The Visible and The Invisible

The Visible
and
the Invisible
Edition Angewandte
Book Series of the

University of Applied Arts Vienna
Edited by Gerald Bast, Rector

Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat The Visible
and
the Invisible
On Seventeenth-Century
Dutch Painting
Translated from German by

Margarethe Clausen
Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Vienna, Austria
Translation from German language edition:

Das Sichtbare und das Unsichtbare by Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat
© Böhlau Verlag Köln Weimar Wien 2009
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© 2015 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin / Munich / Boston
Translation from German into English:

Margarethe Clausen, Berlin, Germany
Chapter II/5 by Karen Williams, Rennes-le Château, France
Coverimage: Samuel van Hoogstraten, The Slippers

1658 – 60, Paris, Louvre
akg-images / Erich Lessing
Image page 5: Rembrandt, A Woman in Bed

c. 1645 – 49; Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland
Photograph: Antonia Reeve
Layout: Martina Gaigg, Vienna, Austria

Printing: Holzhausen Druck GmbH, Wolkersdorf, Austria
Printed on acid-free paper produced from chlorine-free pulp. TCF ∞
Printed in Austria
ISSN 1866-248X
ISBN 978-3-11-042690-8
e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-042301-3
e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-042304-4
www.degruyter.com
Contents
Preface 9
Part I Visible becomes Invisible

Gender Construction in Rembrandt’s Works 13

1 On Female Representation or
On the disappearance of male protagonists from the field of representation 15
An alternative to traditional patterns of femininity? — Bathsheba 15

Reversals — Woman in Bed 28
Discourses on femininity 38
Dangerous gazes — Susanna 42
Fatal looks and a laughing nymph — Diana and her Nymphs Bathing,
with Actaeon and Callisto 51
Where have all the men gone? 54
On the discourse of rape — Lucretia 56
Sources and their re-interpretations 58
Lucretia fever 63
Social practice 71
Rembrandt — An entirely different Lucretia? 75
Radical positions 89
Querelle des Femmes 91
2 On Male Representation or
On the disappearance of female protagonists from the field of representation 99
Differences 102
The impossible reversal I — women as ‘rapists’ or Potiphar’s Wife 102
The impossible reversal II — erotic images of men for a female gaze? 106
Self-Images — Self-Portraits 107
De Staalmeesters or Public representation is male 118
Historical summary 119
The group portrait 121
De Staalmeesters 124
3 Asymmetry. Gender Relations in the Field of Sexuality 135
Danaë or How the male sex partner was made invisible 136
Pornography? 145
One objection and three possible answers — Rembrandt’s erotic graphic works 149
4 Summary 157
Part II Invisible becomes Visible
Painting, not Mimesis 173
1 Mirror, Mirror on the Wall …

Woman before the Mirror by Frans van Mieris 175
2 The Picture within the Picture or Conveying the world through media
Woman Holding a Balance by Vermeer 193
The Final Judgment as the norm? 194

The balance 196
A Catholic work of art? 199
Aesthetic staging 200
New views on Vermeer 204
Contemporary discourses — Spinoza 214
The Final Judgment as an outdated image 217
3 Farewell to Lessing’s Laocoon: Leaving behind a Methodological Dispute

Gabriel Metsu’s A Woman Reading a Letter 219
(Love)Letters 219
Metsu’s A Woman Reading a Letter 225
Language and images — a methodological dispute among art historians 232
The dichotomy of language and image 235
Farewell, Laocoon … 248
4 The Gender of Letters 251
5 Affect / Emotion / Imagination 259
Affects: Dirck Hals 262

Emotion: Rembrandt 263
Affect awareness (Affekt-Wissen) 272
Interiorization: Vermeer 279
Imagination: Hoogstraten 285
Coda 293
Publisher’s note: 4 Plates 1 – 8: 163 – 171 Plates 9 – 14: 301 – 307

Literature: 309 Illustrations: 330 Image credits: 336
Preface
The Visible and the Invisible presents a new look at some of the most complex
and fundamental issues in the cultural field. How have paintings helped shape our imagi
nation and the idea of modern subjectivity? What role has painting played in forming
the discourse on emotion and the representation of gender relations? The Visible and the
Invisible stresses the relevance of visual media for the understanding of our world and
offers a new understanding of how paintings and written discourse relate. These ideas
are exemplified in the analysis of select works by masters of 17 th century Dutch painting,
including Rembrandt, Vermeer, Metsu, Ter Borch and Hoogstraten.
The Visible and the Invisible comprises two parts. Part I focuses on constructions
of masculinity and femininity in Rembrandt’s work, while Part II questions the specific
qualities of painting as a medium and subsequent methodological issues. Both parts are
joined in their examination of the relationship between the visible and the invisible. This
leads to the investigation of the medium of painting’s semiotic qualities and how they
relate to social practices and visible reality.
Art has the ability to make the invisible visible. It also has the power to render
certain things, people, views or ideas invisible, to omit them from the field of represen
tation and thus delete them from our consciousness. Dutch painting has been viewed,
and to some extent is still viewed, as a paradigm of art aimed at creating a mimetic
depiction of natural or social reality and describing optical phenomena. My endeavor to
examine the meaning of invisibility in what is believed to be the epitome of naturalistic
painting is thus of particularly high significance.
Art history generally focuses its investigations on what is at hand: it analyzes what
is visible. Of course images are examined in regard to metaphors, to their symbolical
meaning and thus their references to invisible things. We are used to asking how some
thing is depicted. What we are not used to, is asking what is not part of the represen
tation. However, investigating the invisible can shed light on the fundamental structures
of our concept of reality (Vorstellungswelt). We are not consciously aware of these struc
tures because they are invisible, yet they are firmly planted in our minds. This book
exemplarily discusses the issue by examining how gender is constructed in Rembrandt’s
oeuvre. I chose Rembrandt because he created an alternative, positively connoted image
of women — even according to some of the most radical feminist positions. Thus the
task at hand is to question the boundaries, or historic possibilities, within our culture.
Female and male protagonists are excluded from the field of representation in specific
9
situations, even though their presence is required by the respective subject’s motif.
Exclusions of this kind lead to an asymmetry, which has played a major role in construc
ting gender differences. Since the other never appears in the image, difference is never
directly addressed, literally keeping the construction of difference out of the picture, and
thus on a subconscious level. The naturalistic style of Dutch painting suggests that these
artistic constructions are in fact faithful portrayals of nature and guarantees of authen
ticity. Producing knowledge by rendering certain things invisible is highly topical; it plays
a major role in ideological debates. The media, particularly television, create an ‘eyewit
ness-effect’ that suggests what we see is the ‘truth’— an analogy to the apparent natural
ness created in Dutch painting. We cannot notice those omitted from the image or the
frame, those without a voice, because they remain invisible.
The notion that pictures created between the Renaissance and Modernity (at least
intend to) reproduce the reality we see has been maintained to this day. Supposedly it was
not until the Avant-garde that painting as mimesis finally came to an end. This prejudice is
particularly persistent in regard to 17 th century Dutch painting. In fact, however, Dutch
painting was not only concerned with the visualization of optical phenomena, but also
dealt with the depiction of invisible ones. Dutch painters used painting as a medium to
reflect its own status and relationship to the visible world. Many Dutch artists (albeit not
all) demonstrated that painting is not mimesis in a variety of ways: Mieris, for example,
used a mirror to reflect the portrayed woman as an other, thus anticipating issues of self-
recognition and self-misconception that were addressed much later by Lacan. Vermeer, in
turn, used the picture within a picture to demonstrate how our thinking is influenced by
images. Images not only depict (the visible), they produce meaning (of the invisible), just
like language. In the relationship between image and language, the image’s semantics are
as powerful as its interconnection with language. An examination of the relation between
text and image in Dutch painting leads to a discussion of the ongoing methodological
controversy between iconologists and image theorists in the field of art history and of
current theory debates within cultural studies (in the sense of the German Kulturwissen
schaften). Based on a representation theory approach, I demonstrate how these opposing
interpretations can be overcome in favor of an entirely new perspective.
The 17 th century was an age when debates on affect first peaked. We can find
remarkable parallels to today in this context. After a long period of neglecting emotions
in scientific discourse, emotions have once again become a current topic. Then and now
central issues revolve around the question of visibility: Can we recognize a person’s inner
state by their facial expression, gesture and body? Ter Borch, Vermeer, Hoogstraten and
other Dutch artists from the second half of the 17 th century interpreted emotions as
intimate, individual and subjective, unlike their baroque contemporaries. The named
artists used painting, i.e. means of visibility, to address invisibility. Considering psycho-
10
historical aspects I not only examine how emotions are represented, but also how they
help produce imagination in recipients. Painting actively contributed to the generation of
subjectivity in early bourgeois Dutch society. Many scholars have not yet realized the
importance of imagination in Dutch painting.
This book argues for an understanding of art history as part of cultural studies, as
a Kulturwissenschaft. Cultural studies are based on the idea that everything produced by
humans must be seen as produced by humans. What may sound trivial at first goes
beyond tangible objects and includes knowledge systems, religions and values. We can
only recognize the world through media, through visual and lingual signs. Visual art takes
up a special role within this semiotic system. Art is both product and producer of
discourse, embedded in non-lingual experiences and practices of society. This means it is
also involved in conflicts and power relations. Unlike most social historians, I assume
that images are not mere illustrations of social reality; they in fact actively contribute to
the formation of concepts of ‘reality,’ such as social differences or gender relations. We
must always keep in mind that we are asking our questions from a present perspective. A
deeper historical dimension can change our current views. It is important to create
awareness for the semantic potential of visual media, in this case of the medium pain-
ting. Images are key in shaping how we perceive our identity, the other — and the world.
I hope the field of cultural studies (Kulturwissenschaften) will soon abandon its focus on
text and pay more attention to the semantic potential of visual art. Art history as a
cultural study, in turn, must be anti-essentialist, oppose any decontextualization of art
and refute all notions of the artist-as-genius. Art is never a mere illustration of text — here
is where I clearly draw a line between my approach and iconology. Meaning is not only
embedded in certain motifs, it can also be found within form itself, as what I call aesthetic
staging. The aim is to learn to read the semantics of aesthetic structures. Art is unique
in its ability to visualize and thus address contradictions and ambiguities that are usually
excluded from normative discourse. Once the significance of visual arts’ aesthetics is
recognized, its analysis in context with other social practices and discourses can sub
stantially deepen or change our understanding of certain historical events and periods. It
can, as I will demonstrate, help correct previously established chronologies.
This book has many fathers, mothers and grandparents. They are the many people
and texts that have inspired this book. I am in close scholarly exchange with some of
these authors, while I have never had the chance to personally meet others. My first and
greatest influence is my mother, Grete Tugendhat (1903 –1970), who commissioned and
oversaw the building of the Tugendhat House designed by Mies van der Rohe in Brno.
She was the one who sparked my love for art in countless conversations, visits to the
museum and during travels. She taught me that art is nourishment, a basic need. I was
11
able to turn this passion into a profession during my studies under Otto Pächt at the
University of Vienna. He taught me to take the aesthetic structure of art seriously, to
refrain from instrumentalizing it and to always see it in the context of image tradition.
The generation of the late 1960s helped me break through a constricted art history
focused only on art-immanent matters and to expand its scope to socially relevant issues.
I never could have written this book without numerous exchanges of ideas with like-
minded art historians, who I have predominantly met at women art history conferences:
They were the first to advocate a feminist approach to art history and to introduce
semiotics, post-structuralism, discourse analysis and psychoanalysis to our conservative
field of study. At conferences I also learned a great deal from my peers’ critical feedback,
especially from Silke Wenk, Sigrid Schade, Kathrin Hoffmann-Curtius, et al. Numerous
colleagues were important as I delved into the field of cultural studies (Kulturwissen
schaften), especially at the IFK Vienna (Internationales Forschungszentrum Kulturwissen
schaften Wien) and the University of Vienna. I would like to express my special thanks to
Gotthart Wunberg who dealt with my text with unparalleled fervor. Without the years of
debate with Horst Wenzel, I would not be where I am today: It started with a new view of
the Middle Ages leading to a re-evaluation of the ‘modern’ in the modern period and
continued with a clarification of the highly complex relation between text and image.
Equally productive were conversations and workshops with Ludwig Jäger, whose linguistic
competence helped me express the theoretical aspects of my methodological approach
with greater precision. My husband, Ivo Hammer, is not only my best critic, but as an art
historian and conservator has taught me how to look at objects differently and in more
detail, consistently keeping in mind the materiality of the actual object. Viktoria Schmidt-
Linsenhoff’s (†) helpful comments were a great source of inspiration and motivation.
Karin Gludovatz — student, teacher and friend — was there for the entire journey. I also
thank Marie-Luise Angerer, Helga Kämpf-Jansen (†), Christina Lutter, Elisabeth Nemeth
and Agnes Sneller. Special thanks go to Martina Gaigg for her wonderful layout and
design. This book was originally published by Boehlau Verlag Cologne, Weimar, Vienna in
2009. With very few exceptions, I was unable to consider any literature published after
2009 in the translation at hand. Jane and Susan Lowbeer helped make the English edition
possible. I admire Margarethe Clausen for her profound understanding of my text and am
grateful for her meticulous translation. Books cost a remarkable amount of money. My
gratitude goes to my university, the University of Applied Arts Vienna and its rector
Gerald Bast, who made this publication possible with his generous financial support.
Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat
Vienna, 2009 /2015
12
Part I: Visible
becomes
Invisible
Gender Construction in Rembrandt’s Works
1 On Female Representation
or
On the disappearance of
male protagonists from
the field of representation
My interest lies in the subversive potential of visual art; in alternative, albeit

marginal discourses, in the inconsistencies, contradictions and boundaries of our culture.
So why choose Rembrandt? I chose him because scholarly research has rightly confirmed
that Rembrandt’s representation of femininity has a truly alternative attitude.
Rembrandt’s portrayals of women have become some of the most famous

images in the history of Western art, prompting emotive reactions amongst
his strongest critics and enthusiastic admirers alike.
This is the first sentence in the catalog of the exhibition Rembrandt’s Women held in
London in 2001.1 Rembrandt’s portrayals of women, particularly his nudes, have garnered
hefty amounts of criticism from classicists since the 17 th century.2 At the same time, his
representations of femininity have also been received quite positively, especially by
gender-critical scholars like John Berger, Mary Garrard or Mieke Bal.3 I want to further
explore the fascination evoked by Rembrandt’s images of women. In the following, I will
investigate the representation of femininity in his oeuvre by analyzing a few exemplary
works. First we will deal with what is visible in these images, then we will ask what is kept
out of the image, is made invisible. As I will
demonstrate, the answer to this question will
231 Julia Lloyd Williams (ed.), Rembrandt’s Women, exhibi- also change our view of the visible.
tion catalog National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh,
Royal Academy of Arts, London 2001, Munich, Lon-
don, New York 2001.
232 These critiques, ranging from Sandrart (1675), Pels
(1681) and Houbraken (1718) to Kenneth Clark (1966)
An alternative to traditional patterns
and others, are so well documented that there is no of femininity? — Bathsheba
need to repeat them here in great detail. See, a.o., Jan
A. Emmens, Rembrandt en de regels van de kunst,
Utrecht 1968; Eric Jan Sluijter, “Horrible Nature, In- The starting point of my observations
comparable Art”: Rembrandt and the Depiction of
the Female Nude, in: exh. cat. Edinburgh, London is Rembrandt’s Bathsheba from 1654, in the
2001, p. 37 – 45; Anat Gilboa, Images of the Feminine
in Rembrandt’s Work, Delft 2003, p. 12 – 17; Eric Jan Louvre (plate 1). 4 No other portrayal of a woman
Sluijter, Rembrandt and the Female Nude, Amster- in the artist’s oeuvre has received so much
dam 2006.
233 John Berger, Ways of Seeing, London 1972; Mary Gar- scholarly attention in the past few decades.
rard, Artemisia Gentileschi. The Image of the Fema-
le Hero in Italian Baroque Art, Princeton 1989, esp.
p. 238 f.; Mieke Bal, Reading Rembrandt. Beyond the
World-Image Opposition, Cambridge 1991. 15
Pl. 1: Rembrandt, Bathsheba, 1654, canvas, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 1: Bible Moralisée, David and Bathsheba, 15th century, Paris, Bibl. nat. de France, Ms. 166 fol. 76 v
Research on the painting even includes two monographs, namely Ann Jensen Adams’s
anthology Rembrandt’s Bathsheba Reading King David’s Letter from 1998 and Petra
Welzel’s German master thesis Rembrandts Bathseba from 1994.5 My own dealings with
this particular painting began in 1993.6 It is remarkable how much art historic research
has (at least to some extent) changed throughout the years. When I first began my work,
asking about gender constructions was still a taboo in Rembrandt research.
As a reminder, let us quickly revisit the story of Bathsheba as it is told in the Old
Testament in 2 Samuel 11 – 12. One evening, from inside his palace, King David sees a
beautiful woman taking a bath. He inquires about her and finds out that she is
Bathsheba, wife of Uriah. David sends a messenger to summon her and later sleeps with
her. When Bathsheba becomes pregnant, the king summons her husband, who is at war,
and commands him to visit his wife in an effort to conceal his adultery. Uriah refuses to
stay with his wife and instead remains with his soldiers in front of the king’s palace. David
sends him back to war with a letter to his superior, ordering to send Uriah to the front
line and thus to his death. Uriah dies. After the required mourning period has passed,
David makes Bathsheba his wife. All we find out about Bathsheba is that she mourned
her husband’s death. God punishes David by letting their son born out of wedlock die.
The iconography of this episode is a story of re-interpretations and reversals, in
which one thing remains the same: the object character of Bathsheba.7 During the Early
Middle Ages, the story illustrated the need for repentance and promoted the introduction
of confessions. As a visual tradition we most often encounter this story as an illustration
of the penitential psalm 51, in which David repents in reaction to Nathan’s reproof. The
16
fact that solely David is blamed and not Bathsheba, should not be misinterpreted as a
special validation of women in the Old Testament’s story. A look at the parable Nathan
cites to reprove David sheds light on the true values of the time. Just like the rich man
stole the poor man’s only ewe, David stole Uriah’s wife. Like a piece of livestock,
Bathsheba is a trading object that has changed
234 Oil on canvas, 142/142 cm. Top and left very likely
owners.8 Depictions from the High Middle Ages
cropped. On technique and state of preservation, are usually based on Augustine’s interpretation.
see Ernst van de Wetering, Rembrandt’s Bathsheba:
the object and its transformations, in: Ann Jensen In his typological speculations, which cite the
Adams, Rembrandt’s Bathsheba Reading King David’s
Old Testament to justify and verify the New
Letter, Cambridge 1998, p. 27 – 47. Nothing is known
about the circumstances of the painting’s produc- Testament, King David becomes a model for
tion — whether it was a commissioned work, was sold,
or remained in the artist’s possession — nor about its Christ and Bathsheba, in reference to the Song
contemporary reception. On the history of its recep- of Songs, represents Ecclesia, the Bride of
tion after 1811, see: Gary Schwartz, Though Deficient
in Beauty. A Documentary History and Interpretation Christ. Consequentially, Uriah becomes Satan,
of Rembrandt’s 1654 Painting of Bathsheba, in: ibid.,
p. 176 – 203. or in Isidor of Sevilla’s interpretation, the Jewish
235 Ann Jensen Adams (ed.), Rembrandt’s Bathsheba Rea People. Here we find a first instance of reversal:
ding King David’s Letter, Cambridge 1998; Petra Welzel,
Rembrandt’s Bathseba — Metapher des Begehrens Adultery and murder are denied while the
oder Sinnbild zur Selbsterkenntnis? Eine Bildmono-
graphie, European University Studies, Series 28: His- betrayed is turned into the devil. This typological
tory of Art, vol. 204, Frankfurt a. M., Vienna, et al. 1994. interpretation was picked up by the Bibles
Also see Sluijter 2006, p. 333 – 368. For a bibliography
on research, see ibid. Moralisées, in which scenes from the New
236 I published a short summary of my insights on the
painting many years later: Geschlechter-Differenz. Die
Testament are paired with analogous motifs
Bathseba von Rembrandt, in: Ingrid Bennewitz (ed.), from the Old Testament.9 The christening of
Lektüren der Differenz, dedicated to Ingvild Birkhan,
Bern, Berlin, et al. 2002, p. 125 – 141. Ecclesia is linked to Bathsheba’s bath,
237 On the iconography of Bathsheba see: Elisabeth Ku- Bathsheba summoned by David is paired with
noth-Leifels, Über die Darstellungen der Bathseba im
Bade. Studien zur Geschichte des Bildthemas. 4. bis Christ summoning the faithful (his church).
17. Jahrhundert, Essen 1962; Welzel 1994; Eric Jan
Sluijter, Rembrandt’s Bathsheba and the Conventions In late medieval literature the allegory of
of a Seductive Theme, in: Adams 1998, p. 48 – 99; Da- Bathsheba as Ecclesia could not withstand the
niela Hammer-Tugendhat, Judith und ihre Schwestern.
Konstanz und Veränderung von Weiblichkeitsbildern, general surge of secularization and Bathsheba
in: Annette Kuhn, Bea Lundt (eds.), Lustgarten und
Dämonenpein. Konzepte von Weiblichkeit in Mittel- (once again) became a woman. In this role, the
alter und früher Neuzeit, Dortmund 1997, p. 343 – 385, figure experienced another reversal, this time
especially p. 367 – 373; Sluijter 2006, p. 333 f.
238 This, for example, is how the story is illustrated in the one of shifted moral values. David is no longer
Carolingian Utrechter Psalter. Utrecht, Universiteitsbi-
bliotheek, ms 484 fol. 29 r; see E. T. De Wald, The Illus-
the one at fault for the tragic events, instead it
trations of the Utrecht Psalter, Princeton n.d., fig. 47. is Bathsheba’s seductive beauty. This new mean
239 Bible Moralisée, 13th century, Oxford Bodl. Libr. 270 b
fol. 152 and 153 v; A. De Laborde, La Bible Moralisée ing found its way into the Bibles Moralisées of the
Illustrée, Paris 1911 – 27, vol. 1, figs. 152, 153. 15th century (fig. 1). Paradoxically the story of
210 Found, for example in Albrecht Dürer’s designs from
1521 for the City Hall Council Chamber in Nuremberg Bathsheba now also became part of the so-
(Morgan Library and Museum, New York). The topos
of Weiberlist originally only included the couples Aris called Weiberlisten, the theme of dangerously
totle and Phyllis and Samson and Delilah: the smartest powerful women.10 By tying her into this context,
and the strongest man, respectively, fall victim to the
seductive powers of a woman. Essential reading on Bathsheba is turned into the perpetrator and
the theme of Weiberlist is Susan Louise Smith, The Po-
wer of Women: A Topos in Medieval Art and Literature,
Pennsylvania 1995; also see Hammer-Tugendhat 1997,
p. 367 – 373. 17
Fig. 2: Adam Elsheimer, Bathsheba, 1600 – 10, gouache, Vienna, Albertina
Fig. 3: Cornelis Cornelisz. van Haarlem, Bathsheba, 1594, canvas, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
David becomes the victim. Parallel to the visual arts, late medieval literature such as the
widely read Livre de la Tour pour l’enseignement de ses filles, which the German audience
knew in a paraphrase by Marquart von Stein, blamed the sin of adultery on Bathsheba’s
haughtiness.11 This reinterpretation reflects urban society and its valorization of marriage
and the imperative of female chastity that came with it. Women’s supposedly corruptive
beauty and the adultery it ‘caused’ were also central moments of the narrative among
Rembrandt’s contemporaries. In a series of engravings from the 16th century, Maarten
van Heemskerck, for example, used the episode of Bathsheba taking a bath to illustrate
the Sixth Commandment “You shall not commit adultery” instead of the more fitting
Ninth Commandment “You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife.” The latter command
ment was instead illustrated with the story of Potiphar’s wife, who tried, but failed to
seduce Joseph.12 The misogyny we see here is so engrained that the actual words of the
biblical text are ignored. Calvinists and moralists in Rembrandt’s time used the story of
Bathsheba to warn of women’s seductive beauty and of adultery. Opinions were diverse
in regard to the issue of blame, ranging from placing nearly all of it on Bathsheba to at
least partially blaming her. She was definitely considered guilty of not preventing the
possibility of someone seeing her naked.13 At this point we can identify a culmination of
disciplinary ramifications. While late medieval literature reprimanded Bathsheba for
boldly exposing her nude body to David, the moral breach now lies in the fact that she
did not prevent being watched in the first place. Thus Calvin judges her in one of his
87 weekly sermons:
18
And as for Bathsheba, she is not to be condemned merely for washing
herself; there should have been more discretion in her, even if she thought
she could not be seen. For an honorable and chaste woman does not
present herself this way, in order to not seduce men nor to be the work of
the devil, to spark the fire; thus Bathsheba was unchaste, in this sense.14
The iconography of Rembrandt’s Bathsheba is a combination of traditional

