Rembrandt_Art_Making_Practice

Rembrandt Van Rijn made a lot of changes in his life concerning his artistic practice. 
Rembrandt is a Baroque Artist from the 17th Century. He is famous for his paintings now but in the 17th Century he was more praised for his skills as a printmaker.
The Artistic practice is the process in which he created his artworks from the beginning where he would have thought of his concept (inspired by beliefs, choices etc.) to the end masterpiece.
Through the use of the structural frame this essay will explore in depth the life of Rembrandt and his artworks.
This essay will explain Rembrandt’s life and then refer to both Rembrandt’s earliest and latest artworks such as, Self Portrait, Open-Mouthed 1629, Rembrandt with a Broad Nose (etching) 1630, Return of the Prodigal Son 1666 and The Woman with an Arrow (etching) 1661 in order to describe the archaic dutch style, the techniques used to create greater meaning in both Rembrandt’s paintings and his etchings and what he wished to portray through the use of costumes. Rembrandt was born in the city of Leiden in the Netherlands. His father had pushed him to study for a well educated career. Later, Rembrandt on his own, decided to begin studying art. This decision left him learning under the hand of great local art masters such as Jacob van Swanenburch and Pieter Lastman.
In 1634 Rembrandt married Saskia van Uylenburgh, a woman who’s cousin was an art dealer.
Rembrandt created various types of art such as mythological and religious artworks as well as dramatic artworks.
Rembrandt had a unique style with interests for ancient sculpture, Flemish and Italian Renaissance paintings, Far Eastern art, contemporary Dutch works, weapons, and armor.
As time went by Rembrandt’s life became more and more unbearable.
From early 1636 to 1642 various unfortunate events began to occur. Three of Rembrandts children as well as his wife died in this time leaving just him and one surviving son.
But these personal misfortunes did not take negative effect on his artistic career. They actually did the opposite and his artistic talent became higher quality than before. A lot of dutch style artworks in the 17th Century were based on the independence of the Netherlands and the remembrance of the land and citizens rights. Much of the Dutch art in the 17th Century was influenced by the long, hard and victorious fight for the independence of Netherlands.
Dutch art was a representation of the different types of people coming together as one union to win independence of their land.
The artwork at the time was made to be a lot smaller than usual in order to fit into peoples houses, as the houses were very small in the Netherlands.
This era produced the greatest Dutch artworks and Rembrandt’s still life artworks excelled in this time.
Dutch art became less and less wanted in the 18th and 19th Centuries regardless of it’s good quality and unique style.
Rembrandt, who was well known for his portrait paintings at the time, used his incredible and individual skills of detail to express the depth of feeling in his artworks. Rembrandt thought himself to be a history painter who painted portraits to convey the image of the lands bad economic states.

Rembrandt used different techniques for his paintings and his etchings in order to supply the audience with a greater depth and information of the artwork. These techniques include, the use of shadow and light, emphasis on the face and hands, changing long contour lines into dots and shorter strokes and the use of costume.
Rembrandt uses various effects in his paintings. He has a heavy use of strong and outgoing light as well as shadows to create interesting composition and depth. This technique is used to highlight specific areas of the artwork that Rembrandt thought needed more attention. It was mostly used by Rembrandt to emphasise the face and hands of the person being painted.
Oil paints are a very good medium to use for the technique that Rembrandt used as oil paints take at least 2-3 days to completely dry up and because of this Rembrandt was given more freedom to develop his paintings as the oil was malleable and he was able to move it. This effect is called ‘sprezzatura’. As he got older his unique mixture of colours became darker and darker.
Etching on the other hand, is a technique in itself used to make prints.
Long contour lines and split up in order to make short strokes and dots. This technique was created in search of finding a way to create a stronger sense of tone and effect in prints based on landscape.

Rembrandt painted portraits of himself whilst wearing historical costume from the 16th Century to express his interest in history. Rembrandt also painted portraits of people that would wear this historical clothes and in wearing them himself he is making a taking on different personas and making a mockary of that which he used to put into his artwork. Using the change of clothing Rembrandt could switch between genres, it was more of a make-believe world where he could be anything he wanted to be. His meanings were shown through he use of historical costume assists him in creating a barrier between the present and the past. This method assists in creating a defined mood. This technique taught the viewers of the customs and culture from that time. In conclusion, Rembrandt lead a very interesting and fulfilling life.
His art was strongly influenced by the historical times in Netherlands as he created portraits of people from older times and history was something he was very interested in re-creating through the use of art.
The different techniques Rembrandt used for his artwork definitely took a big role in the finishing masterpiece. He created several effects of depth, personality and feeling in his artwork through the use of these various techniques and through the use of costumes he expressed his interest in history and created a place where he could be whatever he wanted to be.
Rembrandt became a very accomplished artist and he will definitely be remembered as one of the greatest Dutch artists from the 16th Century.