sold a Rembrandt did the events find an explanation. In 2016 the painting was acquired by the US billionaire Thomas S. Kaplan for his Leiden Collection , the purchase price should have been between three and four million US dollars, according to initial media reports. Kaplan himself named a purchase price of five million US dollars.

The glasses seller (seeing)

In the 19th century the painting was in the collection of Sir Walter Buchanan Riddell, 10th Baronet Riddell of Hepple near Rothbury in Northumberland , England. In 1906 it was owned by his son, Sir John Buchanan-Riddell, 11th Baronet Riddell . The closest evidence for 1930 is the Dutch art dealer Nathan Katz. At the time of the first related to this painting publication of the first volume of the Corpus of Rembrandt Research Group in 1982, it was owned by the art dealer Daan H. Cevat in Saint Peter Port in Guernsey . From 2002 to 2012, Cevat loaned it to Museum De Lakenhal in Leiden. In 2012 the museum was able to purchase the painting with financial support from the Rembrandt Association , other foundations and the city of Leiden.

The head operation (feeling)

After the painting The Three Singers (Hearing) , the head operation ended up as the second painting in the cycle in the private collection of Cornelis Johannes Karel van Aalst in Hoevelaken. Van Aalst was able to acquire the picture from an unknown English private collector. Both paintings were bequeathed to Nicolaas Johannes van Aalst in 1939 and offered by the Gustav Cramer Gallery in The Hague from 1965 to 1979. In 1984 the pictures were initially separated from each other, the head operation was sold to the Dutch collector Willem van Aalst. On July 7, 1995, the painting was auctioned by Christie's in London for 386,500 British pounds to the Dutch entrepreneur Edgar James Swaab . He sold it to the Leiden Collection in January 2007.

Exhibitions (chronological)

Numerous exhibitions have taken place in the past at which one or more paintings from the cycle were shown. Today, three of the paintings, if not on loan, are on display at the Leiden Collection's permanent exhibition in New York City and one, The Glasses Seller (Seeing) , at Museum De Lakenhal in Leiden. Since the discovery of the fourth picture in 2015, exhibitions of all four paintings have been held, for example in 2016 in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and in the Museum Het Rembrandthuis in Amsterdam.

  • Museum De Lakenhal , Leiden, Netherlands, 1956. Exhibition Rembrandt als leermeester ( hearing, feeling )
  • Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden, 1968. Exhibition Rondom Rembrandt: de verzameling Daan Cevat (seeing)
  • Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal , 1969; Art Gallery of Ontario , Toronto, Canada, 1969. Exhibition Rembrandt et ses élèves / Rembrandt and his pupils ( hearing, feeling )
  • Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden, 1977. Exhibition portrayed dead Leyden anno 1626 ( hearing, feeling )
  • Sogo Museum of Art , Yokohama, 1986; Fukuoka Art Museum , Fukuoka, 1987; Kyoto National Museum of Modern Art , 1987. Rembrandt and the Bible ( hearing, feeling ) exhibition
  • Swedish National Museum , Stockholm, 1992–1993. Exhibition Rembrandt and his age: focus on man ( hearing, seeing )
  • Mauritshuis , The Hague, The Netherlands, 1995-1996. Exhibition The amateur's cabinet: seventeenth-century Dutch masterpieces from Dutch private collections (listening)
  • Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister , Kassel, 2001–2002; Museum Het Rembrandt House , Amsterdam, Netherlands, 2002. Exhibition The young Rembrandt. Riddles about its beginnings / Het mysterie van de jonge Rembrandt ( hearing, seeing )
  • Graphic Collection Albertina , Vienna, 2004. Rembrandt (seeing)
  • Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden, 2006. Exhibition De vijf zintuigen van Rembrandt on the Rembrandt Year ( hearing, seeing, feeling )
  • National Museum of Western Art , Tokyo, 2011; Nagoya City Art Museum , Nagoya, Japan, 2011. Exhibition Rembrandt: The Quest for Chiaroscuro ( hearing, feeling )
  • North Carolina Museum of Art , Raleigh, North Carolina, 2011–2012; Cleveland Museum of Art , Cleveland, Ohio, 2012; Minneapolis Institute of Art , Minneapolis, Minnesota, 2012. Exhibition Rembrandt in America: collecting and connoisseurship ( hearing, feeling )
  • Virginia Museum of Fine Arts , Richmond, Virginia, USA, 2012–2013. Exhibition ( hearing, feeling )
  • Frans Hals Museum , Haarlem, The Netherlands, 2014–2015. Exhibition (feeling)
  • Worcester Art Museum , Worcester, Massachusetts, USA, 2015–2016. Exhibition ( hearing, feeling )
  • Szépművészeti Múzeum , Budapest, Hungary, 2014–2015. Rembrandt & the Dutch Golden Age exhibition (see)
  • The European Fine Art Fair , Maastricht, Netherlands, 2016. Exhibition (smelling)
  • J. Paul Getty Museum , Los Angeles, California, 2016. Exhibition The Promise of Youth: Rembrandt's 'Senses' Rediscovered ( Hear, Smell, Feel )
  • Ashmolean Museum , Oxford, United Kingdom, 2016. Exhibition Sensation: Rembrandt's First Paintings ( Hear, Smell, See, Feel )
  • Museum Het Rembrandthuis, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 2016–2017. Exhibition Rembrandt's First Paintings: The Four Senses ( hearing, smelling, seeing, feeling )
  • Louvre , Paris, 2017. Exhibition Chefs-d'oeuvre de la collection Leiden: le siècle de Rembrandt ( hearing, smelling, feeling )
  • Chinese Art Museum , Beijing, 2017. Exhibition Rembrandt and His Time: Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection ( hearing, smelling, feeling )
  • Long Museum , Shanghai, 2017–2018. Exhibition Rembrandt, Vermeer and Hals in the Dutch Golden Age: Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection ( hearing, smelling, feeling )
  • Pushkin Museum , Moscow, 2018; Hermitage , Saint Petersburg, 2018–2019. Exhibition The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer: ​​Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection ( hearing, smelling, feeling )
  • Louvre Abu Dhabi , United Arab Emirates, 2019. Exhibition Rembrandt, Vermeer and the Dutch Golden Age: masterpieces from The Leiden Collection and the Musée du Louvre ( hearing, smelling, feeling )
  • Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden, 2019–2020; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 2020. Exhibition Jonge Rembrandt - Rising Star / Young Rembrandt - Rising Star (German: The young Rembrandt - Rising Star ) (See)