elements, as none of the used motifs are new.15 The motif of the bathing woman with a
kneeling female servant washing her feet has a long tradition. Based on antique sources,
it can be traced back to medieval illuminations such as the Psalter of Saint Louis from the
13th century, and to the German masters of the 15th century, Lucas Cranach and Albrecht
Altdorfer. Dutch artists like Maarten van
Heemskerck or Rembrandt’s teacher Pieter
211 Edith Wenzel, David und Bathseba. Zum Wandel der
Weiblichkeit im männlichen Blick, in: Bulletin des Lastman also made use of the motif. In its
Zentrums für interdisziplinäre Frauenforschung der radical reduction to female nude and the foot-
Humboldt-Universität Berlin-Brandenburg, vol. 11, 1995,
p. 41 – 55. washing servant, Rembrandt’s image shows
212 See Sluijter 1998, p. 83 f., Heemskerck fig. 6, p. 50; also
see below (Chapter 2) on the impossible reversal of remarkable proximity to a few drawings by
roles (women as rapists) and the theme of Potiphar’s Elsheimer (fig. 2). The elimination of King David,
wife.
213 On the different positions see Sluijter 1998, p. 83 and the main biblical protagonist of the story, was
Welzel 1994, p. 48 – 65. On the danger of the gaze, see
below in the section on Susanna.
also already done by others, for example by
214 English by translator. “Quant est donc de Bethsabée, Buytewech in an etching from 1615, by Elsheimer
elle n’est point condamnée simplement de s’estre
lauee; mais il y devoit auoir plus grande discretion en in the aforementioned drawings and by Cornelis
elle, qu’elle pensast bien de n’estre point veue. Car Cornelisz. van Haarlem in a panel painting from
une femme chaste et pudique ne se monstera point
en telle sorte, pour allecher les hommes ny pour est- 1594 (fig. 3). In another drawing, Buytewech
re comme ung filet du diable, afin d’allumer le feu;
Bethsabée donc a esté impudice, quant a cela.” John already employed the intense contrast between
Calvin, Sermon on 2 Samuel. French quote after Hans youth and old age. In it the reference to the
Rückert, Neukirchen-Ubyn 1936, p. 281.
215 Scholars generally assume that Rembrandt had pain- transitory nature of female beauty was explicitly
ted two other versions of Bathsheba before the monu-
mental one from 1654. One version is assumed to be emphasized by including the word ‘vanitas.’ 16
from 1632; however it has only been preserved in co-
pies. The best of these can be found at the Musée des
Beaux-Artes in Rennes, where there is also an etching Including a letter is also not Rembrandt’s
by one of Rembrandt’s students. See RRP, vol. 2, 1986,
C 45, p. 591 – 594. We see a half nude Bathsheba sitting
invention. Even though the biblical text does not
in a landscape with David’s palace in the background; mention any letter to Bathsheba — David
an old maidservant sits at her feet, cutting her toenails
while Bathsheba holds a small bouquet of flowers in summoned her with a messenger — it became
her hand. The second version is a panel painting from somewhat of a marker for the story during the
1643, which is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in
New York. The attribution to Rembrandt has been con- 17 th century.17 Knowledge of the story was
tested, but the image’s invention usually is concluded
to be his. See Sluijter, 1998, p. 65 f. and 2006, p. 341 ff. passed on through images as well as through
I think this is a piece by one of Rembrandt’s students, written text. The images that carry the memory
because Bathsheba’s coquettish pose turned to the
beholder contradicts Rembrandt and, as a whole, the of a story are transported to the present with
painting seems to be inspired by Lastman’s Bathsheba.
216 On the mentioned images, see Kunoth-Leifels 1962:
figs. 6, 19, 22 – 25, 36 – 38, 43, 58 – 60.
217 See Welzel 1994, p. 37. 19
Fig. 4: Peter Paul Rubens, Bathsheba, drawing, 1613/14, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Kupferstichkabinett
Fig. 5: Simon Bening, Bathsheba, Hennessy Book of Hours, early 16th cent., Brussels, Bibl. Royale, Ms. II, 158
contemporary elements, gradually changing the canonical texts. How the royal messen
ger became a messenger with a letter and then just a letter can only be understood
from the point of view of media history. Horst Wenzel points out how, in a predominantly
oral culture, the messenger represents the master.18 As written culture slowly took over,
the letter gradually began to replace the physical representative of the master, making the
messenger less and less important. In analogy to the story of Bathsheba, this pheno
menon of change can also be found in depictions of the Annunciation, in which the angel
started handing Mary a letter in the Late Middle Ages.19
The word of the master excorporated itself from the body of the messenger and
instead became part of writing. We can see how closely linked the Annunciation and
Bathsheba were in visual memory in a drawing by Rubens, which shows a kneeling,
angel-like figure in flowing draped garments handing a letter to a naked Bathsheba
(fig. 4). The motif of handing over a letter was passed on in Bathsheba iconography from
the early 16th century (fig. 5). Along with the messenger’s gradual loss of meaning as a
representative of the master and the consequential reduction of the figure to a mere tool
only used for transferring a message that no longer depended on him, we can witness a
change in gender: the messenger turned female. In Simon Bening’s illustration, it is a
woman who hands Bathsheba the letter. In Dutch painting from the 16th and 17 th century
these women are most often old and ugly women, procuresses, or, like in Ruben’s pain
ting, a dark-skinned messenger (fig. 6). This shifted how the passing of the message was
understood. Instead of a royal command executed, the focus now lay in the adulterous
content of the letter.
20
Fig. 6: Peter
Paul Rubens,
Bathsheba,
c. 1635, panel,
Dresden,
Staatliche Kunst
sammlungen,
Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 7:
Jan Lievens,
Bathsheba,
c. 1631, canvas,
Studio City (Cal.),
Coll. Mr. and
Mrs. Cooney
The letter is part of the iconography of message transmission and thus of an

action-oriented context. In medieval visual narration, we usually have a chronological
sequence of events. This was also the case in the miniatures of the Bibles Moralisées,
which first introduce David watching the beautiful Bathsheba taking a bath and then the
messenger bringing Bathsheba to the king. In painting after the Renaissance, which
sought to unite space and time in linear perspective, both scenes are often depicted
together: we see Bathsheba taking a bath while a matchmaker or messenger hands her a
letter and David’s palace is seen in the background. Jan Lievens, who studied together
with Rembrandt under Lastman in Amsterdam and later frequently communicated with
him in Leyden, already eliminated the dramatic element of handing over the letter. He
did, however, keep the prop. There seem to be at least two versions of the subject by
Lievens from the 1630s: one is mentioned by Philip Angel in Lof der Schilderkonst,
published in Leyden in 1642. Angel explicitly stresses that the message is not conveyed
orally through the matchmaker, but in a letter.20 The picture, which also depicts a Cupid
with bow and arrow, is lost today. Another version, presumably from 1631, presents a
clothed Bathsheba holding a letter and looking at the viewer. The procuress is seen in
profile behind her, to the left (fig. 7).21 The scene
takes place in an interior setting. In the 1630s
218 See Horst Wenzel, Hören und Sehen. Schrift und Bild. and -40s there were numerous related versions
Kultur und Gedächtnis im Mittelalter, Munich 1995,
especially p. 287 – 291. among Rembrandt’s peers. Interestingly, the
219 For example in an Annunciation by an Upper German
Artist from 1640, in: Wenzel 1995, fig. 38, p. 289. identification of the respective portrayed story
120 Philips Angel, Lof der Schilderkonst, Leiden 1642, as Bathsheba, Esther or other biblical heroines
p. 48 – 51.
121 Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler, 5 is often unclear.22 These visual inventions must
vols., Landau/Pfalz 1983 – 90, vol. 3, no. 1189, p. 1779.
122 Sluijter 1998, p. 62 ff. On similar pictures by Lievens,
Salomon Koninck and Philip Koninck, see Sumowski
vol. 3, no. 1188, no. 1086, no. 1002. 21
be seen in a wider context. In this case, the context of a culture of letters, which began
playing a vital role in Holland during the 1630s and which we will investigate more
thoroughly in the second half of this book.
All the iconographical elements used in Rembrandt’s painting already existed
beforehand. What is new and different about his painting is the specific combination of
these motifs and the aesthetic staging as a whole, and therefore the meaning of its
contents. Rembrandt brings all the action to a standstill in his painting. He even
eliminates the procuress, reducing her part to a maidservant washing Bathsheba’s feet.
In comparison, the old woman in Lievens’s image is also inactive, but she can be linked
directly to the letter in Bathsheba’s hands. It is a reciprocal relation: the letter suggests
that she is a procuress, while her presence defines the letter as the one that was just
delivered and contains David’s message. Remarkably enough, scholars have been quite
unsure what letter Bathsheba might be holding in Rembrandt’s painting. Freise claims
that it was a later episode in the story, after Uriah’s death, because that was the only
explanation for Bathsheba’s sorrowful face.23 This interpretation was rightly refuted, but
not without declaring the painting to be set at the beginning of the story. Mieke Bal, on
the other hand, uses a semiotic approach for her analysis, regarding the letter as a “sign
of textuality” and subsequently concluding that the letter also connotes the message
David sent along with Uriah, indirectly containing the latter’s death sentence.24 I find it
remarkable that the elimination of definite markers, such as the procuress, seems to
disable the specification of a certain moment within the narrative, thus dissolving the
boundaries of the story. Because there is no specific action, the letter lets the entire story
of Bathsheba unfold before our mind’s eye. Rembrandt’s painting is not the illustration of
a text that we can link to a specific passage and thus to a specific timeframe in the story.
The painting itself is a text, albeit one that cannot be read like a written one. Different
parts of the text can be synoptically perceived. Rembrandt’s contemporaries did not read
history paintings as illustrations of temporally set episodes. This is documented in a
passage of De pictura veterum by Franciscus Junius, a treatise that was published in
Amsterdam in 1637. Here Junius calls for a linking of past, present and future elements in
one painting, especially in regard to history painting.25 Research on Rembrandt would
greatly profit from the inclusion of this specific contemporary source. Many images by
Rembrandt have caused pointless debates on whether this or that episode from a specific
story was portrayed. This however, is a fundamental misreading of the core of
Rembrandt’s artistic practice.26
Rembrandt’s forgoing of any exterior moment of action is radical. He even avoids

any form of embellishment or specification of the surroundings. The scene is reduced
to Bathsheba and the maidservant, who both appear stuck to the image’s surface like a
22
relief. All potential movement is suppressed. The servant does not bend down at her
lady’s feet like in versions by Elsheimer or Rembrandt’s teacher Lastman; she is a half-
figure cropped by the painting’s edge, applied to the image’s surface, lacking any spatial
position. Bathsheba sits upright, her limbs arranged in a system of verticals and
horizontals, created by hints of her seat, the balustrade covered by her shimmering,
golden garments and the architecture. Bathsheba’s naked body is fully lit and in full view,
yet its austerity and monumentality create a sense of distance. Even though Rembrandt
breaks with the iconography of an actively conveyed message, he does not let the
painting slip into an idyllic scene, nor does he merely present the audience with an
appealing nude to behold. As opposed to Elsheimer’s drawings, with which it shares the
figurative reduction to maid and nude, Rembrandt positions the letter at the center of the
image. In fact, it nearly is at the physical center of the painting, at the intersection of
Bathsheba’s legs and her hand resting upon them, the same height as her crotch, which
the written pages are facing. The letter’s text
remains invisible to us, and yet this very letter
123 Kurt Freise, Bathsebabilder von Rembrandt und Last-
man, in: Monatshefte für Kunstwissenschaft, 2, 1909, floods the painting with text and meaning.
p. 302 – 313.
124 Bal 1991, esp. p. 228 ff.; also Bal, Reading Bathsheba: Bathsheba is not shown during the act of
From Mastercodes to Misfits, in: Adams 1998, reading, she obviously already knows what it
p. 119 – 146, esp. p. 128 f. Similarly, see Wetering 1998,
p. 40 ff. says. Her slightly tilted head and downcast eyes
125 1637 Latin, 1638 English and 1641 Dutch version. Fran-
ciscus Junius, De pictura veterum libri tres. The Pain-
signal a state of pensiveness. Her facial
ting of the Ancients (1638), in: Keith Aldrich, Philipp expression and the letter contextualize each
Fehl and Raina Fehl (eds.), The Literature of Clas
sical Art, 2 vols., Berkeley 1991, vol. 1, p. 275. Quoted other. Thus the dark, empty pictorial space
here after Wetering 1998, p. 40 f.: “[…] onely that the becomes somewhat of an associative space for
methode of a painted history must not always be tyed
to the lawes of a penned historie: an historiographer the viewers who can unfold their thoughts and
discourseth of affaires orderly as they were done, ac-
cording as well the times as the actions: but a Painter feelings within the given framework of the
trustheth himselfe into the very middest, even where it story — sinking into a mode of contemplation in
most concerneth him: and recoursing from thence to
the things forepast, preventing (foreshadowing) like- analogy to the protagonist herself. The absence
wise the things to come, he maketh his Art all at once
represent things alreadie done, things that are adoing, of a messenger/procuress reduces King David’s
and things which are as yet to be done.” power to the letter. The decision whether to
126 I would like to cite the discussion on Rembrandt’s
late work Haman Recognizes His Fate (St. Petersburg, commit adultery or disobey the king’s order is
Hermitage, fig. 131) as an example. In this work, like
in many others, Rembrandt generalizes the essence of
shifted completely inward, into Bathsheba’s
the narrative so much that even the subject cannot be mind. If David had her summoned by a
clearly determined. There is debate on what point of
the story is depicted and even whether this is a story messenger, thus physically retrieving her, she
from the book of Esther at all. See, a. o., Madlyn Kahr, would not have any room for decision. The
A Rembrandt Problem: Haman or Uriah?, in: Journal
of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, vol. 28, 1965, letter, however, opens up a temporal and
p. 273 ff.; Madlyn Kahr, On the Evaluation of Evidence
in Art History, in: Burlington Magazine, vol. 114, 1972, physical space of contemplation, suddenly
p. 551 – 553; Christian Tümpel, Ikonographische Beiträge allowing her to consider possible actions and
zu Rembrandt. Zur Deutung und Interpretation seiner
Historien, in: Jahrbuch der Hamburger Kunstsamm- their consequences. Here we see the connection
lungen, vol. 13, 1986, p. 95 – 126; Christian Tümpel,
Rembrandt. Mythos und Methode, Antwerpen 1986,
p. 316 – 392; H. van de Waal, Rembrandt and the Feast
of Purim, in: Oud Holland, vol. 84, 1969, p. 199–223. 23
Fig. 8: Willem Drost, Bathsheba, 1654, canvas, Fig. 9: Govert Flinck, Bathsheba, 1659, canvas,
Paris, Louvre St. Petersburg, Hermitage
between letter culture and the inner self (Innerlichkeit), which we will deal with in more
detail later on. The entire action takes place within Bathsheba, making it a matter of her
psyche. The aesthetic staging is what produces this effect of psychological charging: the
radical reduction of the narrative to Bathsheba and her maid, the freezing out of any
exterior action and the significant connection between letter and pensive gaze. Because
we are familiar with the letter’s content and know that it confronts Bathsheba with a
decision, we interpret (because of the illegible letter) Bathsheba’s facial expression as one
reflecting the process of decision-making. Contemplation is difficult to portray and the
object of reflection — in our case the letter — supports our interpretation of Bathsheba’s
face. Rembrandt also achieves Bathsheba’s air of pensive, melancholic introspection
through her tilted head, the slightly arched eyebrows and, most of all, her downcast dark
eyes and the thereby staged lost gaze. The specific lighting of the scene emphasizes the
inwardness: red and ochre tones, especially those in the golden garment shimmering
from the shadowy darkness, dipping the scene in a mysterious light. This light seems to
emanate from the bodies and objects themselves.
The entire aesthetic staging of the painting aims at moving the story from the outside
into Bathsheba’s inner self. It is like a visualization of Bathsheba’s mind. The image’s viewers
are supposed to imagine her feelings and thoughts while she makes the terribly difficult
decision. Transforming the narrative into her inner struggle simultaneously activates the audi-
ence’s fantasy; by representing reflection the viewers are encouraged to reflect themselves.
24
Bathsheba is portrayed as an individual contemplating a decision. Does that
mean that Rembrandt represents her as a subject capable of decision-making? In order
to clarify this question and with it the concept of femininity in this and other works by
Rembrandt, we must deal with several questions. I will return to answer this question
after a few detours.
First I would like to position the painting within tradition. Rembrandt does not
suggest any explicit accusations, neither David nor Bathsheba are accused. He rather
encourages the contemplation of tragic and unsolvable conflicts. Rembrandt’s Bathsheba
is neither a piece of livestock or object of trade (as in early medieval tradition, closely
tied to the Old Testament), nor is she an allegory of the church (as in illuminated manu
scripts like the Biblées Moralisées from the High Middle Ages); she is neither a dangerous
seductress, nor the object of voyeuristic male desire like in the visual tradition prevalent
since the Renaissance. As closely related as Rembrandt’s painting may be to Cornelisz.
van Haarlem’s from 1594 (fig. 3, p. 18), it differs immensely in its understanding of the
subject. Cornelisz. stages female nudity and beauty in three variations. In Rembrandt’s
image, it becomes impossible for the viewer to merely enjoy the beauty of the presented
female body. The emphasis of Bathsheba’s pensive expression encourages the audience
to see the individual instead of just a beautiful body. In the same year, 1654, Rembrandt’s
student Willem Drost also painted a Bathsheba — obviously influenced by his teacher
(fig. 8). However, the even further reduction of figures to just Bathsheba herself is not
used for an even deeper level of content. Quite the opposite is the case: Drost flaunts
Bathsheba’s beauty by letting her blouse slip off her shoulder as if by accident, intended
to direct the viewer’s gaze to her white breast, and adding her smoldering gaze to the
viewer. The letter has once again been reduced to a mere attribute held in her hands.
Other contemporaries, including Rembrandt’s students Govert Flinck or Cornelis
Bisschop, also gave up dealing with the issue of Bathsheba’s inner conflict in favor of
depicting her seductive beauty (fig. 9).
What is exceptional about Rembrandt’s Bathsheba is indeed the pairing of

an erotic female nude with an individually portrayed face signalizing contemplation.27
Her pensive gaze has often been pointed out by scholars. Ann Jensen Adams, for
example, writes:
One of the most consistent observations about the painting is

Bathseba’s sober emotional tenor: she sits lost in deep, apparently
melancholic, thought.28
127 On the meaning of faces in Rembrandt’s work,

see below, part II, Chapter 5.
128 Adams 1998, p. 10. 25
Adams continues that she is not perceived as an anonymous object of male desire, but
as an individual who is experiencing her own subjectivity and with whom

the viewer can empathize.29
Sluijter uses similar words to describe the difference between Rembrandt’s and Lieven’s
use of the letter motif:
In Lieven’s painting, the letter and the longing gaze of this courtesan-like
Bathsheba merely seem to anticipate the meeting with her lover.
Rembrandt turns our attention instead to Bathsheba’s reflecting on the
content of the letter.30
The first written description of the painting in a Christie’s auction house catalog from 1811
already emphasizes Bathsheba’s melancholic facial expression — even though it includes
the dismissal of Rembrandt’s nudes typical for the normative concept of beauty in the
early 19th century:
Though deficient in beauty, the head of Bathsheba is not wanting in

expression; she is just informed of the passion of David, and her
countenance is clouded with the melancholy forebodings of its fatal
consequences.31
Contemporary Dutch painting in the 17 th century also included depictions of

women characterized as individuals, however almost exclusively in the genre of portraits;
occasionally in narrative paintings, but never in nudes. Following the tradition of Italian,
particularly Venetian painting, nudes were a genre that included beauty, chastity and
eroticism, but never individuality and subjectivity. Rembrandt joined the representation
of an erotic, naked female body and an individualized face signalizing contemplation.
Scholars have merely stated the facts on this phenomenon, but have neither analyzed
and historically positioned it, nor have they investigated its meaning for the under
standing of femininity in Rembrandt’s day and age. And so, Bathsheba merely remains a
sign for the greatness of Rembrandt’s art. Svetlana Alpers and Margaret D. Carroll are the
only scholars who have tried to find an explanation for the unusual nature of Rembrandt’s
portrayal.32 Alpers ties the reason for the individuality and subjectivity of the depicted
figure to the model. She adopts the often-claimed speculation that Rembrandt’s long-
term partner, Hendrickje Stoffels, was in fact the model for Bathsheba. Linking the
painting with the artist’s biographical facts and circumstances is anything but a new
26
practice. In 1654, the year the painting was made, a five-month pregnant Hendrickje was
cited to appear before the protestant church council; she was accused of living in sin with
Rembrandt and was excluded from communion. The new aspect of Alpers’s interpretation
is that she sees the model, or more specifically, Hendrickje herself, as the reason for the
aforementioned specific characteristics of the painting. According to Alpers, the oddly
twisted body — an almost fully frontal torso with the head in profile — and the unclear
positioning of the legs, combined with her facial expression conveying a sense of inacces
sibility are all signs of Hendrickje’s unruliness:
Against the evidence of her bodily pose and the anecdotal letter in her
hand, she resists the role.33
However, the reason the body is twisted in an anatomically incorrect pose is an

aesthetic one. While the position of Bathsheba’s head in profile allows her gaze to look
like lost in the void, the contortion of her torso makes it possible to present the full
beauty of her body to the viewers. Even the greatest ‘realists’ never fully followed nature’s
model, as divergences from anatomically ‘correct’ depictions were always necessary for
aesthetic reasons. Rubens, a master of depicting bodies, also resorted to this type of
aesthetically motivated alterations. Just think of his wife’s contorted pose in the nude
Portrait of Hélène Fourment (Het Pelsken). How a body is represented is also an issue of
the medium used. While a spontaneous drawing might incorporate movements made by
the model, it seems highly unlikely that the same
thing would happen for a monumental panel
129 Ibid.
130 See Sluijter 1998, p. 58 f. painting, which requires meticulous planning
131 Quoted from and commented in Schwartz 1998,
p. 176 – 203, here p. 179 f. and — as we have seen — is positioned within a
132 Svetlana Alpers, Not Bathsheba. I: The Painter and the clearly set visual tradition. The impossibility for
Model, in: Adams 1998, p. 147 – 159; Margaret D. Caroll,
Not Bathsheba. II: Uriah’s Gaze, in: ibid., p. 160 – 175. a woman in the 17 th century, even if she was not
I am ignoring Caroll’s theory that Rembrandt identifies
himself with Uriah and not with David; and that he is the artist’s wife, to sit as a model for a nude has
trying to sublimate his fear of loss when he claims that already been verified by scholars.34 Nude models
Hendrickje is not Bathsheba.
133 Ibid., p. 157. were prostitutes, or considered as such. Rem
134 For a refutation of the model theory, see esp., Volker
Manuth, “As stark naked as one could possibly be
brandt’s biography makes it clear that he con
painted …”: The Reputation of the Nude Female Mo- sidered Hendrickje his life partner and officially
del in the Age of Rembrandt, in: exh. cat. Edinburgh,
London 2001, p. 48 – 53. On Rembrandt’s relation- accepted their daughter Cornelia in 1654. He was
ships with women, see: Simon Schama, Rembrandt unable to marry Hendrickje for legal reasons,
and Women, in: Bulletin of the American Academy
of Arts and Sciences, vol. 38, April 1985, p. 21 – 47; because he could not dispose of the fortune his
Simon Schama, Rembrandt’s Eyes, London 1999;
S. A. C. Dudok van Heel, Rembrandt: His Life, His first wife Saskia had left their son Titus and was
Wife, the Nursemaid and the Servant, in: exh. cat. not allowed to remarry without the consent of
Edinburgh, London 2001, p. 19 – 27; on general sour-
ces on Rembrandt’s biography, see: S. A. C. Dudok her family.
van Heel, Archival Investigations and the Figure of
Rembrandt, Amsterdam 1987 – 88; W. L. Strauss, M.
van der Meulen (eds.), The Rembrandt Documents,
New York 1979. 27
Images are always images. They are constructions, and not copies of a given
reality. ‘Realism’ does not reflect a real, living person. Alpers, like many other art
historians, has obviously fallen for Rembrandt’s realistic effect. One typical quality of
Rembrandt’s art is exactly this effect of tangible realism and individuality. We are
supposed to believe that there is a real human being of flesh and blood before us. It is not
the power of the model, but rather a certain form of representation centered on the
categories individuality, emotion and subjectivity. These categories are supposed to be
conveyed to the viewers as if the represented was an actual, living person. This is what
triggers a sense of identification. If Rembrandt really was inspired by the appearance of
his wife or lover, the interesting point would not be personal identification with one of
these women, but rather the fact that the artist’s private context found its way into his art
at all. We will see later how these images contributed to a new form of perceiving
individuality and subjectivity in 17 th century bourgeois Dutch society.
First I would like to take a closer look at another painting by Rembrandt to

demonstrate what paradoxes have resulted from the strongly felt need to identify the
women represented in his works as actual figures from his private life.
Reversals —Woman in Bed (plate 2)35
We have a signed and dated painting. And yet — in an ironic twist of fate — the
last digit of the date is illegible. All we have is 164_. The 1640s are the decade in which
all three women who we know played an important role in the artist’s life lived in
Rembrandt’s house: his wife Saskia van Uylenburgh died in 1642, Geertje Dircx from
Ransdorp lived there from 1642 to 1649 as a housekeeper and as a wetnurse for
Rembrandt’s son Titus. There is no confirmed portrait of Geertje. Rembrandt’s
relationship to her was considered a shameful chapter in his life. Scholars were so
shocked about the master’s immoral behavior that they kept all evidence of the story
under tight wraps until the 1960s.36 Rembrandt had had an affair with Geertje and,
according to her, had promised to marry her. Instead of keeping his promise, he threw
her out after Hendrickje moved in. Geertje sued Rembrandt, who was forced to pay her.
After numerous squabbles, Rembrandt managed to have her committed to the Spinhuis
in Gouda in 1650, a kind of reformatory or correctional house, from which Geertje
was not released until 1655. Hendrickje was first confirmed a member of the household
in 1649 and remained Rembrandt’s life partner until her death in 1663. Depending on
the number scholars choose to fill the gap in Woman in Bed’s date, the identity of the
portrayed lady miraculously changes. All three women have been postulated as models
28
for the painting. François Tronchin, who owned the picture in the 18th century, dated it
as 1641, automatically making the woman Saskia. Saskia may have posed for a number
of Rembrandt’s drawings of women lying in bed. However, current research dates the
painting as made in the second half of the forties for stylistic reasons. Which of the two
remaining rivals, Hendrickje or Geertje, is portrayed divides the opinion of today’s
scholars.37 If one of these women actually was depicted here, there would be no trouble
identifying her, considering the faithfulness of Rembrandt’s portraits. This example
demonstrates that Rembrandt’s realism creates the effect of individuality; in fact the
effect is created so efficiently that a large number of art historians have fallen for it. 38
He achieves the impression of individuality through a certain roughness in the figure,
expressed in the heaviness of the body, the large hands, the nearly missing neck, the
rough skin, the ruddy cheeks and the thick nose. For Rembrandt it was about the idea
of individuality. The construction of this uniqueness does not derive from the model’s
actual features and cannot be explained with biographical elements or the greatness of
Rembrandt’s art. The answer lies in the historical context of a certain discourse in
Holland’s early bourgeois society. I do not want to dismiss completely that Rembrandt’s
women were the inspiration for certain figures and pictorial inventions. However, even if
this were the case, it would have been a historical novelty for an artist’s personal life to
find its way into his art in this manner.39
135 National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, oil on canvas,

