Philemon and Baucis – (Rembrandt Van Rijn) ◄ Previous Next ►

Artist: Rembrandt Van Rijn

Date: 1658

Size: 81 x 96 cm

Technique: Oil On Panel

Three men and a woman sit around a wooden table on the right side of a dimly lit room in this horizontal painting. The scene is painted entirely in warm shades of bronze, golden yellow, and dark brown. A cleanshaven man to our right, Mercury, is dramatically backlit by golden light so we see his face almost in silhouette, though we can make out his eyes, straight nose, and parted lips. He rests both hands on the table, one palm down by the edge close to him and one palm up in front of him, near a glass of amber-colored liquid. He wears a gray and brown tunic, and light glinting in his chin-length hair suggests a silver band or another ornament. He looks toward a man and woman at the other end of the table, to our left and near the center of the composition. The woman’s head is covered with a dark cloth, and she holds a gray fowl in her lap. Her lips are also parted and her face tips down. The man next to her, closer to us, has a gray beard and hair, and he holds a rust-red cap at his chest with both hands as he looks across the table. A bowl of food lies in the center of the table between this couple and Mercury. The fourth person has a long gray beard and hair, and faces us across the table. He wears a gleaming copper and silvery-gray robe and cloak, and holds one hand up, palm down, over the table. Much of the rest of the room is swallowed in shadow but there is the suggestion of rafters and beams, and a small fire glows in a hearth on the left side of the scene. The artist signed and dated the lower left, “Rembrandt f. 1658.”