Catalog raisonnés

Catalog raisonné The three singers (listening) The passed out patient (smelling) ? (Taste) The glasses seller (seeing) The head operation (feeling)
Corpus VI (2015) 2 - - 1 3
Pool (1986) A27 - - A29 A28
Corpus I (1982) IB 1 - - IB 3 IB 2
Bredius-Gerson (1969) 421 - - 421A 421A
Bredius (1935) 421 - - - -

literature

Web links

Commons : The five senses  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. IV , p. 627.
  2. ↑ a b c d e Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. VI , pp. 480-481.
  3. ↑ a b c Alexandra Libby, Ilona van Tuinen and Arthur K. Wheelock Jr .: Allegory of Hearing, Allegory of Smell, Allegory of Touch, from The Series of the Five Senses on the Leiden Collection website , accessed August 15, 2019 .
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g h Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. I , Work B 1 Three singers (Hearing) , pp. 399–404.
  5. ↑ a b c Alexandra Libby, Ilona van Tuinen and Arthur K. Wheelock Jr .: Three Musicians (Allegory of Hearing) on the Leiden Collection website, accessed on August 15, 2019.
  6. ↑ a b c Vitale Bloch: To the early Rembrandt .
  7. ↑ a b c d e Rembrandt, Three musicians, approx. 1624–1625 on the website of the RKD - Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis , accessed on August 16, 2019.
  8. ↑ a b c d e Alexandra Libby, Ilona van Tuinen and Arthur K. Wheelock Jr .: Unconscious Patient (Allegory of Smell) on the Leiden Collection website, accessed on August 15, 2019.
  9. ↑ Rembrandt, Unconscious Patient, approx. 1624-1625 on the website of the RKD - Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis , accessed on August 16, 2019.
  10. ↑ a b c d Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. I , Werk B 3 The spectacles-pedlar (Sight) , pp. 410-415.
  11. ↑ a b Christiaan Vogelaar: Brilleverkoper (Allegory op het Gezicht) .
  12. ↑ Brilleverkoper (Marskramer die een bril verkoopt) on the website of Museum De Lakenhal , accessed on August 15, 2019.
  13. ↑ a b c Rembrandt, Spectacles Seller, approx. 1624–1625 on the website of the RKD - Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis , accessed on August 16, 2019.
  14. ↑ a b c d e f Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project (Ed.): A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings. I , Work B 2 The operation (Touch) , pp. 405–409.
  15. ↑ a b c Alexandra Libby, Ilona van Tuinen and Arthur K. Wheelock Jr .: Stone Operation (Allegory of Touch) on the Leiden Collection website, accessed August 15, 2019.
  16. ↑ a b Rembrandt, Stone Operation, approx. 1624–1625 on the website of the RKD - Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis , accessed on August 16, 2019.
  17. ^ Hans Kauffmann: The five senses in Dutch painting of the 17th century .
  18. ↑ a b Ashmolean Museum (ed.): Sensation: Rembrandt's first paintings. Rembrandt's four earliest paintings reunited for the first time at the Ashmolean . Ashmolean Museum press release on the exhibition opening, September 19, 2016, digitized . http: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3Dhttps% 3A% 2F% 2F 0A ~ SZ% 3D ~ double-sided% 3D ~ LT% 3D ~ PUR% 3D