What is so remarkable and irritating
81.1/67.8 cm. For a bibliography, see: exh. cat. Edinburgh, about the painting is, similar to Bathsheba, the
London 2001, no. 100, p. 182–184; RRP, vol. 3, 1989, A 146.
136 Dudok van Heel 2001, p. 19. juxtaposition of an individualized face and an
137 Among those in favor of Geertje are: Albert Blankert, obviously erotic subject.
Rembrandt. A Genius and his Impact, exhibition
catalog, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne,
Canberra, Zwolle 1997, no. 14, p. 130 – 133 and Alpers,
Rembrandt’s Enterprise. The Studio and the Market, The wish to fully grasp the subject matter
London 1988, p. 64. — Alpers uses the term “generally of this extraordinary painting has gone beyond
accepted.” In favor of Hendrickje are, among others,
Horst Gerson, Rembrandt’s Paintings, Amsterdam attempts to firmly link it to a person from
1986, cat. 227, p. 497 and L. J. Slatkes, Rembrandt, Ca
talogo Completo, Florence 1992, cat. 292, p. 442. Rembrandt’s personal background. There have
138 As further evidence for the theory that Rembrandt’s also been endeavors to tie it to (or invent) a
realism is not a recording of actual reality, but rather a
consciously employed effect and thus the production manifest story. A majority of scholars dealing
of meaning, I would like to point out Diana Bathing
from 1630/31 (drawing and etching at the British Mu-
with the painting follow Christian Tümpel’s
seum, London): The etching is ‘more realistic’ than interpretation that the panting is a depiction of
the drawing, because in the etching we see an empha-
sis of details that are not considered ‘ideally beautiful’ Sarah expecting her groom Tobias, from the
(such as folds of skin in the stomach area). apocryphal book of Tobit. 40 The story is about
139 Thus Eddy de Jongh, for example, carefully considers
drawing conclusions between the emergence of Flora Sarah, who has been married seven times, but
depictions in Rembrandt’s oeuvre and his private life.
The images coincide with the respective pregnancies whose husbands are always murdered in their
of Saskia and later Hendrickje. Eddy de Jongh, The wedding night by the demon Asmodeus. When
Model Woman and the Woman of Flesh and Blood, in:
exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001, p. 29 – 35, here: p. 35. Tobias is married to Sarah, he heeds the advice
140 Christian Tümpel, Studien zur Ikonografie der Histo
rien Rembrandts. Deutung und Interpretation der
Bildinhalte, in: Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek,
vol. 20, 1969, p. 107 – 198, here: p. 176 – 178. 29
Pl. 2: Rembrandt, A Woman in Bed, c. 1645 – 49, canvas, Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland
Fig. 10: Pieter Lastman, Tobias and Sarah, 1611, panel, J. Ch. Edwards Coll., Boston, Museum of Fine Arts
of the angel Raphael and puts pieces of a fish’s liver and heart on a bowl of cinders. The
intestines of said fish (who later on in the story help him cure his father from blindness)
help him defeat the demon and enable him to spend his wedding night with Sarah.
Rembrandt’s teacher Lastman illustrated this rarely depicted scene in 1611 (fig. 10). We see
Sarah in bed, leaning on her arm as she watches Tobias kneeling on the floor, burning the
fish’s intestines. Hovering in the air above Sarah’s bed, the angel Raphael wrestles the
demon. Tümpel argues that Rembrandt extracted the figure of Sarah from this scene. It
is a fact that Rembrandt’s image is unique in its iconography. I think it is absolutely
impossible that anyone of Rembrandt’s contemporaries would have associated the image
of a woman in bed with the barely known scene of Tobias and Sarah. The woman in our
painting is not similar to the Sarah in Lastman’s work: In the Lastman she does not lift a
curtain and her gaze is not directed outside the painting, instead she looks at Tobias
kneeling on the floor. Why does art historic research feel the need to incorporate
Rembrandt’s painting in a neatly defined narrative context? 41 It has been demonstrated
that many of his pictures cannot be linked to one explicit theme or cannot simply be
ascribed to (biblical) stories. It would make more sense to analyze the aesthetic staging
of these images and to investigate the specific function of their motifs than to desperately
search for a specific iconographic source.
Next to the numerous drawings of women in bed made by Rembrandt in the
thirties and early forties, the source for the invention of this particular image was likely
the painting of Danaë that he began in 1636 and completed in the forties (plate 8). 42
A Woman in Bed seems like a reversed detail taken from the large nude composition. 43
Here, we can see the development of several similar motifs: the female figure leaning on
a large, white embroidered pillow, wearing an unusual headdress, with a decidedly clear
30
Fig. 11: Rembrandt, Girl at a Window, 1645, canvas, London, Dulwich Picture Gallery
Pl. 8: Rembrandt, Danaë, 1636 and 1643 – 49, canvas, St. Petersburg, Hermitage
gaze — in this case toward an undetermined, yet well-known male, namely Jupiter. There
is also a predecessor of the curtain motif, as the old maid is drawing it back. In conclusion,
we can ascertain that the staging of expectation is what connects these two paintings.
At the same time that Woman in Bed was created, Rembrandt developed a motif
that captured his attention for many years and was later adapted and varied in many ways
by several of his students: woman at the window, or to be precise, a woman seemingly
leaning out of a window opening into the space
of the viewer. 44 His Girl at a Window, dated 1645,
141 On the absurdities that can result from art historians’ which is in the Dulwich Picture Gallery in
urge to always explain pictures with images that came
before them, see the critique by Leo Steinberg, An In- London today, can be considered the central
comparable Bathsheba, in: Adams 1998, p. 100 – 118. piece of this group (fig. 11).The portrayed young
142 On Danaë, see below.
143 This was already concluded by Richard Hamann, woman eludes any precise identification:
Rembrandt, Berlin 1969, p. 95. Also see: Christopher
Brown, Jan Kelch and Pieter van Thiel (eds.), Rem scholars have deemed her anything from a maid
brandt und seine Werkstatt, exh. cat. Gemäldegalerie to a courtesan or biblical figure, but none of
Berlin, Munich 1991, no. 36, p. 230 – 232, here p. 232.
144 The Kitchen Maid from 1651 at the National Museum these diverging ascriptions can be confirmed.
in Stockholm is part of this group as well as Woman at
an Open Door from approx. 1656/57 at the Gemäldega-
The girl’s clothing is too vague and there is no
lerie Berlin, Staatliche Museen. In my opinion, The Girl clear narrative context. While the plain white
in a Picture Frame is a yet unsolved and difficult issue.
It is seemingly signed by Rembrandt and is dated 1641. shirt may lead us to believe she is a maid, the
Formerly part of the Lanckoronski Collection, it went gold necklace surely points in a different
missing until 1990 and today is part of the Stanislaw
August Collection in Warsaw’s Royal Castle. It shows direction. 45 This invention was followed by many
a girl in a red dress and oversized velvet hat standing
frontally in a picture frame, which her hands are laid variations of differently aged women among
over. This is an explicit trompe l’oeil. After having seen Rembrandt’s peers, ranging from the child-like
the original in a 2006 exhibition in Berlin, I highly
doubt both the dating and Rembrandt’s full author- girl in Rembrandt’s picture to an old woman like
ship. (Ernst van de Wetering, Jan Kelch (eds.), Rem
brandt. Genie auf der Suche, exh. cat. Berlin, Staatliche
Museen Gemäldegalerie, Cologne 2006, cat. no. 33,
fig. on p. 308). 31
Fig. 48: Rembrandt,
Self-Portrait, 1640,
canvas, London,
National Gallery
Fig. 11: Rembrandt,

Girl at a Window,
1645, canvas,
London, Dulwich
Picture Gallery
in a painting by van der Helst. The same wide spectrum can be found in regard to social
status: we have a maid with a broom by Fabritius, a fantastically elegantly dressed lady by
Jan Victors and numerous socially indefinable figures like a young woman portrayed by
Hoogstraten (fig. 12). 46 The shared motif in all these pictures is a female figure leaning out
of the opening of a door or window, turned towards the viewers’ space, while the pictorial
space is always dark and non-descript. Rembrandt had already developed this trompe
l’oeil effect of a figure extending itself beyond the boundaries of the image in portraits
from the early 1640s, including a self-portrait from 1640 (fig. 48), an etching of Cornelisz.
Sylvius from 1646, or the portraits of Nicolaas van Bambeek and Agatha Bas from 1641.
His student Jan Victor also created noteworthy versions, dating from as early as 1640 and
1642. 47 The trompe l’oeil effect was preceded
and prepared by Gerrit van Honthorst, for
145 On different ascriptions, see exh. cat. Edinburgh, Lon-
example in The Merry Violinist from 1623. We see don 2001, no. 104, p. 188. The catalog refrains from
any final conclusions.
a laughing musician as he pushes a curtain to 146 Due to the signature, the Young Woman used to be
the side, leans out of a window-like opening and ascribed to Rembrandt, but today it is rightly ascribed,
in my opinion, to Hoogstraten. Further examples:
toasts the viewers with a wineglass in his hand Carel Fabritius, Girl with a Broom, Washington D. C.,
National Gallery of Art; Jan Victors, Girl at the Window,
(fig. 13). Figures who cross the threshold of a
1642, Amsterdam, Salomon Liliaan Gallerie, ill.: exh.
painted frame and with it the pictorial space cat. Edinburgh, London 2001, p. 188, fig. 137; Jan Vic-
tors, Young Girl at the Window, 1640, Paris, Louvre, ill.:
slowly began to appear during the 15th and 16th Sumowski 1983 – 95, vol. 4, no. 1785; Philipp Koninck,
century, for instance the portrait of Jacqueline de Girl with Pearl Necklace, 1664, formerly in The Hague,
art dealership S. Nystad, ill.: Sumowski 1983 – 95, vol. 3,
Bourgogne by Jan Gossaert from 1520 in the no. 1021; Gerard Dou, Young Girl with a Burning Can
dle, ca. 1660 – 65, Collection Thyssen-Bornemisza, ill.:
London National Gallery or the portrait of Maria Sumowski 1983 – 95, vol. 1, no. 291; Ferdinand Bol, Wo
Magdalena Portinari by Hans Memling in the man at a Window, Vaduz, A. F. Studer, ill.: Sumowski
1983 – 95, vol. 1, no. 123; Bartholomeus van der Helst,
Metropolitan Museum New York; the original Old Woman at the Window, Leipzig, Museum der bil-
denden Künste, ill.: exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001,
fig. 71, is a particularly interesting example in this
group. Depicted is a woman with a landscape in the
32 background, opening a window panel from the out-
Fig. 12: Samuel
van Hoogstraten,
Young Woman at
an Open Door,
c. 1645, canvas,
Chicago, Art
Institute
Fig. 13: Gerrit

van Honthorst,
The Merry
Violinist,
1623, canvas,
Amsterdam,
Rijksmuseum
ancestor of this optical illusion is of course Adam’s foot painted in bottom view in the
Ghent Altarpiece by Jan van Eyck. The subject of Dutch paintings depicting a woman at
the window or door is the border between interior and exterior in a double sense. From a
social perspective we have the boundaries between private home (defined as female) and
public space (defined as male); from a media-oriented perspective we have the border
between pictorial space and the viewers’ space. 48 Victor Stoichita demonstrated that the
aesthetic border was an obsession during the 17 th century and that the frame was
considered a fundamental issue for the definition of every image. 49 The frame is what
separates the two worlds: the world of the image and the real world. Painting the frame
turns the frame into the subject and thus questions the relationship between represen
tation and reality. Unlike the examples cited by
Stoichita, we are not looking into the image,
side. She seems to look inside at the viewers in the
room. There are also a few examples of young men where our gaze is directed through a window
looking out the window: Samuel Hoogstraten, Boy
Looking through the Window, ca. 1647, St. Petersburg, into a landscape or through a door into a certain
Hermitage, ill.: Schama 1999, p. 524. pictorial space. No, here the pictures’ protago
147 Fig.: exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001, p. 188; another
version by Victors from 1640 in the Louvre, Paris in: nists lean out of the pictorial space into our
Sumowski 1983 – 95, vol. 4, no. 1785.
148 On the positioning of women at windows and
space. It is the reversal of the usual relationship
thresholds as a means to address the boundaries between image and viewer. Most of Rembrandt’s
between private home and public space, see: Heidi
de Mare, Die Grenze des Hauses als ritueller Ort und students address the frame as the defined
ihr Bezug zur holländischen Hausfrau des 17. Jahr- opening of a window or door. In the aforemen
hunderts, in: kritische berichte 1992/94, p. 64 – 79. On
precursory examples of figures extending the image’s tioned example by Hoogstraaten from 1645, the
frame, see Ivo Hammer, Typologie und frühbürger
licher Realismus. Die Biblia Pauperum Weigel-Felix, window, door and frame are crafted into one
The Morgan Library N. Y. Ms 230, (unpublished) doc- (fig. 12). Rembrandt’s Girl at a Window (fig. 11)
toral thesis, University of Vienna 1975.
149 Victor I. Stoichita, The Self-Aware Image. An Insight does not show a clearly defined location, we
into Early Modern Meta-Painting, Cambridge, New
York 1997, Chapter 3. Surprisingly, Stoichita does not
mention this group of images, even though it is para-
digmatic for the complex of issues he deals with. 33
Fig. 14: Rembrandt,
The Holy Family,
1646, panel, Kassel,
Schloss Wilhelms
höhe, Gemäldegalerie
Alte Meister und
Antikensammlung
have neither a doorframe nor a window. Rembrandt does not demarcate the boundaries
between pictorial space and viewers’ space, but rather blurs them. The blurriness of the
boundaries of media, paired with an individually characterized figure produces his
signature effect of realism. Sources confirm that contemporaries actually reacted to these
trompe l’oeil effects. Roger de Piles, a French painter and scholar (1635–1709) noted that
Rembrandt had attached a painting of a maid looking out of a window to the side of his
house to fool those who came by. Supposedly they did not recognize the optical trick
until they had observed that the girl’s eyes were not moving.50 Even though this anecdote
is surely a figment of the author’s imagination and takes the form of a traditional comple
ment to the artist, it nonetheless tells us about the specific type of reception it received.
This illusionist effect can also be found in Woman in Bed. Here we also have a
single, female half-figure under an arched upper edge, looking from a dark pictorial space
into the viewer’s space. Here the viewer is also drawn very close to the woman and there
is no (painted) frame to remind him of the boundaries between him and the depicted
figure. Both the distance created by the medium and the actual spatial distance between
viewer and the painted woman are meant to be dissolved. The illusion is evoked
especially by the extreme proximity the image induces. Rembrandt creates this feeling
of closeness with several techniques: the tight framing of the pictorial space, the viewer’s
positioning right at the bedside (we are looking down on the right arm, but the hand
drawing the curtain is painted in bottom view) and finally, the rough manner of the
painting.51 Next to windows, doors and frames, curtains can also signal the boundaries
between pictorial space and viewers’ space. It is no coincidence that Rembrandt painted
the Holy Family (Kassel) around the same time, in 1646 (fig. 14).52 Here, he marks the
difference between the spaces of the two media with a curtain that seems to cover the
34
Fig. 15: Francesco Colonna, Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, Nymph and Satyr, Venice 1499, woodcut
Fig. 16: Pablo Picasso, Faun Revealing a Sleeping Woman, 1936, lithograph/aquatint
actual painting. Wolfgang Kemp demonstrates how Rembrandt uses the painted curtain
to identify the Holy Family as a painting and thus destroys the sacral character of the
image. His knowledge of the image as a medium creates the effect of distance in the
representation of a devotional image. Rembrandt also experiments with his knowledge
on the power of the medium in Woman in Bed. However, his goal is quite the opposite
from the Holy Family. The representation of a profane, erotically staged female figure
aims at making the viewer forget any awareness of how the medium works. ‘The woman’
is supposed to leave her space and enter his reality. The tactile quality of Rembrandt’s
painterly technique boosts this effect, giving us the feeling that we could almost touch
the woman before us.
As opposed to its position in the Holy Family, the curtain in A Woman in Bed
becomes an immanent part of the bed and thus of the image. She draws back the curtain
herself, revealing the sight of her body. Here we also have an instance of reversal. Ever
since this particular iconographic tradition began in the Renaissance, we have been used
to male figures — satyrs or god-like figures — drawing back curtains to reveal naked
female figures, most often nymphs, to the eyes of the viewer. One of the earliest and
most proficient images is an illustration from a
series of woodcuts in Hypnerotomachia Poliphili,
150 Exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001, p. 188.
151 In his treatise on painting Inleyding tot de hooge which was published in Venice in 1490 (fig. 15).
schoole der schilderkonst, published 1678 in Rotter- The exposure of female nudity by male prota
dam, Rembrandt’s student Samuel Hoogstraten re-
commends painting objects in the foreground of an gonists was a popular erotic motif during the
image in a rougher, more open manner than objects in
the background. See: Ernst van Wetering, Rembrandt: Renaissance and Baroque periods53 and en-
The Painter at Work, Amsterdam 1997, p. 184. dured far into the 20th century — for example
152 See Stoichita 1997, p. 60 – 62; Wolfgang Kemp, Rem
brandt. Die Heilige Famile oder die Kunst, einen Vor- in Picasso’s work (fig. 16).
hang zu lüften, Frankfurt a. M. 1986. On the meaning of
curtains also see part II, Chapter 3, notes 600, 634 – 638.
153 Rembrandt also used this motif in both of his versions
of Jupiter and Antiope. See below. 35
Rembrandt staged Woman in Bed as an erotic figure: lying in bed, leaning on a
large white pillow, lifting a curtain to reveal herself. She is wearing an ‘impossible’
garment, an odd nightgown with just one sleeve (it is an actual sleeve and not a sheet
thrown over one shoulder). Her partial clothing emphasizes the act of taking clothes off,
yet her nudity is only hinted at with her partially exposed breast. The right hand in front
of her breast is reminiscent of the pudica gesture. Together the hands evoke the dialectic
interplay of covering and revealing. The bizarre gold headdress heightens the erotic
tension, as it is not anything a woman would actually wear to bed. By linking a sense of
expectation in the female figure with an eroticized staging, Rembrandt triggers the
viewers’ fantasy to envision a male addressee.
Let us sum up our observations on Woman in Bed: The traditional relationship
between viewer and female nude is reversed: the (assumed male) viewer does not
penetrate the linear perspective of a pictorial space with his gaze to see a naked beauty
and there is no male figure in the image to representatively do so for him.54 Instead, we
have an erotically staged female protagonist who draws back the curtain herself and looks
into the viewer’s space. The woman is not an idealized beauty, but rather has individual
features; her body, hands, skin and face are painted in a realistic manner. The direction
of her gaze is from left to right, which is the active viewing direction. She looks into the
viewer’s space, but not directly at the viewer. Her attention is not directed at us, which
results in an irritating effect. The staging of extreme proximity and intimacy while
simultaneously excluding the viewer combined with the effect of realism may have
sparked the desire to identify the female figure in order to at least link her to Rembrandt
as a person or to invent an (unseen) male protagonist. This figure, however, is not de
picted; the object of her desire is invisible and she, in turn, is unavailable for the viewer.
One could even speak of a triangular constellation: the (real) viewer in front of the
painting, the woman in the painting and a second, simulated (presumably male) figure
outside the image, who is the focus of the woman’s attention. What we have here is
the staging of expectation and desire in a double sense: desire sparked in the viewer and
the representation of a female figure who desires. This desire can never be fulfilled, just
like our desire to find out who the woman is looking at. The imaginary rival in the paint
ing’s off-space heightens the viewer’s desire.55
The female figure can neither be traced back to one of the women in Rembrandt’s
life, nor can she be identified as a specific figure within a traditional narrative or icono
graphy. In fact, the unrealistic costume and ambivalent characterization of this rather
roughly painted woman reclining in an elegant bed, the blending of realistic and fairy
tale-like or fantastical elements increase the effect of vagueness. Together with her gaze
into the painting’s off-space, this activates the viewers’ fantasies: we all start to wonder
36
what is going on. Because no story is told, we begin to develop different stories in our
head. The wide array of interpretations found in research is the result of Rembrandt’s
staging. He creates an invisible space that we fill with our own associations.56 Here we
encounter a phenomenon that will be further investigated in this book: Dutch painting’s
contribution to the formation of subjectivity.
Similar to Bathsheba, Rembrandt pairs signs of individuality and subjectivity with

signs of eroticism. It is exactly this combination that causes an irritation of the traditional
female dispositif. I have held several lectures on this subject and have often encountered
colleagues who found Rembrandt’s images of women completely unerotic. Therefore, I
would like to briefly comment on their reception today. Whether the image of a person is
considered erotic or not is an entirely subjective matter, just as it is impossible to
objectively measure how erotic or unerotic an actual, living person is. There are, however,
certain themes, motifs and signs that were used and perceived as erotic codes in certain
historical contexts like the staging of nude Bathsheba or the Woman in Bed described
above. The combination of individuality with traditionally erotic themes and signs is
exactly what makes Rembrandt’s female figures so unusual. It is a disturbance, or rather
shift of conventional patterns of femininity, in which eroticism was always defined as
idealized and purified beauty detached from specific individuals. Venetian nude painting
from the Renaissance, which Rembrandt also referred to, is an example for this concept.
We can also find a clear separation between individualized female portraits and de-
individualized, idealized female figures in the nude genre among Rembrandt’s Dutch
contemporaries. That today’s audiences consider Rembrandt’s representations of fem
ininity unerotic proves how deeply perceptive patterns are rooted in men and women to
this day.
While Bathsheba is so unique because her pensive attitude paired with a nude is
rightly considered highly unusual, Woman in Bed is marked by an erotic staging with the
representation of female individuality in a domestic scene instead of a mythologically or
biblically heightened setting. The gesture of
154 Linda Hentschel, Pornotopische Techniken des Be-

drawing back a curtain and the distinct gaze are
trachtens. Raumwahrnehmung und Geschlechterord- signals of female activity; within the context of
nung in visuellen Apparaten der Moderne, Marburg
2001. an erotic staging, this can be read as the
155 On the production of desire by the Other in the field representation of female desire. Because the
of literature, see: René Girard, Figuren des Begehrens.
Das Selbst und der Andere in der fiktionalen Realität, portrayed woman cannot be defined as a
Münster, Hamburg, London 1999.
156 During a lecture on this painting at the IFK, Vienna (In- specific (for instance biblical) figure and thus
ternationales Forschungszentrum Kulturwissenschaf- cannot be tied to a narrative context, her desire
ten) in September 2004, a few attendees argued that
the woman seems to express a sense of melancholic has no negative connotation, like the story of
reminiscence after saying goodbye rather than of ex-
pectation. The controversial discussion that followed
made it all too clear that Rembrandt’s painting truly
provokes a wide range of reactions. 37
Potiphar’s wife. Our question, whether Rembrandt grants his female figures the status
of being a subject, cannot be answered yet. What we can assert is that this kind of female
representation is highly unusual at the time.
Discourses on femininity
How unusual are the aforementioned visual representations of positively connoted

female desire within discourses on femininity at the time? Art is only intelligible within
its contemporary frame of discourses, or rather is part of these discourses itself. With
addressing the importance of contextualizing art comes the necessity to point out a few
related issues. One problem is that there is barely any research on the representation of
female subjectivity and female desire in Dutch literature.57 Unlike painting from that
period, 17 th century Dutch literature is quite unknown outside the Netherlands, even
though there is clear evidence that visual artists and Rederijkers (writers) were closely tied
at the time.58 The language barrier is a central part of this problem.59 Furthermore, dif
ferences between various text types60 must be considered and finally, how they related to
social practices is a difficult and barely
answerable question. The texts that are most
157 I am not familiar with any research dealing specifically
thoroughly researched and easily grasped are with this question; my observations are mostly based
normative texts: texts that create and pass on on the following literature: H. Rodney Nevitt, Jr., Art
and the Culture of Love, Cambridge 2003 (Cambridge
certain norms and judge, affirm, legalize or Studies in Netherlandish Visual Culture); Maria-There-
disparage certain social practices. Strictly sia Leuker, Widerspenstige und tugendhafte Gattinnen.
Das Bild der Ehefrau in niederländischen Texten aus
speaking, this text type is made up of theologi- dem 17. Jahrhundert, in: Hans-Jürgen Bachorski (ed.),
Ordnung und Lust. Bilder von Liebe, Ehe und Sexuali-
cal and legal texts and conduct books. The tät im Spätmittelalter und Früher Neuzeit, Trier 1991,
normative ideas on gender relationships in 17 th p. 95 – 122; Maria-Theresia Leuker, “De last van’t huys,
de wil des mans …” Frauenbilder und Ehekonzepte im
century Holland are bundled in the writings of niederländischen Lustspiel des 17. Jahrhunderts, Nie-
derlande-Studien, vol. 2, Münster 1992; Jan Konst, De
Jacob Cats.61 vrouwelijke personages in het toneel van Vondel, in:
Neerlandica Wratislaviensia 12, 1999, p. 7–21; Els Kloek,
Nicole Teeuwen, Marijke Huisman (eds.), Women of
Cats (1577 – 1660) was a legal expert and the Golden Age. An International Debate on Women
in Seventeenth Century Holland, England and Italy,
pensionary of Holland. He owned and sold land Hilversum 1994; Agnes A. Sneller, Reading Jacob Cats,
and stocks, which made him a very wealthy in: Kloek et al. 1994, p. 21 – 34; Agnes A. Sneller, Met
man en macht. Analyse en interpretatie van teksten
man. As one of the most influential men in van en over vrouwen in de vroegmoderne tijd, Kampen
Holland, he was part of the political, economic 1996; Marijke Spies, Women and Seventeenth Century
Dutch Literature, in: Marijke Spies, Rhetoric, Rhetori-
and cultural elite. Cats is the author of several cians and Poets, Amsterdam 1999, p. 109 – 124; Klaske
Muizelaar and Derek Phillips, Picturing Men and Wo-
emblem books and works of didactic verse. He men in the Dutch Golden Age: Paintings and People
can rightly be considered one of the most read in Historical Perspective, New Haven, London, 2003;
Franits 1993. In response to my question whether there
Dutch writers of his time, as his books could be were any affirmative descriptions of female desire in
Dutch literature of the time, Agnes Sneller wrote: “ik
ken jammer genoeg geen analogie van Vrouw in Bed,
er zullen echter zeker teksten zijn waarin een (Neder-
38 landse) vrouw zich als actieve liefdespartner opstelt,
found in almost every bourgeois household. He combined Calvinist teachings with
traditional popular beliefs and easily comprehensible stories from Christian and antique
tradition. Thus his writings merged normative and narrative elements. One of his most
popular works was Huwelyck (matrimony) from 1625, a didactic poem describing the
stages in a woman’s life from girl to wife and mother, to widow. Huwelyck is part of a
long-lasting tradition of matrimonial codices like Le Ménagier de Paris, Alberti’s Della
Famiglia, Albrecht von Eyb’s Ehebüchlein, Juan Luis Vives’s De institutio foeminae
Christianae from 1524 and, as a paragon, Erasmus’ Encomium matrimonii from 1518 and
Christiani matrimonii institutio from 1526. For Cats, matrimony is the base of all human
life; neither God’s church nor human society could exist without it. The only conceivable
way of life for women is in the role of housewife and mother. Women are not really
perceived as independent beings, but rather as subordinates of husband and family. Cats
directly addresses women in his writing. Women are assigned a passive role in regard to
their love life and courtship. A vrijster (a young woman eligible for marriage) must not
articulate her love, except in response to (serious) courtship by a man. Active female
desire is only introduced in a context of sin like the story of Cyprine and Probus, in which
Cyprine commits adultery.62 The call for female passivity in all matters of love can also be
found in conduct books, such as the Italian La
Civil Conversazione by Stefano Guazzo that was
maar ik heb daarvan geen voorbeld in mijn corpus.”
Maria-Theresia Leuker wrote: “Meines Wissens nicht.
translated from Italian to Dutch in 1603. Guazzo’s
In der komischen und erotischen Literatur kommen ideal of female modesty is demonstrated in
solche Repräsentationen von Frauen vor, letztlich sind
sie aber immer negativ konnotiert.” (As far as I know, sentences like:
there aren’t any. Some representations of women like
this can be found in comedic and erotic literature, but
they are always negatively connoted.) I would like to […] when she speaks, she seems
thank both for their support.
158 Maria A. Schenkeveld, Dutch Literature in the Age of to remain silent and when she is
Rembrandt, Amsterdam, Philadelphia 1991. silent, she seems to speak.63
159 Ralf Grüttemeier, Maria-Theresia Leuker (eds.), Nie-
derländische Literaturgeschichte, Weimar 2006. The
focus of this volume lies on the modern period.
160 Hans Jürgen Bachorski, Diskursfeld Ehe. Schreibwei- Equal to remaining silent, downcast eyes are a
sen und thematische Setzungen, in: Bachorski 1991, sign for a virtuous woman.
p. 512 – 545.
161 Willem Frijhoff, Marijke Spies, 1650: Hard-Won Unity.
Dutch Culture in a European Perspective, vol. 1, As-
sen 2004, especially p. 19, p. 77 f., p. 531 – 583; Agnes
Interpreting cultural expressions solely
A. Sneller (ed.), Jacob Cats, Huwelijk, Amsterdam under the aspect of normative texts will always
1993; Sneller 1994, p. 21 – 34; Sneller 1996, especially
p. 170 ff.; Leuker 1991, p. 95 – 122; T. Loonen, De vrouw produce deficient results. What Bachorski
in het werk van Cats. Erasmiaanse inspiratie. De ze- establishes for German literature from the 15th
ventiende eeuwse discussie, in: Bulletin van de Ko-
ninglijk zeeuwsch genootschap der wetenschappen- and 16th century can also be applied to Dutch
woerkgroep historie en archeologie 28, 1978, p. 26 – 46;
Nevitt 2003. culture in the 17 th century:
162 In a bedroom scene Cyprine says: “I thought: I can call
this noble heart my own, I can enjoy it when I want,
I can even use it in my bed.” (English by translator)
Sneller 1994, p. 27: “Only a wicked woman would ex-
press herself to be such an active lover.” The story is
told in Trou-Ring, another book on matrimony by Cats.
163 Nevitt 2003, p. 73. 39
What only appears as the expression of urges that must be subdued
in matrimony in treatises stands alone in a vast and obvious mass
of stories centered on uncontrollable lust triumphing over all rules
established by church, moral and law.64
The complexity of this discursive field and the multitude of literary forms prohibit
the search for a singular order of discourse. Farces (kluchten), fables, novels and —
particularly in the 17 th century — comedies diverge immensely from the abstract ideo
logical ideas they are based on. Comedies from the 17 th century are performative demon
strations of existing paradoxes and conflicts. Even if a comedy about adultery ends in the
re-establishment of matrimonial order, non-normative realities are presented and can be
experienced. The actual narration can end in the complete dismantling of the moral
concepts it intends to enforce. Maria-Theresia Leuker, who wrote a book on female
representation and concepts of matrimony in 17 th century Dutch comedy, demonstrates
that the most differentiated and advanced form of dealing with issues of gender relations
and the function of matrimony can be found in comedies. She rightly concludes that in
light of the large efforts made to argue for the subordination of women, they obviously
must have been needed. Comedies refer to a breach of norms as part of common reality.
These comedies should not be interpreted as illustrations of normative discourse. In my
opinion, the unruly aspects, the momentum of the performative, the getting-out-of-hand
in the struggle with and against predominant norms need to be emphasized. Even if, as
Leuker points out, girls and women actively voicing their desires in these texts are repri
manded and punished, their energy and potential is visible and audible on stage, making
it possible for female viewers to experience and empathize with them.65
Theater was subsequently harshly attacked by Calvinist clerics. Andries Pels
authored a text commissioned by the Council in the last quarter of the 17 th century, in
which theater was defended, but only under the condition that it become a moral
institution. Pels was also one of the first to harshly criticize Rembrandt’s art, especially
his nudes.
It is astonishing how art historians interpreting visual art tend to almost

