Grounds in Rembrandt’s
workshop and in the paintings by
his contemporaries
Karin Groen
Netherlands Institute for Cultural Heritage
Rembrandt Research Project
‘Self-portrait’
Stuttgart
Research Kühn 1962 to 1965
• 48 painting attributed to Rembrandt
• 10 shop works or contemporary copies
• 38 other Dutch painters from the 17th to 19th
century
• By 1965, the grounds of 122 paintings on
canvas and panel from various periods ascribed
to Rembrandt had been examined.
‘Self-portrait’
Stuttgart
the Night Watch
Cross-sections made in 1975
Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum, 1976
Incident and transmitted ligth
Thin sections of
the Night Watch
Incident and transmitted ligth
Transmitted, polarized light
Clay minerals 0,5-1 m
Kaolinite? Mica?
New sampling necessary for obtaining insight into the
occurrence and distribution of the quartz ground!
Criteria for sampling:
• Paintings by Rembrandt and those ascribed to him:
As many works on canvas as possible from Bredius
(1935)
• Pictures by Amsterdam painters who had nothing to do
with Rembrandt
Pictures made between 1640 (Night Watch)
and 1669 (Rembrandt’s death)
Results
• 160 canvas paintings investigated
• 125 of these made after 1640
• 48 on a quartz ground: almost half of the
production
• None of the 60 non-Rembrandt paintings
made in Amsterdam 1640-1669 has a quartz
ground
• Canvasses with a quartz ground were used
exclusively in Rembrandt’s workshop
• These canvasses must have been prepared in
Rembrandt’s workshop
This find provides a strong supplementary
criterion for attributing paintings:
Every Rembrandtesque painting on a
quartz ground derives from
Rembrandt’s studio !!
Rembrandtesque ‘Self-portraits’
National Gallery of
Victoria Melbourne
c.1660
Fogg Art Museum
Cambridge Mass.
c.1660
Staatsgalerie
Stuttgart
c.1659
Corpus IV21
Corpus IV22
Corpus IV17
What could have been the reason for
Rembrandt using quartz grounds?
Quartz ground is clay with a high proportion of ground
up sand
River clay as used by potters and for making bricks,
recommended for priming canvases in written sources,
abroad.
Clay for bricks and pottery under the microscope
River clay, from quarry
for bricks
Clay along the Old Rhine
River clay, from quarry for bricks,
Bruggen, near border Germany
Old sea clay, Makkum
Bare ground (darkened) visible in the Night Watch
Br 612
Br 236
Br 410
Br 369
Br 390
Quartz grounds on canvases