Rembrandt Drawings

by Seymour Slive

Although the extensive literature on Rembrandt could fill a small library, there has been no up-to-date survey of his extraordinary achievement as a draftsman. Renowned Rembrandt scholar Seymour Slive fills this void with his scrutiny of some 150 drawings culled from a corpus of about eight
hundred by the master. The drawings, reproduced in color, are accompanied by etchings and paintings by Rembrandt and others, including Leonardo and Raphael. Unlike other publications of Rembrandt's drawings, they are here arranged thematically, which makes his genius crystal clear. Individual
chapters focus on self-portraits, portraits of family members and friends, the lives of women and children, nudes, copies, model and study sheets, animals, landscapes and buildings, religious and mythological subjects, historical subjects, and genre scenes. Slive further discusses possible doubtful
attributions, which account for the considerable reduction from earlier times in the number of drawings now ascribed to the master.

Genres: Art

260 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Bart · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great reproductions, great selection - yet obviously not a 'Complete Rembrandt Drawings' by a long shot. The text is not on the level of what Van de Wetering does for the paintings, but it's mostly informative & well written - at times maybe a bit too much description instead of analysis. There's not much about technique for instance.

Still, a great, great book simply because of the genius of Rembrandt's drawings.

5 stars for the reproductions, 3 stars for the text.

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[Ed Heinzelman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great reproductions of Rembrandt's drawings. Fairly academic discussion of content and genres. Something of interest to the Rembrandtphile, drawing maven, or art historian.