exclusively draw from sources that per definition claim normative authority. Particularly
proponents of iconological interpretations have turned Dutch painting to a beacon of
morals, and Cats is generally the point of reference. Comedies, dramas, poems and other
fields of non-normative texts more closely related to visual art have hardly been used as
sources. I would like to emphasize that there is no logically stringent connection between
iconological methods of interpretation and the idea of art as an instrument of visualizing
moral norms or other normative constraints. I believe moralizing interpretations have
40
little to do with Dutch painting. They do, however, reveal a lot about the thinking of
certain art historians.
Not until recently have we seen changes in the perception and evaluation of
Dutch painting.66 H. Rodney Nevitt’s Art and the Culture of Love in Seventeenth-Century
Holland is one of these voices. He investigates songs from the first half of the 17 th cen
tury, poems, emblem books and ars amandi and compares these forms of love literature
with the period’s youth culture in Holland. He dethrones Cats by demonstrating the
wide array of voices that existed. Very frivolous texts were as common as moralizing and
Petrarchan texts. Nevitt locates a conclusive connection between the love culture and
painting and graphics in David Vinckboon’s garden parties and works by others such as
Esaias van de Velde.
The love texts are (almost) exclusively authored by men; the songs’ voice
usually reflects a male perspective. Women singing the songs sang about his love.
There are, however, a few remarkable exceptions like the following poem from the song
collection Den Nieuwen Lust-Hof (1602) by an anonymous author. In the song, a woman
laments how her gender prevents her from articulating her love and thus explicitly
points out the taboo:
Die my bemint en trouwe biet / Die sluyt ick uyt mijn herte, / En die ick min
en vrijt my niet, / Ist niet een groote smerte. // Den ick bemin en wil my
niet, / Die spreeck ick also selden, / Eylaes wat leet is my geschiet, / ‘Ken derf
mijn Liefd’ niet melden. // De Voghelkens in’t groene Wout / Gaen onbed-
wonghen vryen, / Daer is gheen dwangh van vrienden out / Die haer haer
lust benyen. // Wat doet die eer, die layde eer / Al vrouwen lust ontbreekcken, /
Dat zy niet vry na haer begheer / Van liefde moghen spreecken. // Dit doet
mijn hert en mijn ghemoet / Met
droevighe ooghen claghen, /
164 Bachorski 1991, p. 528. Misschien mijn lijden waer
165 In the play Jan Klaaz of gewaande dienstmaagt from
1682 by Thomas Asselijn, the girl Zaartije forces her gheboet / Dorst ick mijn Liefd’
parents to allow her to marry her lover by secretly trick
ing him into her home and sleeping with him. Even
ghewaghen. / […] O Prins der
though the marriage is divorced in the course of the minnen vol perty / Ghy quetst die
play, the comedy caused a scandal and was subse-
quently forbidden. The problem was not only her non- teere vrouwen / En gheeft haer
compliance to an official marriage deal, but the pre- daer gheen vryheijt by / Om liefde
sentation of a woman who actively fights for her love
and against her parents’ will. Leuker underestimates t’onderhouwen.67
the subversive potential of a play like this and over-
rates the end of the play, which re-establishes order
through punishment. Leuker 1992, p. 157. The second part is particularly remarkable:
166 See below, esp. part II, Chapter 3.
167 Nevitt 2003, p. 85 (Engl. translation) and p. 246, note
189, quoted after A. A. Keersmaekers, Wandelend in
den Nieuwen Lust-Hof. Studie over een Amsterdams
Liedboek 1602 – (1604) – 1607 – (1610), Nijmegen 1985,
p. 60 – 70. 41
[…] Of what service is that honor — that blazing honor / that takes
away all women’s happiness / That they, according to their desire /
May not speak their love.
[…] Oh prince of love, full of hostility / you torture tender women /

you give them no freedom / to live their love.
Another written record of a ‘female’ voice on love is a song from Bredero’s Lied-
boek dating 1622. Despite being written in Petrarchan verse, the speaker is a woman.
Originally the song is from his play Lucelle (1616), in which the main protagonist Lucelle
breaks traditional convention as she is the first to profess her love to her admirer.68
Female authors who wrote love poetry barely existed. There were exceptions like Tessel
schade Roemers (1594 – 1649), who was one of the poet Roemer Visscher’s two highly
educated daughters. Her love poems are marked by the idea of an equal partnership
between lovers.69 In social practice, which we of course cannot fully fathom, there seem
to have been some instances of female initiative, as the prominent example of Dorothea
van Dorp and Constantijn Huygens proves. It is not only remarkable that Dorothea van
Dorp made the first move, but also that Huygens does not reflect his own experience in
his poems, but instead converts them into the conventional, patriarchal pattern. 70 In
light of all research presently available on the subject, I can conclude that, next to the
predominant discourse embodied in Cats, there were in fact a few exceptions allowing
females to voice their desires, or at least some cases where the articulation and repre
sentation of female desire were not connoted as something completely negative.
Rembrandt’s affirmative representation of female desire in A Woman in Bed might be
an exception to the rule, but nonetheless can be considered historically possible.
Equally as important as contextualizing visual art in its contemporary discourses

is the specific quality of the respective medium. Thus the possibility of pairing an
individualized face signaling contemplation with an erotically charged nude (Bathsheba)
is a unique quality of visual art, which, in this form of synopsis, would probably be
inconceivable in the field of language.
Dangerous gazes — Susanna
Images of Bathsheba, like portrayals of Susanna or Diana with Actaeon must also
be seen in the context of the heavy debates led at the time on the danger of erotic
images. 71 Already during the Renaissance there were discussions on the eroticizing effect
42
of images. Pictures were not just enjoyed as ‘pure art.’ 72 Art was supposed to arouse
desire, like Leonardo writes in his treatise on painting. 73
While Erasmus and other 17 th century moralists such as Jacob Cats or Camp
huyzen fulminated against images of nude women, claiming that they seduced and spoiled
people, contemporary nude painting mostly focused on Bathsheba, Susanna or Diana
and Actaeon — stories in which the sight of a naked female body either leads men to com
mit crimes (Bathsheba, Susanna) or brings about their demise (Diana and Actaeon). The
context of its presentation moralizes the lusting, desiring gaze. David often serves as the
chief justification in this debate: If even the hero of the Old Testament succumbed to the
sight of a naked woman, how could a normal man ever resist such powerful temptation?
On the other hand, authors like Joos van den Vondel and Jan Vos praised depictions
such as Bathsheba in their poems. 74 In reference to the ancient Greek painter Apelles,
they considered painting the most beautiful female nude the pinnacle of artistic creation.
Bathsheba is also the motif of choice in this discourse, even more so than Venus, because
her beauty even seduced the greatest hero of the
Old Testament. 75
168 Nevitt 2003, p. 86, p. 89.
169 Sneller 1996, especially p. 266 (p. 266 – 272 = English
summary). The top favorite theme for voyeuristic
170 Nevitt 2003, p. 86. Huygens incorporates the episo-
de in the poem Doris oft Herder-Clacht, in which he
scenes in painting is Susanna and the Elders
himself appears and speaks as a sheperd. (plate 3). The biblical story of Susanna is about
171 Eric Jan Sluijter, De “heydensche fabulen” in de Noord
nederlandse schilderkonst circa 1590 – 1670. Een proe the chaste wife of the rich Jew Joakim. Two old
ve van beschrijving en interpretatie van schiderijen judges desired the beautiful woman and hid in
met verhalende onderwerpen uit de klassike mytho-
logie, (proefschrift) 1986, Leyden, p. 270 – 281; Sluijter Joakim’s garden to watch her take a bath. When
1998, p. 76 – 83; Sluijter, Seductress of Sight. Studies
in Dutch Art of the Golden Age, Zwolle 2000; Sluij- they tried to force her to commit adultery, she
ter 2006; Stefan Grohé, Rembrandts mythologische resisted, even though they threatened to defame
Historien, Cologne, Weimar, Vienna 1996, p. 216 – 218;
Welzel 1994; also see Werner Busch, Das keusche und her by spreading a rumor that she was having an
das unkeusche Sehen. Rembrandts Diana, Aktaion und
Kallisto, in: Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 52, 1989, affair with a young man. Susanna knew that her
p. 257 – 277. Sluijter sees Rembrandt’s opinion in the refusal would probably equal a death sentence.
debate on the effectiveness and legitimation of erotic
images as the main point of Rembrandt’s Bathsheba. However, Daniel prevented her sentencing
172 David Freedberg, The Power of Images, Chicago 1989.
173 Elizabeth Cropper, The Place of Beauty in the High Re-
to death by cross-examining the elders who
naissance and ist Displacement in the History of Art, became entangled in their web of lies, thus prov
in: Alvin Vos (ed.), Place and Displacement in the Re-
naissance (Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Stu- ing Susanna’s innocence. Ultimately, the old
dies, vol. 132), Binghampton 1995, p. 159 – 205; Marian- men were sentenced to death by stoning instead
ne Koos, Bildnisse des Begehrens. Das lyrische Män-
nerporträt in der venezianischen Malerei des frühen of her. The story of Susanna is set in the time of
16. Jahrhunderts — Giorgione, Tizian und ihr Umkreis,
Emsdetten, Berlin 2006, p. 272 – 306. the Babylonian Jewish Diaspora in the 6th cen
174 Sluijter 1998, p. 80 f., and 2000, p. 122. tury BCE. It was first brought to written form in
175 On Rembrandt’s Bathsheba, Sluijter (1998, p. 86)
writes: “In his Bathsheba of 1654, then, Rembrandt the first century BCE, and in early Christianity
portrayed her not as a self-evidently dishonorable,
active seductress, but rather as the passive victim of
her own fateful beauty to which no man — least of all
the viewer — is able to offer effective resistance.” 43
Pl. 3: Rembrandt, Susanna, 1636, Fig. 17: Lorenzo Lotto, Susanna and Fig. 18: Capitoline Venus,
panel, The Hague, Mauritshuis the Elders, 1517, panel, Florence, Roman copy after Greek
Uffizi original, Rome
the Daniel of the story was identified with the biblical figure Daniel. The story was not
sanctioned as the 13th chapter of the Book of Daniel until the Council of Trent. 76
In early Christian art, Susanna is portrayed in the catacombs as an orant with
extended arms — she is depicted as an innocent soul in need who was saved by God;
she is a symbol of God’s fair judgment. In medieval iconography the story of Susanna
was usually portrayed as an entire narrative. 77 The relevance of the story is based on her
absolute purity and willingness to sacrifice herself. During the Renaissance we see a
radical shift in the story’s meaning. 78 A singular
scene was suddenly detached from the narrative 176 W. O. E. Oesterley, An Introduction to the Books of the
sequence. The extraction from a narrative Apocrypha, Their Origin, Teaching and Contents, New
York 1935. In Jewish tradition, the legend obviously
context combined with a new meaning was had the function of illustrating the fight between Sad-
ducees and Pharisees in regard to a stricter handling
closely linked to changes in the art market and of laws and a more exact examination of witness ac-
the new medium of panel painting. The story of counts, ibid., p. 391 ff.
177 Liselotte Popelka, Susanna Hebrea. Theatrum castitas
Susanna was no longer primarily told in a series sive innocentia libertas. Ein Beitrag zur alttestamen-
tarischen Ikonografie, besonders des deutschen und
of public frescos or as illuminations accom niederländischen Kulturkreises, in: Mitteilungen der
panying a continuous text, but instead was de Gesellschaft für vergleichende Kunstforschung 16/17,
Vienna 1963; Harald Olbrich (ed.), Lexikon der Kunst
signed as a panel painting intended for private vol. 7, Susanna (entry by Marianne Koos), Leipzig 1994;
and profane reception. 79 Engelbert Kirschbaum (ed.), Lexikon der christlichen
Ikonografie, Susanna (cols. 228 – 231), Rome, Freiburg,
The choice of image no longer revolved Basel, Vienna 1972.
178 Michaela Herrmann, Vom Schauen als Metapher des
around God’s judgment, which had been the Begehrens. Die venezianischen Darstellungen der
essence of early medieval depictions. Now the “Susanna im Bade” im Cinquecento, Marburg 1990
(also doctoral thesis, Hamburg 1985); Mary D. Gar-
beautiful and desirable nude of Susanna was the rard, Artemisia Gentileschi. The Image of the Female
Hero in Italian Baroque Art, Princeton 1989; Marianne
Koos, Bernadette Reinhold, Zum Bildthema “Susan-
na und die Alten” (comparative review of Michaela
44 Herrmann and Mary D. Gerrard), in: FrauenKunst-
Fig. 19: Tintoretto,
Susanna and the
Elders,
c. 1555 /56
canvas, Vienna,
Kunsthistorisches
Museum
central focus of the story. We have two iconographical strands: one is the scene of the
elders lurking; the other is the accosting scene, which, in turn, either shows the men
physically attacking Susanna or trying to verbally force her into compliance. Ever since the
first visualization as a panel painting in 1517 by Lorenzo Lotto, Susanna was tellingly
depicted in the tradition of Venus iconography (fig. 17). The beacon of chastity was turned
into the desirable love goddess.
A central issue in portrayals of Susanna from the Renaissance is that they formed
visual gender regimes that have fundamentally
Wissenschaft, Rundbrief 15, Marburg 1993, p. 127 – 136; shaped our culture: the viewer of the image is
Bettina Baumgärtel, Silvia Neysters (eds.), Die Heldin conceived as a male subject sublimating his
in der französischen und italienischen Kunst des 17.
Jahrhunderts, exh. cat. Düsseldorf 1995, p. 329 – 345; desire in his gaze. Meanwhile, the ideal of femin
Jean-Claude Prêtre, Suzanne. Le procès du modèle,
Paris 1990; Gaila Bonjione, Shifting Images: Susanna inity is the irresolvable ambivalence of embody
through the Ages, doctoral thesis, Florida State Uni- ing beauty and seduction while simultaneously
versity 1997 (unfortunately unavailable to me).
179 See below, section on Lucretia. remaining absolutely chaste.80 The congenial
180 In the second half of the 16th century, several treati-
ses were written in Italy — for example by Firenzuola,
figure of ambivalence between modesty and
Luigini and Trissino — postulating the theory of an seduction is the Venus Pudica, which has inspired
ideal femininity as the combination of beauty, mo-
desty and eroticism. Francis Ames-Lewis, Mary Rogers countless versions of Susanna since the Renais
(eds.), Concepts of Beauty in Renaissance Art, London sance. The motif of covering the crotch and often
1997.
181 While the original is lost, there are Roman and later the breasts goes back to the ancient Greek sculp
copies and a multitude of variations such as the pic-
tured Capitoline Venus. Berthold Hinz, Knidia. Oder: tor Praxiteles from the fourth century BCE, who
Des Aktes erster Akt, in: Detlef Hofmann (ed.), Der with his Venus Pudica created a paragon for all
nackte Mensch, Marburg 1989, p. 51 – 79; Nanette Sa-
lomon, The Venus Pudica: Uncovering Art History’s sculptures of female nudes that followed (fig. 18).81
‘Hidden Agendas’ and Pernicious Pedigrees, in: Ann
Olga Koloski-Ostrow, Claire L. Lyons (eds.), Naked
Truths. Women, Sexuality and Gender in Classical Art
and Archaeology, London, New York 1997, p. 197 – 219. 45
Fig. 20: Govert Flinck, Susanna and the Elders, c. 1640, panel, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 21: Pieter Lastman, Susanna and the Elders, 1614, panel, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
It was the first female nude in ancient art. The pudica gesture (a hand in front of the
crotch and / or breasts) is highly ambivalent: it covers what should not be seen, but
simultaneously directs the gaze exactly there. The (male) gaze becomes a voyeuristic one
that looks where it supposedly is not allowed to look. The female figure, in turn, is staged
as one who should be ashamed of her nudity. She is exposed to a male gaze that she is
trying to cover herself from — quite the opposite of the male Kuroi, who proudly present
their naked bodies. And so a certain visual regime staged as early as Antiquity went on to
deeply shape prevalent gender relations. Tintoretto created the classic scenario of voyeu
rism in his versions of the subject following Lotto’s invention. Here the glorious female
nude is presented to the viewer while Susanna is oblivious to the old men watching her
(fig. 19). Physical violence is sublimated in the power of the gaze.82 By keeping the narra
tive frame (the story of Susanna) in mind, desire is irrevocably entwined with sin, power
and violence. Innumerable pictures of Susanna and other female figures have continued
to vary these visual structures in different stagings to this day.
In 17 th century Dutch art, all three variations of Susanna iconography were

developed further: the voyeur scenario in paintings by Rembrandt’s student Govert Flinck
(fig. 20) or Jan van Neck (fig. 23); the attempt to verbally convince Susanna by Lastman
(fig. 21), Jacob van Loo or Michael Willmann83; the violent attack in two versions by Jan
Lievens (fig. 22) and Samuel Koninck.84
Next to a few drawings, Rembrandt produced two paintings on the subject,
one version from 1636, which is now part of the collection of the Mauritshuis in The
Hague (plate 3) and a second version from 1647 in Berlin, which Rembrandt had already
46
Fig. 22: Jan Jorisz. van Vliet after Jan Lievens, Susanna and the Elders, c. 1629, etching
Fig. 23: Jan van Neck, Susanna and the Elders, canvas, Copenhagen, Statens Museum for Kunst
designed in its basic structures during the thirties.85 The version from 1636 is highly
unusual. Rembrandt eliminated at least one of the elders and positions the viewer in his
stead. I would like to mention that the panel originally had an arched top and was
cropped by one centimeter on the right side, while a strip of four and a half centimeters
was added to the same side later on. Therefore, the head of the old judge in profile
originally did not exist. All we can see or rather suspect of the second elder is a turban
with a feather. In a copy drawn by Willem de Poorter dating from 1636 there are no elders
at all.86 Susanna’s frightened, hunched pose and the attempt to cover herself with a towel
show that she realizes she is being watched. She knows that someone can see her, but
she cannot see the elders. Susanna’s gaze is
182 Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Kunst / Konstruktionen, directed at the (equally invisible) viewer outside
in: Lutz Musner, Gotthart Wunberg (eds.), Kulturwis-
senschaften. Forschung — Praxis — Positionen, Wien the image, who thus is also apostrophized as a
2002, p. 313 – 338; here: p. 319 – 325. On the sexualiza
tion of the gaze and the process of making desire sco- voyeur. Traditional versions of the lurking scene
pic through linear perspective, see Hentschel 2001. either show Susanna absorbed in thought or
183 Van Loo: Glasgow, Art Gallery, ill.: Sumowski 1983–95,
vol. 1, p. 159; Willmann: Nuremberg, Germanisches fully concentrating on her bath and beauty (for
Nationalmuseum, ill.: Sumowski 1983–95, vol. 1, p. 89.
184 Samuel Koninck: The Hague, S. Nystad (art dealer) ill.:
instance in Tintoretto’s version from Vienna
Sumowski, vol. 3, 1983, no. 1095. (fig. 19) or Govert Flinck’s (fig. 20); or she
185 For the painting in The Hague, see RRP, vol. 3
(1635 – 1642), 1989, p. 117, 196 – 201. unaffectedly or seductively gazes out of the
186 Ibid. for drawing by Poorter, p. 200. The results of the picture like in van Neck’s version (fig. 23), which
examination remain unclear, but the question whether
Rembrandt himself added the strip is rather supported is an adaptation of Rembrandt’s graphic of
by the research team. I cannot understand this deci-
sion, because the right part of the signature (on the Diana; or Cavaliere d’Arpino’s painting from
added strip) is definitely not by Rembrandt. Whatever 1607 (fig. 24), which stages Susanna as a Venus
the truth may be, fact is that the painting was origi-
nally conceived with only one elder who was practically combing herself. In Rembrandt’s painting,
invisible. In my opinion it is unthinkable that Poorter
single-handedly eliminated the elders, which are ico-
nographically required by tradition and had always
been depicted. 47
Fig. 24: Cavaliere
d’Arpino, Susanna
and the Elders,
c. 1607, panel,
Siena, Pinacoteca
Nazionale
Fig. 25: Jan van

Noordt, Susanna
and the Elders,
1670, canvas, San
Francisco, Fine Arts
Museum — Legion
of Honor Museum
Susanna’s hunched, tortured pose, the covering of her crotch and breasts and her fearful
facial expression all signal that she does not want to be watched. The figure lacks the
usual play of showing and covering, of modesty and allure that we know from a version
by Jan van Noordt (fig. 25), who was obviously familiar with Rembrandt’s work. Susanna is
not merely presented as an ideal of female beauty, as an object of desire. The subject
here is her reaction to being watched. The viewer is made aware that he is looking even
though the woman being looked at does not want this. The aspect of violence, which be-
comes recognizable in (rare) depictions of the attack scene (such as a version by Lievens),
but is always left out of the voyeurist scene, remains clearly visible in Rembrandt’s
Susanna. The sublimation of violence into the power of the gaze is marked as a violent
relationship in the field of sight.
The reflection of voyeurism as a gender-specific relationship of violence is also
a theme in an etching by Lucas van Leyden from 1508 (fig. 26). As far as I can tell, all
research on Susanna iconography has failed to take this highly unusual etching into
account. It extracts the bathing scene from the entire cycle as early as 1508, almost an
entire decade before Lorenzo Lotto’s panel. I believe that the extraction of single scenes
from narrative sequences in illuminations and frescos for graphics is highly relevant for
panel paintings and deserves more scholarly attention. Lucas van Leyden played an
eminent role for Rembrandt, who was also from Leyden.87 Van Leyden, however, went the
opposite direction: The main protagonists in his etching are the elders, while Susanna is
only a small figure in the background, sitting by the river fully clothed, dangling her feet in
the water. Speaking in the terms of Linda Hentschel, one could say that as a sort of
compensation for the impossibility of catching a glance of naked Susanna or the invisible
48
Fig. 26: Lucas van Leyden,
Susanna and the Elders,
c. 1508, engraving,
Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
site of her sex, the viewer’s gaze is lead far into the depths of the picture.88 Here the
bridge and its reflection on the water’s surface form an opening — an opening into a void.
In the foreground, right between the elders’ and Susanna’s space, Leyden positioned a
tree stump with a small, upward pointing branch. Dangling from this phallic object,
the artist attached a little sign with the initial “L,” inscribing himself into the scene. This
marvelous, voyeurism-criticizing invention by van Leyden was not directly adopted.
Connections to Rembrandt cannot be detected on a formal or iconographic level, but
rather lay in a shared sense of basic contents, with both artists explicitly exposing the
issue of the subject’s inherent voyeurism.
As before, we face the usual difficulties when it comes to the question of how
Rembrandt’s Susanna was received by his contemporary audience: the biggest one is the
lack of sources. Proponents of reception aesthetics and semiotics-based art history have
argued that meanings are not simply inherent to images, but rather depend on context
and reception.89 In this regard, feminist analyses
187 Otto Pächt, Rembrandt, Munich 1991, p. 126 ff., 155, 171 f.,

have managed to create awareness for the blind
177, 183. ness of gender issues in traditional art-historical
188 Hentschel 2001.
189 See a. o. Wolfgang Kemp (ed.), Der Betrachter ist im research.90 Elizabeth Honig claims the existence
Bild. Kunstwissenschaft und Rezeptionsästhetik, Colo- of a female gaze, a female determined form of
gne 1985; Wolfgang Kemp, Kunstwerk und Betrachter:
Der rezeptionsästhetische Ansatz, in: Hans Belting, reception, in the specific situation in Holland
Heinrich Dilly, Wolfgang Kemp, Willibald Sauerländer
(eds.), Kunstgeschichte. Eine Einführung, Berlin 2003 and thus counters the usual absolutization of
(1985), p. 247– 265; Mieke Bal, Norman Bryson, Semiotics the male gaze predominant in feminist literature.
and Art History, in: Art Bulletin 73/2, 1991, p. 176– 208.
190 As an exemplary work on this point I would like to According to Honig, unlike in Catholic and
mention: Sigrid Schade, Silke Wenk, Inszenierungen
des Sehens. Kunst, Geschichte und Geschlechterdif-
ferenz, in: Hadumond Bussmann, Renate Hof (eds.),
Genus, Stuttgart 1997, p. 340 – 407. 49
feudally governed countries, the place of painting was the private home in bourgeois
Holland, and the private home was a female determined place. She argues that female
recipients were already anticipated in the production process and that women could at
least participate in choosing and buying the art that would adorn their private homes.91
Honig’s call for the investigation of gender-specific reception of Dutch painting was
followed by Klaske Muizelaar and Derek Phillips, who attempted to further substantiate
these claims by initiating a socio-historical survey of written sources, inventories and
actual interiors.92 Their endeavors failed, because no sources documenting any gender-
specific forms of reception were found. Both authors arrive at the conclusion that the
reception of paintings differed according to social status, education and gender. They
contest an absolutization of the male gaze as much as any over-emphasis of a female
gaze. This point seems quite plausible, but unfortunately cannot be supported by any
specific documents.93
And so we are back to analyzing specific images, which Phillips and Muizelaar
persistently avoid.
Let us return to Rembrandt’s Susanna. Speaking in terms of reception aesthetics,