  19. ^ A b Anne Woollett: Rembrandt at 18. A newly rediscovered Rembrandt painting reveals the artist in the process of becoming himself . In: the iris. Behind the Scenes at the Getty. May 5, 2016, accessed August 15, 2019.
  20. ↑ Carolus Tuinman: De oorsprong en uitlegging van dagelyks gebruigte Nederduitsche Spreekwoorden .
  21. ↑ Wigardus à Winschooten: Seeman , p. 38.
  22. ↑ a b Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal , Lemmata Brilverkoopen , Kei , accessed on August 17, 2019.
  23. ^ Ernst van de Wetering: Rembrandt, a biography .
  24. ↑ Gabriele Groschner: The young Rembrandt in Leiden .
  25. ^ Quentin Buvelot and Otto Naumann: Format Changes in Paintings by Frans Van Mieris the Elder .
  26. ^ Anja K. Ševčík and Jiří Třeštík: “Doorstep Transactions” - Structural and Compositional Transformations on Gerard Dou's Young Lady on a Balcony .
  27. ↑ Dominique Surh, Ilona van Tuinen and John Twilley: Insights from Technical Analysis on a Group of Paintings by Gerrit Dou in the suffering Collection .
  28. ↑ a b Abraham Bredius: Rembrandt. Painting (1935) , work 421.
  29. ↑ a b Christian Tümpel: Rembrandt. Myth and Method , Works A27, A28 and A29.
  30. ^ Michael Hall: Willem Baron van Dedem (1929-2015) . In: Apollo Magazine , November 30, 2015, accessed August 15, 2019 (republication of an interview from 2010, English).
  31. ↑ a b Anthony G. Attrino: How NJ brothers found lost Rembrandt worth $ 1M under a ping-pong table . In: NJ.com , January 16, 2018, accessed August 19, 2019.
  32. ↑ Paul Jeromack: Has a long-lost painting by a teenaged Rembrandt been discovered in New Jersey? In: The Art Newspaper , September 23, 2015, digitizedhttp: //vorlage_digitalisat.test/1%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fauthenticationinart.org%2Fpdf%2Fartmarket%2FHas-a-long-lost-painting-by-a-teenaged-Rembrandt-been-discovered-in-New- Jersey-The-Art-Newspaper.pdf ~ GB% 3D ~ IA% 3D ~ MDZ% 3D% 0A ~ SZ% 3D ~ double-sided% 3D ~ LT% 3D ~ PUR% 3D .
  33. ^ Oil on Board, Triple Portrait with Lady Fainting . Lot description at Live Auctioneers , September 22, 2015, accessed on August 15, 2019.
  34. ↑ Alanna Martinez: Mystery Painting Sold in NJ Auction May Be a Long-Lost Early Rembrandt . In: The Observer , September 23, 2015, accessed August 18, 2019.
  35. ^ Gary Schwartz: 342 Rembrandt's fourth sense: a quick reaction . In: The Schwartzlist , September 24, 2015, accessed August 15, 2019.
  36. ^ Brian Boucher: Now You Can Check Out This Recently Rediscovered Rembrandt at the Getty. A sharp-eyed buyer made a killing . In: artnet news , May 9, 2016, accessed August 15, 2019.
  37. ↑ Tobias Timm: The fragrance of the precious. At the Tefaf art fair, a rediscovered Rembrandt outshines the looming crisis in the market . In: Die Zeit 2016, No. 13, accessed on August 15, 2019.
  38. ↑ Ted Loos: Billionaire's Spending Spree Creates 'Lending Library for Old Masters' , The New York Times , May 8, 2017, accessed October 24, 2019.
  39. ↑ Abraham Bredius: Rembrandt. The complete edition of the paintings. Third edition , works 421 and 421A.