Hidden sketch Rembrandt It was discovered under the thick paint of the Dutch master’s most famous work “The Night Watch”, revealing for the first time this Renaissance artist’s original vision of a huge canvas.
After two and a half years of investigation by restorers, data experts, and art historians at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, they discovered this preliminary drawing made with beige paint with a high chalk content.
The sketch shows researchers Rembrandt van Rijn’s arrangement of 34 different characters and the arrangement of feathers, spears, and swords around them before completing the painting in 1642. Evidence of a series of changes.
“Night Watch” depicts the militia under the command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq, which took three years to complete after being commissioned by the Amsterdam Civic Guard to set up a banquet hall for its Kloveniersdoelen headquarters .
According to Pieter Roelofs, the head of painting at the National Museum, Rembrandt’s secret sketch can be made visible through the “calcium map” of the work because the artist uses a rich chalk that can be picked up by the latest scanning technology. Of pigments.
He said: “We see straight lines and curves. He used curves to create an initial sketch for the building in the background. You might ask why this is so important? Well, it makes us feel like we can create in Rembrandt. Peeping from his shoulder in “The Night Watch”.
“We have always suspected that Rembrandt must have sketched this complex composition on campus before starting. But this is always a hypothesis.
“Now we can see below the surface better than ever, and we now have evidence, which gives us a real understanding of Rembrandt’s creative process for the first time. It is fascinating to see how he finds suitable works. We have discovered the origin of the night watchman.”
Since the summer of 2019, the staff involved in what they call “Operation Vigil” have been using the latest technology to find new insights into the painting before restoring it.
Rembrandt used a so-called thick coating technique, which involves applying thick paint on the canvas to achieve a three-dimensional structure that reflects light.
The imaging method is used to get under the layer. They discovered that Rembrandt had originally painted feathers on the helmet of the militiaman Claes van Cruijsbergen, but later repainted it.
He drew more spears than he drew and adjusted the position of Sergeant Rombout Kemp’s legs. There are signs that in the original version, there was an extra sword between the captain and his lieutenant Willem van Ruytenburch.
“You might ask, why did Rembrandt change his mind?” Rolovs said. “We don’t know. But maybe he removed the feathers because they were so eye-catching because Van Cruisbergen was in the center of the composition.”
The main purpose of the latest research on “Night Watch” is to prepare for its first restoration in more than 40 years.
Although the painting has gone through four centuries of turmoil, including being transported to a bunker in the coastal sand dunes at the beginning of World War II, it is said to be in very good condition, although there is evidence of wear and tear over time , Discoloration and peeling paint.
Roelofs said that the top priority is to solve the problem of deformation of the canvas, especially in its upper left corner, which is believed to be from 2003 to 2003 2013.
Petria Noble, the head of painting preservation at the museum, stated that the 3.63m x 4.37m painting will be taken from an existing wooden stretcher. Since 1975, the frame of this painting has been fixed by metal nails. .
She said: “We strongly believe that wooden stretchers cause this problem because wooden stretchers actually react differently to canvas. Then we put it on a new filter, a non-reactive material, and we think it’s better for painting. Said it will actually be more stable. Then it is expected that the deformation will relax and they will present a flatter, flatter surface.
“The first thing you really need to do is to remove those tacks very gently and systematically. Of course, we have to use some slight weight to actually coax the deformations we see along the left and right edges.”
The process will start in January and is expected to take up to three months, after which further possible protection techniques will be considered, including the removal of several varnish layers on the surface of the work.