several viewer positions — which can also appear as a combination in one viewer — are
possible. Firstly, there is a ‘female’ point of view, identifying with Susanna’s fears and
defensive reaction. The painting could also have the opposite effect of stimulating the
lust of a male viewer through his position of power and the staging of an overwhelmed
and ashamed Susanna. A third reading could be a male position in the sense of mirror
ing: a viewer who imagines himself in the elders’ place knowing that they will be stoned
to death for their actions. The plausibility of this
form of reception can be substantiated with con-
temporary sources. Jacob Cats, for instance,
191 Elizabeth Alice Honig, The Space of Gender in Seven-
cites a picture of Diana and Actaeon to reflect a teenth-Century Dutch Painting, in: Wayne Franits (ed.),
Looking at Seventeenth-Century Dutch Art. Realism Re-
viewer’s startled realization that he is somehow considered, Cambridge 1991, p. 187–201, esp. p. 193–195.
in the same position as Actaeon.94 The image 192 Muizelaar, Phillips 2003.
193 Agnes Sneller presents plausible and convincing differ
can be read in a way that allows us to become ences in gender-specific reception for literature and the-
ater: Agnes A. Sneller, Passionate Drama. Coster’s Poly
aware of and critically reflect our culture’s pre xena re-read, in: Dutch Crossing 25/1, 2001, p. 78 – 88.
valent visual regimes and their implicit power 194 Busch 1989, p. 274.
195 RRP, vol. 2, 1986, p. 487 – 494; Sluijter 1986, p. 90 – 94,
structures. 195 – 197; Busch 1989, p. 257 – 275; Grohé 1996,
p. 195 – 223; Janicek 2004; Sluijter 2006, p. 165 – 193;
Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Alterität und Persistenz.
Rembrandt und die antiken Geschichten, in: Jan Bloe
mendal, Agnes Sneller, Mirjam de Baar (eds.), Bron-
nen van inspiratiae. Recepties van de klassieken in de
vroegmoderne Nederlanden in muziek, literatuur en
beeldende kunst, Hilversum 2007, p. 77 – 97.
196 Actaeon: Ovid, Met. III, 155 – 257, Callisto: Ovid, Met. II,
401 – 495. Busch (1989, p. 271) sees a possible source
of inspiration for Rembrandt in Sandrart’s description
of a (lost) painting by Lanfranco, which is said to com-
50 bine the two scenes; Grohé (1996, p. 213f) refers to a
Fatal looks and a laughing nymph —
Diana and her Nymphs Bathing, with Actaeon and Callisto
The complexity of the gaze in a field of tension between lusty and wounding, or
even deadly looks was a subject that Rembrandt repeatedly dealt with, for example in his
early work Diana and her Nymphs Bathing, with Actaeon and Callisto from 1634 (plate 4).95
The two stories, “Diana and Actaeon” and “Diana Discovers Callisto’s Pregnancy” are
separate stories in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, which in visual tradition were usually not
paired in a single image.96 The story of Actaeon is about a hunter who unintentionally
happened upon Diana and her nymphs taking a bath; as revenge for a human seeing her
naked, she splashed him with water, turning him into a stag that was torn to death by his
own hounds. The other story is about Callisto, one of her nymphs who had been raped by
Jupiter disguised as Diana. When Callisto refused to take off her clothes as Diana and her
fellow nymphs took a bath, the other nymphs tore off her clothes and revealed her
pregnancy. Diana expelled Callisto from the group and jealous Juno turned her into an
ugly bear after she gave birth to her son Arkas. As a young man, Arkas encountered the
bear and wanted to kill it, not recognizing his own mother; Jupiter finally took pity and
lifted them into the sky as stars, where we can see them shine in the stellar constellations
Ursa Maior and Ursa Minor.
Both stories center on the deadly consequences of seeing: Actaeon pays with his
life for (accidentally) seeing naked Diana. Not only lustful gazes can be fatal; Diana’s
cold, chaste gaze on Callisto’s pregnancy proves to be the beginning of her plight.
The most striking detail and the most

severe breaking of a taboo in the painting,
silver pitcher and bowl by Paulus van Vianen, decora-
ted with scenes from the two episodes, but separately surprisingly, have barely, if it all, been commented
with one scene on each side. There is one example that
has never been associated with Rembrandt — a copper on by scholars. On the right-hand side of the
etching by Nicaise de Ruyter from 1688, in which both picture, one nymph in the group trying to pry
scenes are actually linked. However, the etching has
nothing in common with Rembrandt’s painting on a off Callisto’s clothes to expose her forbidden
formal level. The etching’s design is ascribed to Cor-
nelis Cornelisz. which — if that is true — could mean
pregnancy to Diana stands in the back as her
that the visual linking of the two scenes was indeed naked body convulses with laughter and her
performed before Rembrandt. I would like to thank
Anthea Niklaus for refering me to her text on Nicaise open mouth reveals the top row of her teeth
de Ruyter in: Robert Stalla (ed.), Es muss nicht im- (plate 4, detail). Only Busch goes beyond merely
mer Rembrandt sein. Die Druckgrafiksammlung des
Kunsthistorischen Instituts der Universität München, mentioning this odd gesture in his monograph
exh. cat. Munich, Berlin 2001, p. 150, fig. p. 151. Sluijter
(1986, p. 195) correctly points out the relation between on the painting; he ascribes the extremity of
both episodes and their specific description in Ovid: the gesture to the influence of Alberti’s De pic
“In beide beschrijft Ovidius een zeer verwante, uitge-
sproken idyllische omgeving en is het ontkleed zijn tura, a text that was decisive for all art theoretical
van Diana en haar nimfen essentieel voor het verhaal;
in beide verhalen wordt de idylle verstoord door een
inbreuk op de kuisheid van deze maagden, die meedo-
genloos wordt gestraft.” 51
Pl. 4 + Detail: Rembrandt, Diana and her Nymphs Bathing, with Actaeon and Callisto, 1634,
canvas, Anholt, Museum Wasserburg Anholt
writings that followed.97 According to Busch, Rembrandt merely wanted to visualize the
emotion that expresses itself as laughter in a drastic physical movement. In my opinion
this interpretation falls short of going beyond an immanent art discourse. The motif of
laughter is neither part of the textual model of Callisto’s story nor can it be identified as
part of any iconographic tradition. As far as I can tell, there is no comparable figure in
either Rembrandt’s or any of his peers’ work: a female nude in a history painting (!)
whose body is fully captivated by an excessive bout of laughter.98
The nymph’s laughter could be interpreted as a commentary on the happenings
in the entire painting and not merely as schadenfreude toward Callisto.99 Ovid recounts
Actaeon’s tragic fate as one without fault on his part, while Christian commentators
introduced moralizing and didactic aspects to the story. Van Mander, Cats and other
Dutch writers turned the story into an exemplum on the dangers of seeing. The figure of
Actaeon becomes one of identification for the viewer within this discourse of moralizing
the gaze. Grohé delivers a conclusive analysis of the visual structures in Rembrandt’s
painting and describes the “forbidden pleasures, illicit glances and inclusion of the
viewer” as the basic elements connecting, determining and describing the two stories.100
He does not mention the laughing nymph. Rembrandt positioned her at a prominent
spot in the painting, as she constitutes the furthermost right point of a triangle formed by
one diagonal of nymphs reaching to the oldest one and another diagonal into the spatial
depth of the scene between Diana and Actaeon. Formally, the laughing nymph and
Actaeon form the corner points of the entire composition. Diana the goddess is turned to
the hunter as she splashes him with the water that will change him and subsequently lead
to his death. Diana’s body is twisted in her movement, exposing her full naked body
52
(which must not be viewed under penalty of
197 Busch 1989, p. 263 ff. It would be interesting to include
contemporary theories on laughter by scholars such death) to the viewer. This coincidental exposure,
as Erasmus or Juan Vives. One passage that I find very
close to Rembrandt’s understanding is from the Traité which Diana is not aware of, bears a certain
sur les passions de l’âme by René Descartes. However, humor.101 Diana punishes whoever sees her
it was published more than a decade later, in 1649.
Descartes cites two causes for laughter: joy, mixed with naked with death, yet it is exactly this act of
“the surprise of wonder” (“surprise de l’admiration”),
or hatred, mixed with the surprise of wonder. Laughing
punishment that exposes her to the viewer.
is thus not only an expression of joy, but often also Could the nymph’s laughter be understood as a
of hatred, caused by the bafflement felt when we en-
counter something by surprise. (René Descartes, engl. comment to this circle of gazes? Manic laughter
Stephan Voss, The Passions of the Soul, Art. 124 – 126,
about forbidden gazes and rules that lead to
p. 83 f.)
198 While laughter was never depicted in history paintings, death? Is the nymph laughing in place of the
it was quite common in genre paintings from the time,
for instance by the Utrecht Caravaggists, Frans Hals, viewer? The viewer, however, will hardly want to
or Judith Leyster. Leyster was somewhat of a specialist identify with this brazen creature. I believe the
for laughing figures; however, her work only includes
one female figure laughing (in the background) in nymph can be read in numerous ways: as a
Merry Trio from 1629 – 31 (London, Maastricht, Coll.
Noortman). Only men and children laugh in her pictures, burlesque negative figure, who — only as the
while women smile. (A conclusion reached by Christa figure it is — can laugh at dominant moral values
Gattringer on the subject of Judith Leyster in my uni-
versity seminar Affect / Emotion / Imagination. The role and thus allows the viewer to do the same; on
of 17th century Dutch painting in the formation of subjec
tivity in the Early modern period, held at the Department the other hand viewers can also distance
of Art History, University of Vienna in summer 2006.) themselves from this offensive character. This
199 Laughter instead of punishment as a commentary on
sexual transgressions could have been inspired by a ambiguity found in jesters and similar charac
story in Homer’s Odyssey or Ovid’s Metamorphoses,
in which Vulcan catches Mars and Venus in the act of
ters has a long tradition that can be traced back
adultery and captures them in his thin net, exposing to the Late Middle Ages. The nymph’s laughter
them to the laughter of the other gods. This laughter
is known as Homeric laughter. See Hammer-Tugendhat could also be understood as a comment on the
2007, p. 83 f. voyeurism of a viewer who finds pleasure in this
100 English by translator. For original German quote, see
Grohé 1996, p. 218. brutal scene of exposure. The entire Callisto
101 On this question, Janicek (2004, p. 58) points out
Freud’s analysis of the comical in the sexual and ob- group does not follow any visual tradition.
scene in her master thesis: “A chance exposure has a Viewers used to enjoying lasciviously posing
comic effect on us because we compare the ease with
which we have enjoyed the sight with the great expen- female nudes while simultaneously gloating over
diture which would otherwise be required for reaching
this end.” Sigmund Freud, James Strachey (trans.), Callisto’s fate are irritated on more than one
Jokes and their Relation to the Unconcious, London level. Instead of gracefully posing nymphs we
1960, p. 221 f.
102 In a later self-portrait (ca. 1662 – 1669) in Cologne, are shown a cluster of naked women whose
Rembrandt presents himself as a laughing old man.
Albert Blankert, Rembrandt, Zeuxis and the Ideal
violent behavior equals that of the pack of
Beauty, in: Album amicorum J. G. van Gelder, The fighting dogs — a representation of hitherto
Hague 1973, p. 32 – 39) conclusively argues that Rem-
brandt portrays himself as Zeuxis who, according to unseen harshness. As the viewer is confronted
antique legend, was supposed to paint an ugly woman with both the nymphs and Actaeon, he can
and had to laugh so hard that he died. The profile vi-
sible on the left side of the painting and a depiction of recognize his own (voyeuristic, salacious) gaze
the subject by Rembrandt’s student Arent de Gelder
support this theory. Despite differences in the subject, and the nymph’s malicious laughter becomes a
this late self-portrait proves that laughter had a spe- kind of mirroring of his own reaction.102 The
cific meaning in Rembrandt’s work. This may be rele-
vant for the interpretation of the Diana painting and manifold palette of looks and gazes could also
for the linking of self-reflection, reflecting the medium
painting between the representation of ideal beauty
or (ugly) reality and death. This connection calls for
further scholarly attention. 53
allow the viewers to identify with the nymph in back view sitting on the far right of the
group, who forms a sort of double figure with the manically laughing nymph. She turns
back (thus connecting the two scenes on a formal level) and with her hand protecting her
eyes, she calmly looks at Actaeon: neither frightened, nor judging, nor reacting in any
way. This is pure looking.103
The manic laughter definitely thwarts any traditional interpretations of moralizing

didactics. I find it quite astonishing that art historians have left out exactly this figure
from their interpretations.104 Apart from the fact that the laughing nymph obviously
cannot be classified or derived as a figure, this void demonstrates the tendency of some
iconologists to interpret images as illustrations of texts, particularly of didactic and
moralizing texts. If no corresponding text passage can be found, there is no instrument
for interpretation and the figure in question just does not ‘exist.’ The laughing nymph is
an indication that images are not moral teachings, but rather that art — as opposed to
normative discourse — at least has the potential to bring ambiguity and contradictions
into the picture and address them. In literature there are instances of analog kluchten, a
form of farce that was popular in Holland in the first half of the 17 th century. Van Stipriaan
analyzed the epistemological dimension of laughter in kluchten.105 Calvinist theologians
condemned laughter and, with a growing French influence and the moralizing critiques of
Andries Pels, laughter was gradually eliminated from Amsterdam theater from the 1670s
onward. Contemporaries were definitely aware of the explosive nature of matching ima
ges, as numerous sources of the time by Erasmus, van Mander, Cats, Hoogstraten,
Lairesse and others demonstrate. They either vehemently criticize or even fully condemn
these images.106 Rembrandt’s Diana and her Nymphs Bathing, with Actaeon and Callisto
transgresses its contemporary decorum and horizon of expectations on multiple levels.107
This breach of canon causes irritation and forces viewers to think about the meaning
behind the linking of these two separate stories, the nymph’s intangible and impertinent
laughter as well as moralizing visual prohibitions and their deadly consequences.
Where have all the men gone?
Let us finally return to Bathsheba. We have been able to establish that Rembrandt
developed an alternative idea of femininity, which joins individuality, subjectivity
(contemplation) with nudity and erotic elements. We have confirmed that this concept is
a transgression of dichotomous structures of femininity and we have questioned and
broadened our observations by analyzing A Woman in Bed. We have even recognized an
astonishing level of empathy in his Susanna. These are all marvelous findings! But what
54
about the male protagonists? Where is King David in the painting of Bathsheba? He is
not only required by the text, but even constitutes the main figure of the story and was
present in images following a century-long tradition.108 David and his power are present
in the image, but only in the metonymic form of the letter. David is present as invisible
text, as written word, as logos, but not as body. Considering the importance Rembrandt
attached to the representation of words,109 the physical absence of the male protagonist
becomes even more explosive. The ‘physical’ King David has left the field of represen
tation and entered the space before it, becoming one with the viewer. Like the viewer, he
looks at beautiful Bathsheba before his eyes. Research in the field of reception aesthetics
has demonstrated that images can preset a certain form of reception and thus can pro
duce a certain viewer110; because the viewer ‘replaces’ King David, he is conceived as a
male viewer.111 In Susanna, a figure immanent to the picture is also replaced with a male
viewer. Unlike in Bathsheba, the precarious voyeuristic position of the viewer in Susanna
is addressed as problematic through the gaze of the female figure from within the picture
at the viewer. In A Woman in Bed the gaze of the female figure is directed at an assumed
male protagonist who is outside the image, but
not identical with the viewer. The subject in
103 Busch 1989, p. 271 f. (and following him Grohé 1996, Bathsheba and Susanna is looking. King David
p. 209 ff. and Janicek 2004, p. 42 ff.) point out the two
old people that faintly appear out of the forest in the looks at Bathsheba, the elders look at Susanna,
very darkened background and interpret them as an
inner-pictorial mirroring of the viewer in the sense of
and their desires are sparked through looking;
a pure gaze. They assume that they are a male / fema- the viewer thus repeats their action by looking at
le pair (Busch: maybe Philemon and Baucis) and that
both are looking at the scene. While studying the origi- the picture — with the important difference that
nal painting in detail, I noticed that the two figures are he is looking at an image and not at an actual
very likely two women wearing turbans and the left di-
rects her gaze upwards at the sky and not at the scene woman. Asking about the male protagonists
before her.
104 For the short mentioning, see Busch 1989, p. 263, note changes our view of the female figures, even if
97. the male protagonists have become invisible.
105 René Stipriaan, Leugens en vermaak. Boccaccio’s no-
vellen in de kluchtkultuur van de Nederlandse Renais- If we only focus on a women’s art history
sance, Amsterdam 1996.
106 See note 74; Sluijter 2006. and limit our analysis to the image of femininity,
107 In her analysis of Rembrandt’s The Rape of Europe, the actual issue remains outside our awareness.
Amy Golhany (Rembrandt’s Europe. In and Out of Pic-
torial and Textual Tradition, in: Luba Freedman, Gerlin- Asking about gender relations or gender diffe
de Huber-Rebenich (eds.), Wege zum Mythos, Berlin
2001, p. 39 – 55, here p. 50 f.) describes Rembrandt’s
rences is what points us to the actual relation
adherence to the Aristotelian unity of time and action ship between genders. Asking who or what is
and thus to the cultural norm of the time. Rembrandt
was therefore within the “horizon of expectations” (made) invisible in which context and what is
(Golhany refers to H. R. Jauss, Toward an Aesthetic of no longer the subject of representation is as
Reception, Minneapolis 1982, p. 11).
108 Rembrandt’s immediate predecessors Cornelisz. van important as asking what and how something
Haarlem, Elsheimer and Lievens had already elimina-
ted David from their depictions. is depicted.
109 Julius Held, Das gesprochene Wort bei Rembrandt, in:
Otto von Simson, Jan Kelch, Neue Beiträge zur Rem
brandt-Forschung, Berlin 1973; Christiane Häslein, Am
Anfang war das Wort. Das Ende der “stommen Schil-
derkonst” am Beispiel Rembrandts, Weimar 2004.
110 Kemp 1985 and 2003.
111 See Schade, Wenk 1997 for further literature. 55
In Bathsheba and Susanna, the male protagonist shifts from painted object in the
image to gazing subject in front of the image. There are also images that do not revolve
around the subject of looking, but require a male protagonist, who nonetheless remains
unrepresented. We will investigate the resulting issues as we take a look at the example
of Lucretia.
On the discourse of rape —Lucretia
To this day, the ancient Roman figure of Lucretia has remained a central figure
in the prevalent discourse on rape.112 This astonishing fact is strikingly demonstrated in
the recently published (German) doctoral thesis by Jan Follak.113
It is telling that of all figures, Lucretia became the exemplum par excellence. Her
status as a role model is based on the fact that she committed suicide after being raped
and thus contributed to the downfall of the Roman monarchy. From Antiquity to the
modern period, her story ranged among the top exempla, which are moral anecdotes
used to pass norms and values from one generation to the next. She can justifiably be
considered the incarnation of a ‘real’ ideal woman — as opposed to the ideal of the Holy
Mother. Follak describes how exempla lost their relevance in modernity and were replaced
by modern science, which took over the role of explaining the world. He argues that
because of the loss of educational knowledge transported in exempla, science is forced —
at times in extensive empirical studies — to rediscover these anthropological truths.
According to Follak, women’s reactions to rape were already adequately described in the
14th century by Coluccio Salutati. Follak continues that
His [Salutati’s] description of the process and consequences of rape

leads to the same conclusion as modern psychological studies, which
describe the phenomenon with empirical means. This can be proven
in a comparison of Salutati’s Declamatio and studies on Rape Trauma
Syndrome conducted during the 1970s in the USA. Based on empirical
data, the phenomenon that was automatically linked to the exemplum
of Lucretia in Salutati’s time, was newly named and described. […]
The behavioral patterns scientists observed when questioning rape
victims are almost identical to statements Salutati lets Lucretia make
in his Declamatio. Far from delivering truly new findings, Burgess
and Holmstrom only rediscover knowledge that was already present
in the exemplum of Lucretia.114
56
The reactions rape victims experience, described as Rape Trauma Syndrome and
by Salutati, include fear, feelings of shame, embarrassment and anger, desire for revenge
and feelings of guilt. In Declamatio, Lucretia’s feelings of guilt are the main motivation for
her suicide. Follak draws the following conclusion from the comparison between Salutati’s
text and the American study:
Like the rape victims in Burgess and Holmstrom’s study, Lucretia asks
herself how and why this could have happened. 115
In Salutati’s Declamatio, these feelings of guilt are linked to possible feelings of

pleasure during the rape, to the fear of having been ‘corrupted’ and to facing a life driven
by carnal lust.
Two aspects in this speech about raped women are particularly conspicuous and
actually continue to influence political and legal practices related to the subject: The first
aspect comprises the ‘diagnosis’ of feelings of shame in the victims and the implication
of partial complicity that is linked to them. Complicity is either explained as allegedly
provocative behavior before or supposed feelings of pleasure during rape. This is not the
framework to further discuss how the phenomenon of sexual violence is dealt with today,
but I would like to point out the gruesome topicality of the subject during the Bosnian
War during the 1990s and in the constant acquittals we see in rape cases every day.
Contrary to Jan Follak, I do not believe that the exempla describe anthropological truths,
but rather the opposite, that they produced certain values and norms that were inter
nalized over a longue durée and are continuously reproduced today. Exempla as normative
and literary texts and images have played a fundamental role in creating the ludicrous
phenomenon that victims have to feel complicit in their own violation. Salutati lets
Lucretia lament the beauty of her body as the reason for her rape and lets her fear that
she felt lust against her will; he depicts her as
afraid that “shameful acts will begin to please
112 Stefan Blaschke compiled an excellent bibliography on [her]” and puts phrases in her mouth such as
the subject rape: The History of Rape: A Bibliography:
http://archive.org/details/HistoryOfRapeABibliogra-
“nothing is as fickle as a woman.”116 This is not an
phy, retrieved Dec. 10, 2012; Christine Künzel, Gewalt/ authentic experience made by a raped woman,
Macht, in: Christina von Braun, Inge Stephan (eds.),
Gender@Wissen. Ein Handbuch der Gender-Theorien, as Follak seems to believe. It is rather a text that
Cologne 2005, p. 117 – 138. is part of a long-lasting patriarchal tradition that
113 “Lucretia zwischen positiver und negativer Anthro
pologie. Colluccio Salutatis Declamatio Lucretie und was written by a man. And if women choose not
die Menschenbilder im exemplum der Lucretia von
der Antike bis in die Neuzeit.” Follak wrote his doc- to press legal charges it is not because there is
toral thesis at the Department of Literary Studies at an inherent feeling of shame in them, but
the University of Constance in 2002. It is available
online: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bsz:352-op because they fear the practice of inquisitorial
us-9144, retrieved Dec. 10, 2012.
114 English by translator; Follak 2002, p. 183 f.
115 English by translator; Follak 2002, p. 186.
116 English by translator; Follak, p. 122. 57
questioning. In addition, rapists are not only often acquitted; women pressing charges
face the risk of being sued for defamation.117 At the same time, the prevalent discourse on
rape surely influences women’s own interpretation of their rape.118
Lucretia — what kind of story is this? 119 How could the texts and images of this
narrative shape the idea of rape so thoroughly throughout the centuries that some schol
ars still accept it as the anthropological truth today? How could suicide be considered
the ideal reaction to rape and victims of sexual assault become an ideal of femininity? We
will take a look at this story that became so paradigmatic for the discourse on rape and
will briefly follow different interpretations of the “archetypical rape victim.” 120
Sources and their re-interpretations

