Rembrandt
Landscape with the Good Samaritan
It is one of the few preserved landscape paintings by Rembrandt. The artist explored the genre through a short period between 1637 to 1647.
The painting distinguishes by its dramatism, restless nature captured against stormy sky, unique technique and texture. The landscape is a background for a scene based on the biblical parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10: 30-37). The figures are barely visible as they were intentionally integrated with the landscape. As noticed by E. Melanie Gifford, their place in the paining was determined from the very beginning, as Rembrandt never added new figures to the accomplished work, as some contemporary landscapists.
The topic was frequently explored by different artists and was very popular in the Netherlands from the second half of the 16th century. It seems that one of the main inspirations to the painting was a cycle of woodcuts by Simon Wynhoutsz. Frisius (1580-1629) after Hendrick Hondius (1573-1650). Small figures in this cycle were placed among landscape divided in two unequal parts by enormous trees.
Initially the artist intended to show the scene of healing of wounded man by Samaritan, as it indicates the figure of a man in a turban sitting on the ground and visible in infrared. He changed the concept and show the wounded man sitting on a donkey and supported by Samaritan. This was a new and very innovative way of depicting the topic.
Contemporary world mingle with biblical in Rembrandt's version of the scene - toothless lady in a wide hat interpreted sometimes as personification Vanitas or Luxuria and a young man in beret with a feather, some vagabonds, Dutch windmills, a carriage are clearly visible while the priest and levite from the parable are barely noticeable in the far left of the painting.
In 1766 the painting was purchased on an action of M.D. Eversdijck collection by De Cros as Een Landschap, en daar in de Barmhartige Samaritaan (Landscape with Good Samaritan). Then in 1774 it was purchased by Jean-Pierre Norblin de La Gourdaine in Paris. Norblin, who left Poland in 1804, presented the painting to his pupil Aneta Tyszkiewiczówna. Before 1813 it was presented to Izabela Czartoryska.
The painting distinguishes by its dramatism, restless nature captured against stormy sky, unique technique and texture. The landscape is a background for a scene based on the biblical parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10: 30-37). The figures are barely visible as they were intentionally integrated with the landscape. As noticed by E. Melanie Gifford, their place in the paining was determined from the very beginning, as Rembrandt never added new figures to the accomplished work, as some contemporary landscapists.
The topic was frequently explored by different artists and was very popular in the Netherlands from the second half of the 16th century. It seems that one of the main inspirations to the painting was a cycle of woodcuts by Simon Wynhoutsz. Frisius (1580-1629) after Hendrick Hondius (1573-1650). Small figures in this cycle were placed among landscape divided in two unequal parts by enormous trees.
Initially the artist intended to show the scene of healing of wounded man by Samaritan, as it indicates the figure of a man in a turban sitting on the ground and visible in infrared. He changed the concept and show the wounded man sitting on a donkey and supported by Samaritan. This was a new and very innovative way of depicting the topic.
Contemporary world mingle with biblical in Rembrandt's version of the scene - toothless lady in a wide hat interpreted sometimes as personification Vanitas or Luxuria and a young man in beret with a feather, some vagabonds, Dutch windmills, a carriage are clearly visible while the priest and levite from the parable are barely noticeable in the far left of the painting.
In 1766 the painting was purchased on an action of M.D. Eversdijck collection by De Cros as Een Landschap, en daar in de Barmhartige Samaritaan (Landscape with Good Samaritan). Then in 1774 it was purchased by Jean-Pierre Norblin de La Gourdaine in Paris. Norblin, who left Poland in 1804, presented the painting to his pupil Aneta Tyszkiewiczówna. Before 1813 it was presented to Izabela Czartoryska.
oil on oak panel, 1638, 46.1 x 65.5 cm (18.1 x 25.8 in), inventory number XII-290, currently not on permanent display, Muzeum Czartoryskich
© Marcin Latka
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