The base for all further adaptations of the subject is Livy’s version in Ab urbe condita
from the first century BCE.121 During the siege of Ardea, the sons of the Roman king Tarquinius
Superbus and their military commanders spent an evening of food and drink, passing the
time debating the virtues of their wives. Collatinus, a relative of the king, boasted that his
wife Lucretia surpassed all others in virtue. In order to settle the debate that followed,
they all rode to Rome the same night; they found their wives feasting and reveling, while
Lucretia was the only one quietly spinning
the wheel at home with her maids. Sextus
Tarquinius, one of the king’s sons, was tempted 117 One of many recent examples: A case of sexual assault
not only by Lucretia’s beauty, but also by her that took place in the Austrian refugee camp Trais-
kirchen (“Reception Centre East”) was dismissed by
modesty. He returned that night and an un the court in 2005. An asylum seeker from Cameroon
suspecting Lucretia welcomed him in her home. lodged a criminal complaint alleging that she had been
raped by a security guard. Said guard was acquitted for
While she was sleeping, Sextus threatened her rape, even though he admitted that he had been intoxi
cated and had locked the woman in his office with the
with a dagger and tried to force himself unto her. intention of having sex with her in the middle of the
She resisted and said she preferred to die rather night. The woman, in turn, was threatened with char-
ges of defamation, which may result in a jail sentence
than to give herself to him. So he threatened to of up to five years. For further information on the inci
dent, see Der Standard, June 21, 2005. http://hudoc.
kill her and a male slave and to place their naked echr.coe.int/sites/eng/pages/search.aspx?i=0011131
bodies together so he could claim that she had 37#{%22itemid%22:[%22001-113137%22]}, retrieved
Dec. 10, 2012.
been caught committing adultery. Lucretia 118 On the discursive and historically conditioned cha-
racter of experience, see: Joan Scott, The Evidence of
realized that she would not be able to prove her Experience, in: Critical Inquiry, vol. 17 (summer) 1991,
honor and let him abuse her, telling her hus p. 773 – 797.
119 On the history of Lucretia, see the two monographs
band, her father and Brutus the following Hans Galinsky, Der Lucretia-Stoff in der Weltliteratur,
morning: “It is only the body that has been Breslau 1932 and Ian Donaldson, The Rapes of Lucre-
tia. A Myth and its Transformations, Oxford 1982. Also
violated, the soul is pure; death shall bear see the well-researched bibliography in Follak 2002,
which the author surprisingly barely includes in his
witness to that. […] Although I acquit myself of own observations.
the sin, I do not free myself from the penalty; no 120 Elizabeth Robertson, Public Bodies and Psychic Do-
mains: Rape, Consent and Female Subjectivity in
unchaste woman shall henceforth live and plead Geoffrey Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde, in: Elizabeth
Robertson, Christine M. Rose, Representing Rape
in Medieval and Early Modern Literature, New York
2001, p. 283.
58 121 Livy, Ab urbe condita I, 57– 60; On Livy’s Roman sources
Lucretia’s example.” 122 She then pulled the dagger from under her clothes, called for
revenge and stabbed herself to death. The incident subsequently lead to the downfall of
the Roman monarchy in 510 BCE. The sacrifice of her life was the necessary legitimization
for the founding of the Roman Republic. For a vendetta to begin, there must be blood.
The central values of the story are already present in Livy’s original: gloria (glory),
pudicita or castitas (modesty or chastity) and libertas (freedom). Unlike men, women
could only gain glory through modesty or preserve it by committing suicide. Of course
the Roman chronicler’s main point is gloria, the glory of the founding myth of Rome. He
nonetheless also designs an ideal type of femininity in this exemplum, along with an ideal
type of reaction to the experience of rape. Cases of rape were not really treated differently
than adultery in Roman law: both were considered a property crime defiling the woman
and, more importantly, questioning the fatherhood of any potential offspring.123 In cases
of adultery, fathers were allowed to kill their daughters. Rape was only considered a
provable offence if the victim showed physical signs of abuse. Lucretia had given in —
even if it was under an immense amount of pressure. A woman’s statement without
witnesses was not considered legally valid, so the case could have been interpreted as
adultery.124 Lucretia thus single-handedly carried out
a law that the male society she lived in could have
and Greek versions, see Galinsky 1932, p. 13; Follak

enforced on her. Thus her death no longer seems
2002, p. 31. like patriarchal force, but rather like an autonomous
122 Livy I, 58: “Ego me etsi peccato absolvo, supplicio non
libero; nec ulla deinde impudica Lucretiae exemplo vi- decision. Shortly after Livy’s story, Valerius Maximus
vet.” English translation by. Rev. Canon Roberts. New congruously added two further stories to his
York, 1912.
123 Donaldson 1982, p. 24; Appleton (Trois episodes de exempla, in which fathers murder their daughters
l’histoire ancienne de Rome: Les Sabines, Lucrece, Vir-
ginie, in: Revue historique de droît français et étranger, themselves — in one case even as a preemptory
4éme Ser. 3, Paris 1924, p. 193 – 271, here p. 265) sees measure 125. The collection was one of the most
the base for Lucretia’s suicide in the moral values of
the Roman pastoral people: “Qu’une femelle est gâtée important during the Middle Ages and early modern
pour toujours par le contact avec un mâle d’une race
différente.” The notion that there is hardly any diffe- period. Next to Livy, Valerius Maximus and Plutarch,
rence between adultery and rape has remained more it was first and foremostly Ovid who perpetuated
or less intact in the Catholic Church. When Catholic
nuns asked the pope for permission to abort the fetu- the reception of this antique story. His poetic
ses they conceived when they were raped during the
Bosnian War, their plea was denied. In an interview on
description in Fasti tones down the heroic aspects
the subject in the monthly periodical Basta, the Aus of the narrative in favor of its erotic components.126
trian Bishop of St. Pölten at the time, Dr. Kurt Krenn,
analogized adultery and rape, stating both cases were Instead of bearing noble qualities, Lucretia has
“improper ways of conception.” (For a German article become a touching character. In the ‘confession
on the incident, see Der Standard, April 1, 1993, p. 4.)
124 On this and particularly on the influence of Roman scene,’ Lucretia blushes and begins to cry. Her
Law on jurisdiction from the Middle Ages to the 16th
century, see Elisabeth Koch, Maior dignitas est in sexu beauty is sensualized in empathic descriptions, thus
virli. Das weibliche Geschlecht im Normensystem des making Sextus’s desire for her plausible to the
16. Jahrhunderts, Frankfurt a. M. 1991, esp. p. 100 – 102,
120. audience. According to Galinsky, Ovid created the
125 See Valerius Maximus, Facta et dicta memoriabilia. Libri
I–VI, John Briscoe (ed.), Stuttgart 1998; here: VI, 1, 2–3, 4.
126 Ovid, Fasti, Book II, 721– 852 (February 24), Engl.
translation by A. S. Kline 2004. 59
prototype of someone “captured by blind love” or of the eroticist who becomes a tragic
sinner.127 Here we have the early stage of an interpretation that will subsequently lead to
blaming rape on women and their seductive beauty.
Early Christian writers like Hieronymus adopted the notion that it was better for a
woman to die than to continue living in a state of dishonor: (female) chastity was always
more important than death. Lucretia became a martyr; her suicide is reminiscent of Christ’s
sacrificial death. This Christianized adaptation of Lucretia significantly shaped artistic
portrayals of her during the Middle Ages and early modern period; and so images of
Lucretia in 16th century Germany and the Netherlands became related to depictions of
the Man of Sorrows.128 This is a parallel to the seemingly miraculous idea that Lucretia’s
sacrifice could wash away the guilt of her perpetrator. How could the blood of an innocent
raped woman possibly obliterate the sin of her rapist? This ludicrous reversal was
preserved well into the 20th century, for instance in a libretto by Ronald Duncan for the
opera Lucretia by Benjamin Britten from 1946:
Here in this scene you see:

Virtue assailed by sin
but with strength triumphing;
All this is endless
Crucifixion for him.
Nothing impure survives,
all passion perishes,
virtue has one desire
to let its blood flow
Back to the wounds of Christ.129
It would go too far at this point to further investigate the structures of this concept that
reaches back to the roots of Christian religion and the underlying archaic idea that guilt
can be atoned by the sacrificial death of an innocent.130
Even though Augustine played a central role in shaping Christian sacrificial

ideology, he never considered Lucretia a martyr in the Christian sense. In fact, he had a
problem with Lucretia. In his first book De civitate Dei, written between 413 and 415, he
dealt with the fall of Rome at the hands of Alaric and the Visigoths in 410. Rape was
committed in this context and many of the affected women committed suicide. This was
the specific historical event that prompted Augustine, with the exemplum of Lucretia in
mind, to contemplate an adequate reaction for women who had been raped. Here we
60
can clearly identify the similarities and differences between ancient and Christian thinking.
The value of female chastity remained undisputed, but suicide was a sin according to
Augustine in particular and Christian values in general. By committing suicide, Lucretia
killed an innocent person. In Christian beliefs, suicide was no longer a heroic act guaran
teeing posthumous glory, like it was during Antiquity. Christianity considered it the murder
of a soul, a sign of desperation and thus religious doubt. Glory was also no longer thought
of as the ultimate virtue. Inner values and a clear conscience before God became more
important. There was a visible shift from shame culture to guilt culture.131 Purity was an
issue of the mind and not the body. Thus, if Lucretia had not felt any pleasure during her
rape, she was considered innocent, but guilty of murdering an innocent. At this point,
Augustine developed a thought that would prove disastrous for the entire debate on the
subject for centuries to come. He contemplated the reasons that lead Lucretia to take her
life; one of the reasons he considered was the possibility of her own guilt:
[…] but what if she was betrayed by the pleasure of the act, and gave some
consent to Sextus, though so violently abusing her, and then was so affect-
ed with remorse, that she thought death alone could expiate her sin? 132
And so Augustine concludes:
If you extenuate the homicide, you

confirm the adultery: if you acquit
127 Galinsky 1932, p. 15. her of adultery, you make the
128 Compare, for example, with woodcuts by Baldung
Grien depicting a Man of Sorrows and Lucretia as half- charge of homicide heavier; and
lengths — a staging focused on intimacy and imme-
diacy. The positioning of the figures makes them seem there is no way out of the
identical at first glance. On this, see Carol M. Schuler, dilemma, when one asks, if she
Virtuous Model / Voluptuous Martyr. The Suicide of
Lucretia in Northern Renaissance Art and its Relation was adulterous, why praise her? If
to Late Medieval Devotional Imagery, in: Jane L. Caroll,
Alison G. Stewart (eds.), Saints, Sinners, and Sisters. chaste, why slay her? (“Si adulterata,
Gender and Northern Art in Medieval and Early Mo- cur laudata; si pudica, cur occisa?”)133
dern Europe, Aldershot, Burlington 2003, p. 7 – 25. See
below.
129 Quoted after Donaldson 1982, p. 28.
130 On the questionable nature of an ideology of the
Augustine’s aim was to elaborate on
victim, see Gudrun Kohn Waechter (ed.), Schrift der Christian values in contrast to Roman values
Flammen, Opfermythen und Weiblichkeitsentwürfe
im 20. Jahrhundert, Berlin 1991, esp. Hildegard Can- and to explain that an inner sense of chastity
cik-Lindemair’s essay, Opfersprache. Religionswissen- was more important than gaining glory from
schaftliche und religionsgeschichtliche Bemerkungen,
p. 38 – 56; René Girard, The Girard Reader, James G. your peers. Raped women were supposed to
Williams (ed.), New York 1996; Daniela Hammer-
Tugendhat, Kriegerdenkmäler. Kritische Gedanken bear their shame; if their souls remained pure
zum Opferdiskurs, in: Patrick Werkner (ed.), Kunst during rape, it would be recognized before God.
und Staat — ein problematisches Verhältnis, Vienna
2007, p. 119 – 135. Even though doubts on Lucretia’s chastity play
131 Donaldson 1982, p. 33 f.: with reference to E. R. Dodd,
The Greeks and the Irrational, 1951.
132 Augustine, De civitate Dei, 19, 47 – 51.
133 Ibid., p. 58 – 62. 61
only a minor role in Augustine’s writing, the issue would go on to increasingly occupy
male fantasies; the pertinent passage has repeatedly been cited to this day. In Declamatio
Lucretiae, Coluccio Salutati goes further and puts these words of doubt in Lucretia’s mouth,
thus creating a fictional woman who appears to authentically confirm that women feel
lust when being raped. Salutati lets Lucretia say the following words:
Alas for me! Will such a righteous soul as mine be able to endure anymore
in this corrupted body without the blame of disgrace? Don’t you think I
will discover some pleasure in chastity of a corrupt body? Oh hidden
shame! Spare me, father, and spare me, husband and you gods of chaste
young women. Allow me not to harbor so much grief in my soul and not
to recall so much the feeling of that embrace without the enticements of
my disobedient members assailing me, without remembering the traces
of the marriage flame. That sad and unpleasing pleasure, of whatever
sort it was, must be avenged by the sword. […] Too great are the powers
of Venus for anyone who has had some experience of pleasure. I don’t
ever want the image of such a crime to be brought before the eyes of
the mind. Nothing softens grief and emotions in a woman more quickly
than time, which extinguishes them; if I delay, perhaps shameful acts
will begin to please me.134
Lucretia also ‘certifies’ the notion that the female body and its beauty provoke men to
become sexually violent:
You, earthly body, who produced the cause and occasion of adultery with
your former beauty, give up your soul; pour forth this blood […]135
A great number of artworks since the 16th century stage Lucretia as a lasciviously
posing nude, which we will explore in more detail further below. Parallel to the onset of
the early modern period, the idea that women who are raped automatically experience
feelings of lust became more and more embedded in popular belief. Lucretia the saint
became Lucretia the whore: for example in Jacques du Bosque’s work L’Honneste Femme
from 1636, in which she has sexual intercourse with a number of different men and fears
that it will all come to light.136 Starting in the 16th century, burlesque or parody versions
shaped reception during the Rococo. These depictions blatantly deny the occurrence of a
crime as they depict Lucretia fully enjoying her rape.137
The concepts of Lucretia developed during Antiquity and early Christianity all lived
on, either as parallel readings or hybrid versions. The version based on Livy centering on
62
the heroic act of suicide for the benefit of a (male) political revolt was particularly relevant
during the Renaissance and the concept of the femme forte during the Baroque period.138
Here we also have a coupling of private female life and public, male connoted (govern
mental) power. At the same time, the Christian elevation of Lucretia to a martyr continued.
In recourse to Valerius Maximus and Plutarch, the matrimonial discourse of the early
modern period turned Lucretia into the ideal of a modest and virtuous wife as numerous
examples in matrimonial books, sermons, plays and devotional literature demonstrate.139
Juan Luis Vives, one of Erasmus’s students who lived in the Netherlands, aptly sums up
the idea in his influential text De institutio foeminae Christianae. He lets dying Lucretia
mumble: “What can be secure for a woman when her chastity is lost?” and adds,
“[…] nothing remains to a woman who has cast away her chastity.” 140 Of course Ovid’s
version was just as renowned as Livy’s and played an eminent role during the Renais
sance and Baroque period. Emphasis on what Galinsky calls “the erotic component” 141
combined with Augustine’s doubt of Lucretia’s chastity subsequently lead to a rape
discourse that is still prevalent today. This discourse perpetuates the notion that women
are complicit in their rape because of their radiating physical appeal and beauty and that
they (sub)consciously enjoy being raped.
Lucretia fever
The revival of ancient figures during the Renaissance weakened Augustine’s
medieval position condemning suicide. The condition for the acceptance of her suicide
was of course the fact that Lucretia was a heathen figure from Antiquity.142 She soon rose
to the position of a female ideal, or rather ideal
wife. A wave of ‘Lucretia fever’ broke out and she
134 Salutati, Declamatio Lucretie, English translation quo-
ted after Stephanie H. Jed, Chaste Thinking. The Rape became omnipresent in humanist texts143 and
of Lucretia and the Birth of Humanism, Indianapolis conduct books on matrimony; girls were
1989, p. 151.
135 Ibid., p. 152. christened Lucretia; she became one of the
136 See Donaldson 1982, p. 37.
137 See the examples cited in Donaldson 1982, p. 83 – 100. most popular themes for cassoni, the marriage
138 Exh. cat. Düsseldorf 1995. chests that brides received as wedding presents
139 A selection of works includes Francesco Barbaro’s De
re uxoria from 1415, Albrecht von Eybs’s Ehebüchlein, and as a visual warning that it was preferable to
Hans Sachs’s Lucretia play and the sermons of Abra-
ham a Santa Clara. Also see: Barbara Pöchhacker, Dux
die than to be unfaithful. Suicide became the
Romanae Pudicitiae. Deutsche Bearbeitungen des only believable proof of chastity, a criterion of
Lucretia-Stoffes im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert, master
thesis, University of Vienna 1992. innocence. This was already propagated in
140 Juan Luis Vives, De institutio foeminae Christianae, Boccaccio’s De claris mulieribus from 1361, a text
Plantin 1579, I, 44. English: Charles Fantazzi, The Edu-
cation of a Christian Woman, Chicago 2000, p. 85 f. that was soon translated from its Latin original
141 Galinsky 1932, p. 15; p. 220.
142 Thomas Browne distinguishes between Christian and into several European national languages and
pagan suicide in 1635, claiming that only Christians are became widespread thanks to the invention
to be condemned for taking their life. Ron M. Brown,
The Art of Suicide, London 2001, p. 101. of letterpress printing. Suicide as a proof of
143 Stephanie H. Jed, Chastity on the Page: A Feminist Use of
Paleography, in: Marilyn Migiel, Juliana Schiesari (eds.),
Refiguring Women. Perspectives on Gender and the
Italian Renaissance, Ithaca, New York 1991, p. 114 – 130. 63
chastity and an ideal reaction to rape is also the content of a poem written in the early
16th century by Giovanni de Medici, son of Lorenzo de Medici and later Pope Leo X.
I would like to present the poem here, not because of its poetic beauty, but as a repre
sentative example for the Lucretia trope of the time:
Gladly I fall to earth, the cruel steel

Driv’n to my heart; and yet I find delight
In this self-slaughter, since it needs must prove
That none was ever shown more prompt than I.
With joyful eyes I mark my life-blood flow,
And curse the crimson stream with scathing words.
O Blood of mine, more hateful than the drugs
Which Cerberus or Hydra can produce,
Depart all-tainted to thine ancient source!
Hence bitter-sweet and vile disease of Life,
That once did fill my frame with comeliness!
Thus doth your Lucrece warn her happier peers
Ever to bide in purity and grace,
And ever hold intact the marriage vow.
For is it not the chiefest boast of Rome
That all her matrons walk in Virtue’s path,
Seeking to rule their lords by chastity,
And not by beauty or the art to please?
Thus am I willing by mine own sad end
To preach this lesson; that the faithful soul
Must not survive in the polluted clay.144
It is assumed that Leo X wrote this poem when an ancient statue interpreted as
Lucretia was found in Rome around 1500. The statue in question had great influence on
the future image production of the figure. In his seminal essay Lucretia Statua from 1951,
Stechow retraces the fundamental iconographic renewal of image production that took
place in the first decade of the 16th century.145 The narrative sequencing of the story as it is
found on cassoni 146 was abandoned in favor of depictions of Lucretia as a single figure
during the act of suicide. Dramatic versions showing the rape are quite rare; it was mostly
Titian and his circle as well as Rubens who dealt with and represented sexual violence.147
Stechow rightly ascertains that, apart from reducing the narrative to the single figure of
Lucretia in the moment of suicide, the depiction itself deviates from the textual version.
The text calls for the suicide to take place in public before witnesses. The main point of the
64
Fig. 27: Marcantonio
Raimondi (after Raphael),
Lucretia, c. 1510/11,
engraving, Amsterdam,
Rijksmusem
Fig. 28: Joos van Cleve,

Lucretia, c. 1520/25, panel,
Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum
act lies in Lucretia’s testimony and her call for revenge. With few exceptions — notably
almost always in graphics148 — panel paintings in Italy, Germany and the Netherlands show
Lucretia as a single figure. As early as 1505,
144 Leo X, In Lucretiam Statuam I; quoted after Herbert M. Sodoma painted an isolated Lucretia in full
Vaughan, The Medici Popes, London 1908, p. 28.
145 Wolfgang Stechow, Lucretiae Statua, in: Beiträge für
length, with a half exposed chest standing in
Georg Swarzenski, Berlin 1951, p. 114 – 124. an implied landscape.149 This was followed by a
146 Paul Schubring, Cassoni. Truhen und Truhenbilder der
italienischen Renaissance, Leipzig 1915; Theresa Ge flood of similar images by the same artist, by
orgen, Lucretias Vergewaltigung. Privatisierung einer Francesco Francia and others. An etching by
Staatsaffäre, in: Ines Lindner et al. (eds.), Blick-Wech-
sel. Konstruktionen von Männlichkeit und Weiblichkeit Marcantonio Raimondi, which, according to
in Kunst und Kunstgeschichte, Berlin 1989, p. 437 – 444.
147 Titian’s painting of Lucretia’s rape (ca. 1570, Fitzwil- Vassari, can be traced back to a drawing by
liam Museum, Cambridge) is a case of its own. Titian Raphael, proved to be very influential (fig. 27).
addresses the aggression behind the act of violence
and Lucretia’s panic-striken horror. Tarquinius’s wild Lucretia, standing upright amidst ancient
gaze goes beyond Lucretia; her gaze and gesture sig-
nalize fear and defense. architectural structures, demonstrates an ideal
148 On the graphic examples Pencz, Meckenem, Goltzius, of gloria in her monumentality and subtle pa
see: Karin Hanika, Lucretia als ‘Damenopfer’ patria-
chaler Tugendkonzeptionen. Die vier Kupferstiche des thos, just as described in Livy’s text. However,
Hendrik Goltzius, in: Hans Jürgen Bachorski, Helga
Sciurie (eds.), Eros — Macht — Askese. Geschlechter-
her widespread arms and tilted head are re
spannungen als Dialogstruktur, Trier 1996, p. 395 – 422; miniscent of Christ’s pose on the cross. The
Karin Hanika, ‘Eine offene Tür, ein offenes Mieder.’
Das Schicksal der Lucretia zwischen Vergewaltigung iconography of a standing Lucretia in full length
und Ehebruch, in: Ulrike Gaebel, Erika Kartschoke was also popular in Germany, in depictions by
(eds.), Böse Frauen — gute Frauen. Darstellungskon-
ventionen in Texten und Bildern des Mittelalters und Dürer, Cranach, Baldung Grien and in graphics
der Frühen Neuzeit, Trier 2001, p. 109 – 132.
149 Hannover, Kestner-Museum; ill.: Stechow 1951, p. 117, by Hans Sebald Beham.150 In renderings by
fig. 1. Francesco Francia and later Palma Vecchio, we
150 See especially the excellent essay by Linda C. Hulst,
Dürer’s Lucretia: Speaking the Silence of Women, in: find Lucretia in half-length; here she stands be
Signs 1991, p. 205 – 237. Hulst bases her observations
on a different perspective, asking whether and what
kind of heroic image of femininity was possible in the
Renaissance. 65
fore a dark background, which equals the dissolution of any specific spatial context in
favor of an independent singular figure. The invention of the half-length figure
determined depictions in the Netherlands. Dietrich Schubert compiled the abundant
production there: Artists like Pieter Coecke, Quentin Massys, Joos van Cleve, The
Master of the Female Half-Lengths, The Master of the Holy Blood, Jan Gossaert,
Bernard van Orley and others developed one or more versions (fig. 28). As a typical
example for art historic dealing with the subject, I would like to cite Schubert’s reasoning
for the mass appearance of Lucretia images:
On one hand, the Roman who committed suicide with a dagger after
being violated by Tarquinius was considered the epitome of virtue in the
Netherlands as well as other artistic regions, while on the other hand,
the subject allowed the depiction of a nude female body in a dramatic
situation, a somewhat fertile moment, which with its manifold nuances
probably constituted the special artistic appeal of these images.151
What are the reasons for such widespread divergence from the textual template
and the reduction from an entire narrative to the single figure of Lucretia taking her life?
What was the motivation behind this fundamental iconographic replacement? Stechow
and others read the discovery of the ancient statue and the poem of Leo X as the source
for both the plethora of images and the cult revolving around Lucretia during the 16th
century. Time and again we can observe this type of foreshortened reasoning in art
history; attempts to base fundamental changes in art on the influence of isolated and
immanent instances of artworks and texts. I believe that shifts of this sort can only be
fully understood as part of a complex discursive process and the underlying correlation of
its different fields. The poetic moods of a prospective Pope and the finding of an actually
unidentified ancient statue could not have initiated anything, but rather must be read as
symptoms of a broad discourse that had already spread out among (higher) society.
Isolated Lucretia figures are only conceivable in a cultural environment in which the story
was already so well-known and internalized that the representation of a female figure with
a dagger immediately triggered the entire narrative. The figure’s isolation also pushed all
political implications of the story into the background. What remained was the token of
Lucretia, a symbol of chastity and an incarnation of an ideal femininity that consists of
committing suicide after being tainted by rape. The privatization of Lucretia is also part of
the early modern discourse of matrimony, which, based on the social strata of the urban
bourgeoisie, deemed marriage the ideal form of life, even surpassing celibacy. In the
northern Netherlands, where Reformation had taken hold, an abundance of matrimonial
texts appeared, targeted specifically at female readers. The core texts of this group are
66
Encomium matrimonii and Christiani matrimonii institutio by Erasmus and Juan Luis
Vives’s treatise De institutio foeminae Christianae, written 1523 and translated into Dutch
in 1544. These texts were extremely widespread up to the 17 th century; following their
lead, Jacob Cats wrote Huwelyck in 1625, which became a bestseller.152 Juan Vives
compares male and female virtues; a man needs a number of them: wisdom, eloquence,
sense of justice, strength, courage, compassion, generosity and several more; a woman,
on the other hand, needs none of them. She must only be one thing: chaste. A woman
lacking chastity is like a man lacking all of the aforementioned virtues.153 It is fully in this
sense that Jacob Cats differentiates between male and female honor. While male honor is
marked by authority, power and wisdom, female honor is fully based on chastity.154 Vives,
in turn, cites Susanna and Lucretia as positive exempla. For him, they are the epitome of
ideal women; unlike numerous Christian virgins and martyrs, they are more than mere
incarnations of chastity, they are chaste wives. Parallel to these texts we can find a large
production of didactic graphics propagating concepts of female virtue in word and
image.155
We can only fully understand these pictures as part of the discourse they are
embedded in — a discourse rooted in ancient traditions that had also taken a specific
topical form. At the same time, images played an active role in shaping said discourse
and helped root a specific image of femininity so deeply in the minds of men and women
that women today still process their experiences in accordance with its patterns.
Furthermore, the extraction of a singular

151 Dietrich Schubert, Halbfigurige Lucretia-Tafeln der figure from a narrative context is a characteristic
1. Hälfte des 16. Jahrhunderts in den Niederlanden, in:
Jahrbuch des Kunsthistorischen Instituts der Universi- phenomenon for the shift from early to high
tät Graz 1971, 6, p. 99 – 110. Renaissance. This shift was additionally pro
152 See note 61.
153 Jlja M. Veldman, Lessons for Ladies: A Selection of moted by panel painting. I believe the issue of
Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century Dutch Prints, in:
Simiolus 16, 2/3, 1986, p. 113 – 127, here p. 119.
medium is of great importance here. The me
154 On the particularities of this terminology, see Sneller’s dium changed the mode of representation and
thorough linguistic analysis of the term achtbaerheyt
Cats uses in Tooneel van de mannelicke achtbaerheyt: with it, the semantic layer. It was an interface for
Agnes Sneller, Jacob Cats’ Tooneel van de mannelicke different, yet interconnected layers: panel paint
achtbaerheyt (1622), in: W. Abrahamse et al. (eds.):
Kort Tijt-verdrijf, opstellen over Nederlands toneel. ing was no longer publicly received art like a wall
Aangeboden aan Mieke B. Smits-Veldt, Amsterdam
1996, p. 103 – 109; Sneller, Agnes Verbiest. Wat woor- fresco and was no longer directly connected to
den doen, Couthino 2000. Sneller’s linguistic findings text like illumination art. Panel painting thus
are confirmed by historic empirical research: see Her-
mann Roodenburg, Die Amsterdamer Kirchenzucht made it possible to depict autonomous figures,
im 17. Jahrhundert und die These der Sozialdisziplinie-
rung, in: Zentrum für Niederlande-Studien, Jahrbuch 3, to decontextualize them and privatize the
Münster 1992, p. 27 – 37. narrative. One connective element is the genre
155 Veldman 1986; Yvonne Bleyerveld, Chaste, Obedient
and Devout. Biblical Women as Patterns of Female of graphics. Thus we still find entire sequences
Virtue in Netherlandish and German Graphic Art, ca.
1500 –1730, in: Simiolus 28, 4, 2000 – 2001, p. 219–250.
Artists include Dirck Volkertsz. Coornhert and Crispin
de Passe. 67
Fig. 29: Lucas Cranach the Elder, Lucretia, 1533, panel, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 30: Lucas Cranach the Elder, Venus, 1532, panel, Frankfurt, Städelsches Kunstinstitut
of scenes from the Lucretia narrative illustrated in graphics from the 16th and 17 th
century; often lines from the text are printed alongside the image. At the same time we
have folios like the one by Marcantonio, where Lucretia is already conceived as a monu
mental singular figure (with or without text). Only by means of the medium of panel
painting was it possible for Lucretia to become the symbol of truth for the entire story.
The rest of it, the crime, the sexual violence, Tarquinius the rapist, her husband Collatinus,
her father, Brutus, the oath of revenge, the expulsion of the Tarquinians, the downfall of
the Roman Kingdom, the founding of the Republic — all of it disappeared from the
field of vision and literally can no longer be seen in the dark backdrop behind the single
figure of Lucretia.
During high Renaissance there was an enormous demand for pictures of Lucretia
— we know of at least 37 versions by Lucas Cranach alone.156 In his more developed later
paintings from the 1630s, a nude Lucretia it set off against a dark backdrop (fig. 29).
Not only her radical isolation, but also her nudity stands in stark contrast to the text.
Both Livy and Ovid, as well as later texts, explicitly mention how Lucretia hid the dagger
68
beneath her gowns so none of her relatives could stop her. It is also unconceivable that
Lucretia, who considered pudicitia the highest value, would appear before her witnesses
without clothing. Ovid explicitly mentions that her only concern was to fall and die
decently.157
Cranach’s Lucretia stands in a relaxed counter-pose and is virtually identical to
his depictions of Venus from the same time (fig. 30) in regard to posture and gaze. The
emphasis of these nudes’ linear outlines may not seem very sensual to us, but conform
to the beauty ideals preferred by Cranach and his clients. Only a closer look at the nudes
reveals whether we have a depiction of the Goddess of Love or of a chaste woman on the
verge of committing suicide. The relaxed position of Lucretia’s arm would make it im
possible to stab herself and the dagger is not very prominent as it is held in the same
angle as her arm. Its point barely seems to be touching her skin. As the dagger is used as
more of an attribute than a weapon and as her body is intact, her attitude relaxed and
her face signals neither fear nor desperation, we can conclude that death is trivialized in
this depiction. This is not a demonstration of heroic action, but rather a limp, passively
lingering female figure taking in the viewer’s gaze with open arms. In order to boost the
tingling sensation of seeing her exposed lap, Lucretia, like Venus, lasciviously flaunts a
wafer-thin, see-through veil. What should be veiled is thus explicitly unveiled; where the
gaze supposedly should not wander is exactly where it is directed. If Lucretia is to be read
as nothing else but an allegory of chastity, then why this overtly sexualized depiction that
contradicts the text in each detail and instead closely resembles depictions of Venus?
This critical reading was very much supported by moralist contemporaries — first and
foremostly Erasmus — who harshly criticized all tantalizing versions that did not adhere
to the written model.158
Eroticized versions of Lucretia mark German and Dutch production during the 16th
century.159 Reducing the figure to half-length allowed the viewer an even more intimate
gaze of the naked or half-naked female body (fig. 31). Audiences were familiar with half-
lengths from late medieval devotional images;
156 Max J. Friedländer, Jakob Rosenberg, The Paintings of Schuler points out striking similarities between
Lucas Cranach, rev. ed., Ithaca, New York 1978.
157 Ovid, Fasti II, 833 – 34: “tum quoque, iam moriens,
two woodcuts by Baldung Grien, who used an
ne non procumbat honeste respicit: haec etiam cura identical iconography and formal staging for
cadentis erat.” (“Even then in dying she took care to
sink down decently: that was her thought even as she Lucretia and a Man of Sorrow.160
fell.”). Lucretia as a devotional image? Schuler
158 Specifically on Lucretia, see: Ellen Muller, Jeanne Ma-
rie Noel, Kunst en moraal bij humanisten. Theorie en argues that there is a link between desperation
beeld, in: exh. cat. Nijmegen 1985, p. 129 – 159, here:
p. 141; for more general observations on Erasmus’s and erotic appeal that, as she claims, has yet to
opinion, see Erwin Panofsky, Erasmus and the Visual be investigated in regard to sources and effects.161
Arts, in: Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institute
32, 1969, p. 200 – 227.
159 Hulst 1991; Hanika 2001; Schuler 2003; Garrard 1989,
Capter 4.
160 Schuler 2003, esp. p. 15 f.
161 Ibid., p. 9. 69
Fig. 31: Pieter Coecke van Aelst,
Lucretia, first half of the 16th century,
panel, Lindau, private collection
In Pieter Coecke’s knee-length Lucretia 162, the Latin sentence “Satius est moriquam
indecore vivere” inscribed in the balustrade reminds us of the story’s moral that it is
better to die than to live on in shame (for Lucretia). By twisting her almost fully exposed
torso, the sensually and erotically staged body is presented to the viewer’s eyes. The
dagger’s shaft is pressed against the balustrade and can be read as a continuation of the
viewer’s perspective, leading directly into the body. With the dagger obtaining a phallic
quality, it becomes possible for the viewer to also fantasize Tarquinius’s penetration and
the violence of the sexual act. Lucretia’s tilted head with the artistically arranged hair,
her slightly parted lips and the eyes rolled upwards can be read as both the ‘petit mort’
of orgasm and actual physical death.
Cranach, Pieter Coecke and many other German and Dutch artists created de
pictions of Lucretia that unite a wide range of different, sometimes even opposing inter
pretations of the subject. It is one of art’s great qualities to visualize contradictions that
are usually excluded from normative discourse in favor of one-sided and thus normative
statement.163 This can take on many forms. Sometimes discrepancies are addressed
explicitly, thus visualizing and creating awareness for the limitedness and ambivalence of
normative discourse. In our case, contradicting strands of Lucretia interpretations are
fused into a seemingly harmonious unity. Differing aspects of the story’s interpretations
are added up: the normative laws of female chastity, often explicitly visualized in text
within the image; Lucretia’s idealized chastity in the form of an immaculate beauty and
the motif of suicide; at the same time reminders of doubts about her chastity, signalized
in the staging of an erotically charged nude female body; and finally, the specifically
Christian idea of a sacrificial martyr achieved by adopting the formal characteristics
70
typical for late medieval devotional and martyr images in her gesture and gaze. The in
viting presentation of the female nude and the phallic movement of the dagger that does
not visibly pierce her body can be read as an invitation to the male viewer to envision the
sexual act and relive it in his mind. Art makes it possible to represent prevalent norms
while triggering completely contrary fantasies. I believe that the mixed signals that these
images send out may have been received in many ways. Female audiences might have
identified themselves with the warning to remain chaste and the horrible consequences
that any misconduct would bring. For men, however, the images bore the opportunity to
enjoy the erotic thrill of looking at beautiful nudes while simultaneously praising female
chastity (especially in regard to their own wives) and fantasizing about sexual violence.
And so it became possible to unite the two opposing positions of a dualistic understand
ing of femininity in a single artistic figure. The ideal, chaste wife who gets rid of herself
right after being sexually abused and the other woman, the lover, courtesan, whore, erotic
ideal. These lascivious stagings may also suggest that women actually want to be raped.
In good Christian tradition, Lucretia’s martyr death also atones the perpetrator’s sins.
Her death reestablishes moral balance. Lucretia is the epitome of patriarchal hypocrisy.
Social practice
Like the texts and images on Lucretia, social and legal practices are part of the
discourse on female chastity, marriage and rape.164 In stark contrast to the meaning of
female chastity, the phenomenon of (male) sexual violence barely receives any attention.
Historic research since the 1970s has found that in regard to sexual moral, highly differ
ent parameters were set and legally executed according to gender. Sources of criminal
law texts from the 16th century show that rape did not play a major role compared to
other crimes and was mostly subsumed and identified under the category stuprum.165
Stuprum, in its original meaning ‘disgrace,’ was used to describe all illicit sexual acts,
including rape, as equal to adultery. The
abduction of a woman was punished as a far
162 In my opinion, we can assume that there was a model greater crime: “plus est rapere quam per vim
image from Leonardo’s circle in Milan. See the paint
ing Lucretia Romana by Giampietrino (Chazen Muse- stuprare.” 166 Raptus, ‘abduction’ — the term that
um, University of Wisconsin, Madison), which, in turn,
was inspired by Leonardo’s Leda; ill.: Wheelock, Keyes
lives on in the actual word ‘rape’ — was con
1991, p. 4, fig. 4. sidered a crime of property committed against
163 Scholars tend to negate this potential in favor of one-
sided interpretations. the father, husband or family in general. The
164 E. Koch 1991; Angela Koch, Die Verletzung der Ge- terminology and the legal practice it reflects
meinschaft. Zur Relation der Wort- und Ideenge-
schichte von “Vergewaltigung,” in: Johanna Gehma- clearly reveal that it was not about the violence
cher, Gabriella Hauch, Maria Mesner (eds.) Öster-
reichische Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaften, and crime committed against the woman; what
“Bodies / Politics,” Innsbruck, Vienna 2004, p. 37 – 56; counted was the abduction of another man’s
Diane Wolfthal, Images of Rape. The ‘Heroic’ Tradi
tion and its Alternatives, Cambridge 1999. For further property. It was an issue between men, in which
literature, see the online bibliography “The History of
Rape. A Bibliography” (see note 112).
165 E. Koch 1991, p. 100.
166 See E. Koch 1991, p. 105 for sources. 71
the woman was no more than a semiotic character.167 (The narrative of Lucretia is also a
story about male conquests.) In the modern period, the crime shifted from one per
taining to family to one affecting society: rape was now categorized as sexual misconduct
and thus as an offence and crime against morality in general.168 It was not until the 1970s
that the idea of sexual violence as something that predominantly affects women’s sexual
self-determination found its way into legal texts (of North American and European
countries). Before that, women hardly had a chance to prove that they had been raped;
only loud screams witnessed by other parties or signs of strong physical violence stood a
chance of being accepted as sufficient proof.169 Adaptations of the strict moral idea that it
was better for a woman to die than to commit sin resulted in a legal interpretation that
men were only found guilty if they had employed direct physical force on their victims.
(Thus legal practices corresponded fully to the morals expressed in the story of Lucretia.)
Accusations by women had no value as proof against opposing accounts by men. Men
were often acquitted while women were sued for defamation.170 If a woman’s reputation
was anything less than immaculate, she was very often blamed of being a seductress.
Even pregnancy was used as evidence against women: an ancient theory propagated by
Galen — opposing Aristotle’s theory on sexual reproduction — claimed that female
orgasm was necessary for conception. This theory turned into a trap for many women,
as pregnancy was interpreted as proof for an orgasm and thus as exoneration for the
accused rapist.171 These facts all resulted in a very small number of rape charges and even
fewer convictions. The men that were convicted were most often foreigners, outsiders or
social underdogs.172
In the Netherlands of 16th and 17 th century, there was no law against rape.173 The
Politieke Ordonnantie from 1580, the main book of legal regulations, only mentions
abduction and incest as crimes. The terms used speak for themselves: the same word is
used for extramarital intercourse and rape: oneerlijk (vleselijk) converseren, defloreren,
onteren, misbruiken.174 Manon van der Heijden’s research on original court records of the
cities Delft and Rotterdam revealed that only 14 cases of attempted or executed rape were
recorded in the entire 17 th century. These cases almost exclusively pertained to virgins or
minors. All cases of married woman being raped resulted in mere warnings for the
rapists. It was obviously assumed that women who had some extent of sexual experience
could not be innocent. Unmarried women with sexual experience had no chance what
soever in court. Widows, who neither had any ‘innocence’ to lose, nor ‘belonged’ to
somebody anymore, did not even bother to take legal action. Women who were no longer
virgins had to count on being charged and convicted with defamation. Whatever the
results of a rape case were, even if the perpetrator was convicted, the victim was sure to
have a tainted reputation and damaged honor. Legal practices in cases of incest make
72
even clearer how guilt was projected from male perpetrators onto female victims. Girls
who had already begun menstruating and had been abused by their fathers, uncles or
brothers were automatically considered complicit and thus punished as well.
Research on the situation in Germany, Britain and the Netherlands reveals a shift
from the dispositif of property to one of sexuality during the early modern period.175
Gradually, rape was considered less a crime against property and more a sexual one. And
so, a Dutch matrimonial law from 1656 was the first to make it punishable to seduce an
honorable girl.176 The focus now lay on whether a sexual act was performed with or
against the will of the woman. On one hand this signals a budding awareness for women
as active subjects; on the other, it allowed an
even more intense and internalized investigation
167 See, a. o., the excellent analysis in Miranda Chaytor,
Husband(ry): Narratives of Rape in the Seventeenth of possible complicity: Had the woman pro
Century, in: Gender and History, vol. 7, no. 3, Nov. 1995,
p. 378 – 407. voked her rapist? Had she seduced him? Hadn’t
168 Thus stated in the Criminal Code for Germany in 1871; there been any way to prevent it? Had she been
See A. Koch 2004.
169 E. Koch 1991, p. 100 f.; A. Koch 2004, p. 5 f.; Lyndal Roper, somewhere she should not have been on her
Das fromme Haus. Frauen und Moral in der Reforma-
tion, Frankfurt a. M. 1995, p. 76; Wolfthal 1999, p. 99 ff. own? Had she tried to fight him off at all? Had
170 In 13th century England, for example, more women her screams been loud enough? …?
were convicted for defamation than men for sexual
violence. See Wolfthal 1999, p. 178; Also see note 117. In her excellent work Husband(ry): Narratives of
171 According to ancient medicine, as it was compiled by
Galen, the common opinion was that human procrea-
Rape in the Seventeenth Century, Miranda Chaytor
tion required not only male semen, but also ‘female demonstrates the interrelation between social
semen.’ The liquid discharged during female orgasm
was thought to be this semen. This idea persevered order, work, family, property situation and (self)
well into the 18th and 19th centuries: The female ovum perception in cases of rape.177 The development
was not discovered until 1827. Danielle Jacquart, Clau-
de Thomasset, Sexualité et savoir médicale au Moyen- of urban-bourgeois society led to a withdrawal
Age, Paris 1985; Thomas Laqueur, Making Sex: Body
and Gender from the Greeks to Freud, Harvard 1990, of upper middle class women from domestic
p. 66, 161. production to a private, thus more sexualized
172 A. Koch 2004. This touches upon a methodological
problem, namely how to deal with a lack of sources. life. From the second half of the 17 th century well
It would definitely be wrong to assume that the small
number of evident legal cases means that there was into the 18th and 19th century, only poor women
only a very small number of sexual crimes. What filed charges of rape; no aristocratic or upper
seems very telling, for example, is that most cases of
rape were reported in connection to infanticide cases. bourgeois woman would have made her rape
See Chaytor 1995, p. 378 (note 3, p. 401).
173 Manon van der Heijden, Women as Victims of Sexual
public.178 The source of court files shows that
and Domestic Violence in Seventeenth-Century Hol- victims always spoke ‘in the name of’: in the
land: Criminal Cases of Rape, Incest and Maltreatment
in Rotterdam and Delft, in: Journal of Social History 33, name of their honor, which in turn is defined by
2000, p. 623 – 44, esp. p. 624. their work, their husbands and their families.
174 Manon van der Heijden, Huwelijk in Holland. Stede
lijke rechtspraak en kerkelijke tucht 1550 – 1700, docto- For bourgeois women it was not only about
ral thesis, Amsterdam 1998, p. 94 f.
175 Chaytor 1995, p. 296 ff.; A. Koch 2004; Roper 1995, honor, but also about innocence. Innocence could
p. 75 ff. hardly be proven and even less so re-estab
176 Van der Heijden 2000, p. 624.
177 Her research is focused on Britain, but considering the lished. Innocence was defined as an absence,
similar progression of urban development in Holland,
we can assume that her findings are also applicable to
Holland.
178 Chaytor 1995, p. 397. 73
the absence of certain knowledge. How could this ever be restored after sexual experience
of any sort? A raped woman remained tainted for the rest of her life by default.
We can also identify this discursive shift on sexual violence in literature. In 18th
century English novels, the fascination with the subject rape is replaced by a fascination
with seduction.179 It is in this sense that we can understand the notable decrease in
interest in the subject of Lucretia in 17 th century urban-bourgeois Dutch society compared
to feudal Catholic countries. Lucretia barely plays a role in 17 th century Dutch literature
and Galinsky only mentions two plays by Dirck Pieterz. Pers and Neuyes of Neuye, as well
as two further Lucretia dramas by unknown authors.180 Great Dutch playwrights like
Vondel did not deal with the subject at all. Heroic suicide did not conform to the ideal of
femininity prevalent among Dutch moralists and literates.181 The idea of ideal femininity
was the virtuous wife. When Lucretia is referred to at all, it is in this slightly changed
meaning. In Pers’ play, Lucretia is converted into an example of a virtuous wife who never
leaves the house, supervises the maids and sits at the spinning wheel.182 This is also how
she was portrayed by Rembrandt’s student W. de Poorter in 1631.183 The new version of
the rape story in Jacob Cats’s verse novella
Trouringh (wedding ring) from 1637 is symp
tomatic for the development, especially since
179 Ibid. In the 18th century novel Clarissa by Samuel
Cats, as mentioned above, was a key figure in Richardson, we have the description of a rape. Clarissa
shaping the discourse on women and marriage remains tainted and is ruined mentally and physically;
she subsequently dies from the anguish. Richardson
in 17 th century Holland.184 Even though Lucretia and his contemporaries expected a truly virtuous wo-
must have conformed to his ideal of a chaste man to become melancholic and ultimately die after
being raped.
wife, her suicide obviously was highly proble 180 Galinsky 1932, p. 120 f.: Dirck Pietersz. Pers, Lucretia
ofte het Beeld der Eerbaaheydt, 1624; Neuyes of Neuye,
matic for the devout Calvinist. He thus cloaked De gewroke Lucretia of Rome in vryheit, Amsterdam
the adequate reaction to rape in a different 1669; supposedly a drama about Lucretia was per
formed in Amsterdam in 1609 and 1642, respectively.
narrative. Based on the story from Gesta 181 However, Jan Vos wrote a poem about Govert Flinck’s
Lucretia in 1660, emphasizing the political dimension
Romanorum, Cats describes the case of of the narrative: “In the red ink [of her blood] she writes:
Tryphose and Jocasta, who were both raped definition of freedom.” See Gary Schwartz, Rem
brandt. His Life. His Paintings, New York 1985, p. 330.
by the same man. According to a Roman law 182 Franits 1993, p. 72 (note 52, p. 216). In Dutch painting
and graphic art, the trope of woman at the spinning
(invented by Cats), there were two options for wheel became the symbol of the ideal housewife (or
the women: marriage or death penalty. Lucretia herself is depicted at the spinning wheel),
even though this activity was no longer part of social
Tryphose, described as a proud and harshly practice in bourgeois households.
negative figure, chooses death, while docile 183 Toulouse, Musee des Beaux Arts. Sumowski, vol. 4,
p. 2417, fig. 1604.
Jocasta decides to marry her rapist. Cats por 184 Sneller 1996, p. 170 ff.
185 In Cats’s elaborate collection of emblems Sinne- en
trays the rapist as a victim who was seduced minnebeelden, Lucretia and Tarquinius are only men-
by Tryphose’s chastity (!): “Sy had my eerst tioned once. Under the motto Et in aequore flamma
est (VXI) Tarquinius is named alongside Samson, An
verkracht, eer ick haer maeghdom nam.” (‘She tonius, a. o. as those who indulged in love at the cost
of all other things. The Dutch and Latin versions can
be found online in a collection of Cats’s emblems;
http://emblems.let.uu.nl/emblems/html/c162716.
74 html, retrieved Dec. 2, 2012.
had already raped me before I took her virginity.’) Contrary to the story of Lucretia, the
perpetrator is practically absolved from his guilt while the women are blamed for seduc
ing him with their charm and chastity.185
In the visual arts the fascination with the Lucretia motif cooled down significantly
during the 17 th century. Most examples are from the beginning of the century and almost
all (except Frans van Mieris the Elder, Caspar Netscher, Adriaen van der Werff and
Arnold Houbraken) are graphics: Maerten de Vos, Hieronymus Wiericx, Jan Muller,
Paulus Moreelse.186
Rembrandt — An entirely different Lucretia?

Considering the above, it is quite remarkable that Rembrandt made three
paintings on the subject. The first version is lost; it must have dated from before 1658, as
we know thanks to a comment in Abraham Wijs and Sara de Potter’s inventory on the
occasion of their bankruptcy that year: “een groot stuck schilderij van Lucretia / van R.
van Rijn.” 187 The two preserved versions are from 1664 188 and 1666 189, respectively (plates 5
and 6). None of the two were commissioned
works, and we know nothing about the circum
stances of their production, but the high level of
186 A Pigler, Barockthemen, Budapest 1974 (2nd edition),
vol. 2, p. 406. A painting of Lucretia by Govert Flinck
quality we can see in both panels demonstrate
must have been lost. See Schwartz 1985, p. 330. that they were very important for Rembrandt.
187 Strauss, van der Meulen 1979, 1658/8, p. 418.
188 National Gallery of Art, Washington, D. C., Andrew Even though scholars agree that especially the
W. Mellon Collection, inv. no. 1937.1.76, oil / canvas, Minneapolis version is one of his most impor
120/101 cm, signed and dated: “Rembrandt 1664.” The
painting is well preserved; in 1985 an aged, discolored tant works, the picture “still eludes final inter
varnish layer and discolored repaints were removed.
The painting’s provenance is only verified from 1825 pretation.” 190
onwards. For a detailed description of the painting’s
state of preservation, the painterly technique used
and a bibliography, see Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr., Dutch Both paintings follow the aforementioned
Paintings of the Seventeenth Century (The Collection
of the National Gallery of Art. Systematic Catalogue), tradition of an isolated, singular figure, which
Washington, D. C., New York, Oxford 1995, p. 280 – 287. corresponds to the development of private and
Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr., George Keyes, Rembrandt’s
Lucretias, exh. cat. The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, decontextualized images in bourgeois panel
Washington, D. C. 1991; exh. cat. Edinburgh, London
2001, cat. no. 141, p. 242 – 244; Gilboa 2003, p. 166 – 170.
painting.
189 The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, The William
Hood Dunwoody Fund, inv. No. 34.19, oil / canvas,
110.17/92.28 cm. Signed and dated: “Rembrandt f 1666.” Once again, scholars most often root
The painting is very well preserved, it was cleaned in Rembrandt’s interest in the subject in his bio
1964 and 1988. Its provenance is only verified from
the mid-19th century onwards. For technical details graphy, in the death of Hendrickje Stoffels in
and the entire bibliography, see the documentation of
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts. I would like to thank 1663. Wheelock and Keyes, for example, argue
Erika Holmquist-Wall for sending me the documenta the following in a brochure on the two Lucretias
tion. Also see the literature mentioned in note 188.
190 “Although this late work has been unanimously regard published by both museums:
ed by scholars as one of Rembrandt’s greatest works,
the treatment of the subject, Lucretia, still eludes final
interpretation.” Documentation, The Minneapolis In
stitute of Arts, 2005. 75
Pl. 5: Rembrandt, Lucretia, 1664, canvas, Washington, D. C., National Gallery of Art
Pl. 6: Rembrandt, Lucretia, 1666, canvas, Minneapolis, Institute of Arts, The William Hood Dunwoody Fund
The extraordinary poignancy of Rembrandt’s paintings of Lucretia sug-

gests that the motivation for these works has deeper roots than the
political or moral associations traditionally brought to this tragic figure.191
What is meant with “deeper roots” is Rembrandt’s private life. Supposedly

painting images of Lucretia’s suicide was a sort of psychological catharsis for Rembrandt,
allowing him to process the death of his lover and the memory of her humiliating status
as his concubine. This generally accepted interpretation seems questionable to me: 192
His first Lucretia painting was made several years before Hendrickje’s death; especially
the model for the Minneapolis version does not bear the slightest resemblance to any
image supposedly representing Hendrickje. Why, I dare ask, is the private sphere the
deeper one? Is this belief not already part and parcel of a modern understanding of art,
centered around the artist and his work and assuming that meanings are created in the
inner self of an autonomous subject? 193 If Rembrandt actually processed personal
experiences in his work, the remarkable aspect about it would be the new and specifically
bourgeois phenomenon of privatization, of an artist incorporating his own private and
intimate life into his art. An idea that would have been unthinkable at any earlier point in
time. Whether these paintings were privately motivated or not, they are part of a visual
tradition and the chain of meaning they communicate.
76
Fig. 32: Paolo Veronese, Lucretia, c. 1580 – 83, canvas, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
Fig. 33: Caravaggio, David with the Head of Goliath, canvas, 1609/10, Rome, Galleria Borghese
Iconographically, scholars are very one-sided as they assume both paintings to

follow Italian tradition. Especially research on the version in Washington refers to the
etching by Marcantonio mentioned above (fig. 27, p. 65) and to Venetian examples from
members of Titian’s, Veronese’s and Palma
191 Wheelock, Keyes in: exh. cat. Minneapolis, Washington Vecchio’s circle.194 I cannot understand why
D. C. 1991, p. 10.
192 Also see my observations on models in the section on Dutch visual tradition is completely neglected
Woman in Bed. here. Rembrandt was surely familiar with Italian
193 Nanette Salomon, Der kunsthistorische Kanon — Un-
terlassungssünden, in: kritische berichte 21, 1993/4, images and graphics, but his compatriots had
p. 27 – 40; Sigrid Schade, Kunstgeschichte, in: Wolf-
gang Zinggl (ed.), Spielregeln der Kunst, Dresden already incorporated and adapted these influ
2001, p. 86 – 99; Schade, Wenk 1995, p. 340 – 407; Ka- ences into their work in the course of the 16th
thrin Hoffmann Curtius, Silke Wenk (eds.), Mythen
von Autorschaft und Weiblichkeit im 20. Jahrhundert, century. Rembrandt was just as acquainted with
Marburg 1997.
194 Wheelock 1995, p. 282; Wheelock dismisses the idea
images by Veronese (fig. 32) or by members of
of a Dutch source: “Northern prints and paintings of Titian’s circle as with pictures of Lucretia by
Lucretia have a quite different character and do not
seem to have influenced Rembrandt in his depictions Dutch artists from the first half of the 16th
of Lucretia,” ibid., note 8, p. 286; B. P. J. Broos, Index century, such as Joos van Cleve (fig. 28, p. 65),
of the Formal Sources of Rembrandt’s Art, ed. by Gary
Schwartz, Maarssen 1977, p. 49 f. Not a single men- The Master of the Female Half-Lengths,
tion of Dutch tradition can be found in this list. Any
influence by artists from the north of Europe, such Quentin Massys and others.195 Yet indeed,
as Cranach or Dürer, is still decidedly rejected in the Michael Hirst rightly points out the remarkable
Edinburgh exhibition catalog from 2001 (exh. cat. no.
141, p. 242). The specific 16th century Netherlandish kinship bet ween the truly unusual pose of the
tradition is apparently unknown among Rembrandt
scholars, alongside the essay by Schubert from 1971,
where these images were compiled.
195 See images in Schubert 1971. 77
Lucretia in Minneapolis and Caravaggio’s David with the Head of Goliath in the Villa
Borghese (fig. 33).196 Future research should consider whether this (possible) inspiration
for Rembrandt only applies to a formal level, or if it could have also been a semantic one
including Caravaggio’s ironic play on the role of perpetrator and victim. As is well
known, Goliath’s features resemble the artist himself. David’s tilted head and his down
cast eyes as well as the positioning of the arm and the dagger pointed to the area of her
crotch can also be identified in Rembrandt’s Lucretia. The diagonal direction of David’s
shirt is translated into the necklace around Lucretia’s neck. I believe that Rembrandt
was particularly fascinated by the effect of melancholy and contemplation in this unusual
and unheroic depiction of David: the reflection of murder and suicide.
Rembrandt’s otherwise iconographically traditional painting offers one truly

unique detail, which may have also been inspired by Caravaggio’s David: the cord that
Lucretia grasps. This cord has been puzzled over many times. It has been interpreted as a
bell pull, drapery cord or supportive contraption for the model. Schama points out that
bell pulls did not exist in 17 th century Dutch interiors.197 The drapery associated with the
cord has been interpreted as a theater-like effect and thus as the boundary between her
private canopy bed and public witnesses.198 The final curtain after the last act, revealing
and covering at once. The problem with this otherwise plausible interpretation is that
Rembrandt never — neither in his numerous drawings and etchings, nor in his paint
ings — used cords for the drapery of canopy beds.199 Additionally, the cord seems to be
made of metal as the specks of refracted light suggest, pointing to a bell after all. This
contradicts the specifications of the text as the bell is a quick way to summon the wit
nesses after the deed is done. So how was Goliath’s head turned into a cord? When I try
to imagine this development during the painting’s actual production, I come to the
following possible conclusions. Rembrandt was deeply impressed by Caravaggio’s inven
tion. Instead of choosing a more obvious portrayal of Judith, he decided to paint the
thematically diametrical figure of Lucretia. Caravaggio’s composition suggests a certain
position for Lucretia’s left arm. Rembrandt must have seen this exact position right be
fore his eyes while working on preparatory drawings with his model. The model held on
to a cord in certain poses in order not to tire too quickly. And so the arm’s position in the
model painting merged with the position of the actual model’s arm, allowing Rembrandt
to retain the gesture in his composition while giving it a new semantic meaning.200 In
Maes’s Eavesdroppers we find this type of cord attached to steep staircases and women
holding on to them to keep from falling. Maybe cords were not only installed for models,
but were a not completely uncommon fixture in Dutch houses. Rembrandt’s Lucretia,
who has just stabbed herself and is about to fall, needs the support of the cord to remain
standing upright. She can thus die in a stoic pose201, following Ovid’s text:
78
Even then in dying she took care to sink down decently:
that was her thought even as she fell.202
Perhaps Caravaggio’s David also inspired

196 Michael Hirst, Rembrandt and Italy, in: The Burling- Rembrandt to portray Lucretia after the act —
ton Magazine CX, 1968, p. 221. It remains unclear
how Rembrandt found this model image, because
the correspondence between the position of
Caravaggio’s David was not reproduced in etchings. David’s and Lucretia’s right arm, alongside the
Perhaps he was familiar with a painted copy.
197 Schama 1999, p. 662. alignment of their respective daggers pointing at
198 The theatrical aspect in both versions was particular-
their genitals is undeniable. However, claiming
ly emphasized by Held (1973, p. 123); Schama (1999,
p. 662) interpreted the curtain as part of a canopy bed that David inspired Rembrandt to depict a mo
and thus as a threshold between “public hurt and pri-
vate grief.” ment “that no artist had ever before depicted:
199 There are no cords to be found on the countless cur- Lucretia, in a moment between life and death […]”
tains and bed curtains depicted in Dutch painting,
with very few exceptions: Godfried Schalcken, The is a bit exaggerated.203 There are other works,
Doctor’s Visit, 1669, ill.: Sutton 1984, cat. no. 98, p. 168,
fig. 12; Jacob van der Merck, Vier van de vijf zintuigen, both in graphics and painting, showing Lucretia
Rotterdam, Museum Boymans van Beuningen, ill.: De after she has wounded herself fatally.204
Jongh 1976, p. 162.
200 This theory of a complex link between motives from However, in most of these depictions witnesses
iconographic tradition and a mundane fixture for the
model, subsequently leading to a resemantization, can are also present 205 and either members of her
be supported with the following example: Rembrandt’s family or Brutus catch her as she falls. In
last etching of a female nude from 1661 (London, Brit.
Museum) shows a woman in back-view with a raised Rembrandt’s version, all witnesses are removed.
hand holding an arrow. It is nearly identical to a dra-
wing by Johannes Raven (London, Brit. Museum) who
The idea that the viewers replace any witnesses
obviously drew the same model. In Raven’s drawing, immanent to the picture seems problematic
the model is holding on to the same type of cord.
Rembrandt’s nude has an identical arm position, but because it does not have a persuasive structure;
he put an arrow in her hand (and also added a faint im- Lucretia does not try to connect with the viewer,
pression of a tiny male head). The arrow seems unmo-
tivated, the hand is not really holding on to it, so the her gaze seems lost and completely introspec
presence of the cord remains tangible. Interpretations
of the nude range from Venus to Diana, to others; ill.: tive. By eliminating the witnesses, Rembrandt
exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001, p. 233. cuts off all exterior action and with it all
201 Among them, Christopher Wright, Rembrandt, Mu-
nich 2000, p. 78. narrative elements. The moment of death is
202 Ovid, Fasti II, 833 – 34: “tum quoque, iam moriens, ne
non procumbat honeste respicit: haec etiam cura ca- frozen eternally. Rembrandt achieves a sense
dentis erat.” See note 157. of “detemporalization in an event-portraying
203 Wheelock, Keyes, 1991, p. 6.
204 Example for a painting: Claude Vignon, 1640s, Blois, painting (Entzeitlichung des Ereignisbildes)” 206
Château et Musées, ill.: exh. cat Düsseldorf 1995, p. 297,
fig. 144; see note 148 on the graphic examples.
by employing different aesthetic strategies: to
205 At the same time as Rembrandt, the North Italian die without falling — the cord allows this exter
artist Francesco Cairo painted several versions of
Lucretia’s suicide, depicting her as a singular figure nal static. The cessation of all action is also
after stabbing herself. One of these versions is in the achieved through the frontal view of the figure,
Liechtenstein collection in Vienna: Lucretia as a half-
length without a weapon in her hand, but with a gaping the two-dimensional composition and the unity
wound in her sternum; the version from the Prado in
Madrid shows Lucretia sinking to the floor, the dagger of body, garment and space, which, in turn,
stuck between her bare breasts. Cairo’s pictures are results from the interplay between the warm
highly sexualized and thus stand in stark contrast to
Rembrandt’s images. Beverly Brown, Virtuous Virgins, light and dark and the coloring shared by all
Matthiesen Fine Art LTD, London 2004, fig. 7 and 10.
206 This term was coined by Otto Pächt (1991) who ge-
nerally used it to describe Rembrandt’s late oeuvre,
particularly for The Return of the Prodigal Son. 79
elements.207 The arrest of any external movement and action draws all attention inside,
into the psyche of the figure.208 The slight tilt of her head, the left half of her face in the
shadow, her gaze into the void with slightly swollen and bloodshot eyes and a barely
visible trace of white heightening on the lower eyelid suggesting tears — these elements
signalize infinite sadness.
Rembrandt’s aesthetic staging not only brings a sense of individuality and psy
chology to the story of Lucretia. By eliminating all action while simultaneously adhering
to certain narrative elements such as the dagger, the cord, the bleeding wound and
Lucretia’s intense facial expression between sadness and contemplation, Rembrandt
invokes the entire story and not only the moment of her death.209
Rembrandt neither presents the heroic act of suicide, nor the moment before as
in the earlier version, but rather shows us the act of dying. In his essay on the philosophy
of art and Rembrandt, Georg Simmel notes that the moment of death, inherent to all
things living, is more insistently present in Rembrandt’s portrayals of humans than in
any other painting.210
He continues that instead of understanding death as the greatest enemy or the

biggest contradiction to life, such as it is represented in the genre of danse macabre,
Rembrandt saw death as an integral part of our ‘so-being’ (“So-sein”). Simmel detects
this immanence of death in the artist’s portraits. His observations can be applied fully
to Lucretia. Rembrandt accomplished a complete translation of hurt and death into form:
many individual layers of color illustrate the processual character — the coming and
going — of life; his open, layered painting technique conveys the impression of cuts and
tears.211 Lucretia is positioned close to the viewer’s eye, while simultaneously being with
drawn from by the motif of her imminent fall and the dispersing effect of Rembrandt’s
painterly technique. The painful juxtaposition of intimate proximity and alienation makes
it possible for the audience to empathize intensely with Lucretia’s death experience.
If the representation of a female figure’s suicide had been Rembrandt’s single aim,
he may well have picked another story.212 Even if Rembrandt was not solely interested in
the story of Lucretia, the traditional iconographic elements he used caused his contem
poraries to identify both versions as Lucretia and interpret them with all the correspond
ing connotations.
Where can we situate Rembrandt’s paintings within the discourse on Lucretia and
all its implications of honor, political legitimization of the female victim, ideals of femi
ninity, chastity and rape? By choosing to depict Lucretia taking her life as an isolated
80
figure in half-length, Rembrandt followed a tradition that was quite common in the
Netherlands. However, his aesthetic staging and semantics reflect a different attitude.
Even though the version from Washington, D. C. follows the tradition of Marcantonio’s
etching (fig. 27, p. 65), it lacks all aspects of heroism: the figure is not reminiscent of
ancient poses; there is no glorifying architecture; the exuberant gesture of the left arm is
toned down into a soft movement of the hand, which rather points at a moment of pause
or perhaps intends to keep the witnesses at a distance. In the etching and most half-
length pictures by Netherlandish artists from the 16th century, an engraving in the balus
trade or background marks the historical narrative. Rembrandt, in turn, did everything to
make his depictions of Lucretia individual and private and to eliminate any traces of the
story’s political dimension. His portrayals neither represent a femme forte, nor do they
instrumentalize the female victim for the alleged freedom of the public. In the Roman
narrative, Brutus pulling the dagger from Lucretia’s wound marks the story’s turning point,
as the symbol of suicide is transformed into one of revolutionary uprising. By contrast,
Rembrandt’s painting represents Lucretia still holding the dagger in her hands after
wounding herself fatally.213 In most pictures and graphic depictions, which either tell the
entire story, like the cassoni, or stage Lucretia’s suicide before witnesses, Brutus is shown
holding up the dagger as a sign of his oath. The dagger is the sign that visualizes the shift
from private to political story. The tropes of gloria and libertas, central to the story from
Antiquity to the Baroque period, are irrelevant in Rembrandt’s versions. His paintings of
Lucretia are not political allegories. Nor are they allegories of female chastity. In fact, his
emotionalizing and realistic staging makes any allegorical reading impossible. Let us
compare the Lucretia from Minneapolis with Netherlandish versions from the 16th cen
tury, for instance with one by Joos van Cleve (fig. 28). Even though Cleve, like many of his
Netherlandish colleagues, depicts Lucretia in the moment she thrusts the dagger into her
chest, her body remains astoundingly intact,
which means that the weapon is read as an
207 Note, for example, how the wide sleeve at the right
side of the painting only slowly evolves into brightness attribute and the allegorical character of the
before the dark background, or how the colors of the image is maintained. The motifs Rembrandt
visible parts of her body are partially the same as those
of the garment or the barely visible pillows (or bed- used are more restrained (no dagger piercing
ding) on the left behind Lucretia.
208 Compare to the related staging in Bathsheba.
skin, no nudity), but the bloodstain slowly
209 Garrard (1989, p. 238 f.) concludes from Lucretia’s seeping from her skin and spreading on her
contemplative look that it is the moment right before
the fatal act; she obviously overlooked the bleeding white undergarment has an incredibly sugges
wound. tive force. Rembrandt achieved this effect with
210 Georg Simmel, Rembrandt. An Essay in the Philoso-
phy of Art, New York 2005, p. 70 –79. many layers of color and the subtle change from
211 Alpers (2003, 1988) also detects an analogy between
painter, butcher and surgeon, as all their hands ‘cut’ the red of her blood to the white of her gown.
into an unfamiliar body. His Lucretias also cannot be described as
212 I am referring to Dido, for example, whose broken
heart drove her to commit suicide after Aeneas left her. (realistically imaginable) virtuous housewives
213 The same conclusion can be found in Bal 1991, p. 74:
“But by removing it [the dagger] herself, Lucretia robs
Brutus of this opportunity to use her drama semioti-
cally for political purposes.” 81
Fig. 34: Jan Muller, Lucretia,
early 17 th century, engraving,
Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen,
Kupferstich-Kabinett
like many contemporary versions. Additionally, their fantastical, seemingly royal gowns
clearly separate them from the bourgeois sphere.
One of the most prominent characteristics of the story’s visual tradition is, as we
have already seen, the eroticization of Lucretia (see figs. 29 and 31). This is also how we
encounter her in Dutch graphic art, for example in an etching by Jan Muller (fig. 34). We
are presented an almost nude Lucretia sitting on a bed with spread legs, lasciviously
turning towards the viewer. The aesthetic staging of her suicide seems more like a sexual
act, but not like rape. Rembrandt’s Lucretia is not the object of voyeuristic desire; quite
contrary, he did everything to avoid this impression. In both versions, Lucretia is fully
clothed, her body not at all exposed, her female attributes not emphasized. Her face,
particularly the areas around her eyes and mouth, seem swollen and red from crying. In
the Minneapolis version, her undergarment opens slightly like a curtain, but instead of
revealing her nude female body, we see a white surface. Not even a hint of her breasts,
traditionally almost always exposed, is visible through the gown. Only two openings in
her clothes symbolically refer to her body: the bleeding wound and the corresponding slit
below her neck. Mieke Bal interprets this correspondence, additionally emphasized by the
long necklace, as an association to both an unscathed and a wounded vagina.214
Lucretia’s clothing is barely comprehensible in regard to its cut and parts, but plays an
important expressive function. The white undergarment is partially covered by a further,
pale green garment, which is visible at her shoulders and right arm. It throws soft, wave-
like creases at her neck and is covered by a dress or cape that seems to be slipping from
her body. All we can see of it on her right arm is the cuff, because the arm’s movement
82
has made it slip off. The lower part of the outer garment seems to balloon as if she were
already falling, while the broadening shape stabilizes the composition at the same time.
And so the different layers of fabric covering her body signal both royal splendor and
devastation — falling and breaking down while simultaneously supporting the figure.
Rembrandt’s portrayals of Lucretia defy traditional interpretations of the story.
They neither represent politically heroic, nor purely allegorical, nor morally didactic
components — and certainly no sexualized components. But they are influenced by a
specifically Christian tradition of interpretation, which transformed the heathen heroine
into a martyr. The Lucretia in Washington, D. C. spreads her arms like Christ at the
cross, while the version from Minneapolis is reminiscent of the (half-length) Man of
Sorrows with wounds in his side. What both women lack, however, is the typical
upward gaze of martyrs, looking up at the sky and thus to God. The Lucretia from
Washington pensively looks in the direction of her hand guiding the dagger, while the
Lucretia from Minneapolis stares into the void. Thus, the two figures are once again
made profane. The attitude of a passive victim is countered in the latter version as
Rembrandt grants his female protagonist a certain sense of autonomy: dying, she holds
herself upright and is not caught by anyone else; there is no Brutus to take the dagger
and swear revenge; instead, she holds it in her own hands. The version from Washington
shows Lucretia pointing the dagger at her chest. Her mouth is opened slightly as if
speaking to herself or to her hand directing the dagger.215 In regard to this point,
Wheelock fittingly quotes a verse from Shakespeare’s The Rape of Lucrece from 1594 216:
Poor hand, why quiver’st thou at this decree?

Honour thyself to rid me of this shame:
For if I die, my honour lives in thee;
But if I live, thou livest in my defame.
The relationship between Rembrandt and Shakespeare runs deeper. In Shakes

peare’s epic poem we see a culmination of the conflict between the ancient Roman and
the Christian interpretation of the story.217 Norms are no longer clearly demarcated, but
rather oppose each other. The Roman understanding of Lucretia as a heroine is turned
into sin according to Christian-Augustinian principles, which clearly reject suicide. As
Augustine already wrote, Lucretia’s situation is hopeless. In Shakespeare’s verses, this
conflict is spelled out; Lucretia ponders how she could escape her dilemma. Following
the antique understanding, she sees her honor
214 Bal 1991, p. 75 f. forever tainted and death as the only possibility
215 Held 1973, p. 123. to re-establish it. At the same time, she feels
216 Wheelock 1995, p. 284 ff. This link was already drawn
by J. Veth, Rembrandt’s Lucretia, in: Beelden en Groe tortured by the knowledge that suicide is a sin:
pen, Amsterdam 1914, p. 25.
217 Donaldson 1982, p. 40 – 56; Garrard (1989) rightly sees
a parallel to Artemisia Gentileschi’s Lucretia in regard
to this phenomenon (see below). 83
To live or die which of the twain were better,
When life is shamed, and death reproach’s debtor.
‘To kill myself,’ quoth she, ‘alack, what were it,
But with my body my poor soul’s pollution?’ 218
The inner pause, contemplation and melancholy in Rembrandt’s paintings of Lucretia

can be interpreted as visualizations of such an inner monolog. Shakespeare developed a
female figure who doubts and contemplates. And yet Lucretia reproduces traditional
attributions of femininity: she feels shame and guilt and speaks of adultery.219 Then the
mood changes and she fully unleashes her feelings of hate and lust for revenge against
Tarquinius; later she pronounces that in fact Tarquinius is the one who kills her. She stabs
herself with the words:
tis he, that guides this hand to give this wound to me.
Despite a certain sense of disruption, Shakespeare represents an idea of femininity that

maintains chastity as the highest good and adheres to a role of passivity. Therefore, all
action — in this case, revenge — is left to men. Women are like wax, they become what
ever men imprint on them:
For men have marble, women waxen, minds,

And therefore are they form’d as marble will;
The weak oppress’d, th’impression of strange kinds
Is form’d in them by force, by fraud, or skill:
Then call them not the authors of their ill,
No more than wax shall be accounted evil
Wherein is stamp’d the semblance of a devil.220
Rembrandt was not familiar with Shakespeare’s text; it was neither translated into
Dutch, nor did the painter speak English.221 What Rembrandt’s paintings and Shakespeare’s
text have in common is their basic attitude towards Lucretia. Shakespeare also excludes
all political aspects; his drama is staged as a hopeless individual tragedy that is emo
tionally comprehensible. The epic poem concentrates on its figures’ inner monologs.222
A picture cannot speak. But Rembrandt repeatedly attempted to visualize words, to
show speaking, to illustrate contemplation.223 His Lucretia from Washington alludes to an
inner monolog with slightly parted lips and the gesture of her left hand. The melancholic
facial expression of Lucretia from Minneapolis, on the other hand, exudes an air of con
templation within a context of no action that still maintains narrative elements. Despite
84
her inner struggles and doubts, Lucretia ultimately commits suicide — just as the story
requires. After her long monolog in Shakespeare’s epic poem, this suicide does not seem
conclusive. There are two lines at the end of the poem, which oddly enough are never
quoted, but, in my opinion, explicitly express doubts about the point of this suicide
and thus the logic of the entire story.224 After Brutus has pulled the dagger from Lucretia’s
wound, he calls the present men, all struck by grief, to seek revenge instead of wallowing
in pain:
Such childish humour from weak minds proceeds:

Thy wretched wife mistook the matter so,
To slay herself, that should have slain her foe.225
This should not be mistaken as moralizing criticism against the sin of suicide as
propagated by Augustine. It is a sober observation that the innocent victim has taken
her life instead of that of her rapist. The sentence seems to linger. It emphasizes our
impression of irrationality and paradox, which, we must not forget, is part and parcel of
the story. The effect of Rembrandt’s paintings and Shakespeare’s epic poem are com
passion and empathy for Lucretia and a feeling of bewilderment through the tragic fate of
this chaste and innocent woman. Galinsky asks
the two “central questions that have been asked
218 Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece, http://www.open- for two thousand years: Why did Lucretia give
sourceshakespeare.org/views/poems/poem_view.
php?WorkID=rapelucrece, retrieved Feb. 22, 2013. in? Why did she commit suicide?”226 20th century
219 Coppelia Kahn points out the ambivalence of scholars have also tried to find answers to these
Shakespeare’s Lucretia: “In giving Lucrece ‘tongue,’
Shakespeare perforce works against the patriarchial questions and to understand Lucretia’s actions.
codes that, at the same time, he puts into her mouth.”
(Lucrece: The Sexual Politics of Subjectivity, in: Hig- Even Donaldson ends his chapter on Shakes
gins, Silver 1991, p. 141 – 159, here: p. 142). peare with the words: “The poem gives a con
220 Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece, http://www.open-
sourceshakespeare.org/views/poems/poem_view. stant sense of problems perceived but not
php?WorkID=rapelucrece, retrieved Feb. 22, 2013.
221 I thank Agnes Sneller for this information; Sneller solved.” He laments that Shakespeare does not
confirmed that Huygens was the only member of offer an answer to the question of how a dis
Rembrandt’s circle who knew English.
222 The first part of the epic poem describes Tarquinius’s honored woman should react.227
inner struggle against his desires.
223 Held 1973; Häslein 2004.
However, this is the wrong question to
224 Neither Donaldson, nor Galinsky, nor any literature ask. It should not be why Lucretia commits
on Rembrandt dealing with his relationship to Shakes-
peare, nor Coppelia Kahn who wrote a feminist analy- suicide, but rather: Why did men construct a
sis of the poem, mention these lines. female figure whose (tragic) ideals force her to
sourceshakespeare.org/views/poems/poem_view. commit suicide after being raped? We do not
226 English by translator. Galinsky 1932, p. 218. need a hermeneutic approach to Lucretia,
227 Donaldson 1982, p. 56. Even Norman Bryson (Two but rather the deconstruction of this entire
Narratives of Rape in the Visual Arts: Lucretia and the
Sabine Women, in: Tomaselli, Porter 1989, p. 152 – 173; patriarchal story, which establishes the rape of
esp. p. 165 – 171) speculates whether Lucretia felt lust
against her will in the sense of Augustine; he believes
that the problem is due to the apparent invisibility of a
female orgasm. 85
Fig. 35: Correggio,
Jupiter and Io, 1527 – 31,
canvas, Vienna,
Kunsthistorisches Museum
women as a sort of law of nature, makes victims complicit and finally expects raped
women to either commit suicide, or die of shame and desperation.228 Rape is considered
a ‘tragic fate for women’ to this day. This ‘fate’ has a name: male patriarchal violence.
Compared to the visual traditions of his time, Rembrandt conceived an alternative

Lucretia who is neither instrumentalized for political purposes, nor idealized as an icon
of chastity, nor sexualized — in short, who is not a mere symbol in a male dominated
semiotic system. The subject of these paintings is she herself, her suffering, her dying,
her death.
And yet: Does only identifying with her pain not lead to a calamitous suppression?
To the suppression of the male perpetrator who caused the entire drama in the first
place? To the perception of this death as suicide, even though it was actually murder?
The rhetorics of the images appeal to the viewers’ compassion, yet at the same time they
suggest that the rape is solely Lucretia’s problem. The actual perpetrator, Tarquinius, is
invisible. Male violence becomes invisible, but that does not make it disappear, it is
woven into the fabric of the story. So what does this invisibility achieve? Of course the
viewer is familiar with the story. But he does not have to feel guilty; he is not in Tarquinius’s
position. Instead, he stands in for the witnesses. Moreover, we have established that
neither painting has a persuasive structure: Lucretia does not address the viewer. In
Bathsheba and Susanna the (male) viewer actually replaces the missing male figure, by
86
doing what the figure in the image would do, namely looking at the respective woman.
The question how we can interpret the act of rendering invisible — whether the viewer is
encouraged to imagine or to suppress the invisible — can only be answered in context.
Rembrandt’s images were and are still received as part of a specific visual and textual
tradition, in which the perpetrator has (almost) never been the subject: a culture in which
rape was retold and remembered as a story about women; a culture in which it was
common legal practice to acquit rapists and blame their female victims instead. “Rape
exists as an absence”— the editors of Rape and Representation, Higgins and Silver, state
in their foreword. The literary texts they compiled all revolve around rape, but without
explicitly naming it.229 The message of these texts is rather to “show rape as not rape.” 230
We can only interpret Rembrandt’s paintings of Lucretia in the context of this cultural
tradition. This is not the place to extensively elaborate the full dimensions of rape culture,
but I would like to mention that one of the defining texts of our literary culture, Ovid’s
Metamorphoses, centers around stories of seduction and rape. No other literary work was
as widely received during the Renaissance and Baroque, particularly by artists. Rape is
legitimized as a divine act: While the ‘Father of Gods’ himself is usually the perpetrator,
his female victims are not only not commiserated, they are also the ones who are pun
ished. Why, I would like to ask, is this the case and why of all stories did Ovid’s stories
inspire artists of the early modern period so thoroughly? And why are these stories of
rape artistically staged in a way that makes them seem like sensual love scenes? We have
gotten so used to the myriad of heroic depictions of rape by artists ranging from Correggio,
Titian and Rubens to Poussin, Delacroix and many others, that we do not even realize
what they actually represent (fig. 35).231
Unfortunately, there are no sources that could reveal how Rembrandt’s contem
poraries read his portrayals of Lucretia. When it comes to the reception of these paint
ings, we are forced to rely on the analysis of the
works themselves and their contextualization.232
228 In the paradigmatic novel Clarissa by Samuel Richard-
son from 1747, the heroine (named Clarissa instead How the Lucretias were read surely depended on
of Lucretia) does not commit suicide, as it would be the cultural knowledge and personal experience
anachronistic. Instead, she dies on her own from inner
shame and desperation. See also note 179. In the entry of each viewer, which we can assume was
on Lucretia in his Dictionnaire from 1697, Pierre Bayle
wrote that suicide was an ideal reaction to rape during
pronouncedly gender-specific. To get an idea
Antiquity, but that today a nun could offer better and how Rembrandt’s male contemporaries may
more appealing proof of her innocence by simply be-
coming melancholic and dying. See Donaldson 1982, have read his paintings of Lucretia, I would like
p. 58 ff. On this issue, also see Elisabeth Bronfen, Over to relate the following anecdote: Upon seeing a
her Dead Body: Death, Femininity and the Aesthetics,
Manchester 1992. depiction of Susanna, the poet Jan Vos defamed
229 Higgins, Silver 1991, p. 3.
230 Christopher Cannon in his epilog to Robertson, Rose the model as being unchaste.233 Of course
2001, p. 415. Rembrandt’s versions of Lucretia do not depict
231 See below (think of Io, Callisto, Europe, The Rape of
the Daughters of Leucippus, The Rape of the Sabine any nudity like that of Susanna, but both
Women, a. o.). On the aestheticization of sexual vio-
lence see Wolfthal 1999.
232 See above: Dangerous gazes — Susanna.
233 Sluijter 2001, p. 40. 87
represent role models of female chastity. This story illustrates how male contemporaries
could project their sexual desire onto women without reflecting their own part in it.
Female viewers probably empathized with the figure’s pain and immeasurable despair.
Perhaps Rembrandt’s empathic and suggestive interpretation actually makes it easier for
us to swallow the ultra-patriarchal bait of how this woman’s sacrifice was a necessity
instead of realizing the full scope of a gruesome and perverse story? The intimacy of the
staging and the focus on Lucretia’s mental state and inner self suggest that the crime
she experienced was her problem. We ‘suffer’ with Lucretia and we ‘love’ her for her
sacrificial death. In his epic poem, Shakespeare sheds some light on how people reacted
to images of this kind. After Lucretia has finally decided to act, she sends a messenger to
call her husband Collatinus home from Ardea. During the long wait for his return, she
sinks into deep contemplation over a painting that she has known for a long time, but
now sees with fresh eyes. It is a painting of the Trojan War — a typical subject for
ekphrasis, with a long-lasting tradition that goes back to Vergil’s Aeneid and ultimately
Homer’s Iliad.234 In our present context, I am less interested in the art of ekphrasis than
in the question of how Shakespeare’s Lucretia deals with the painting. His poem gives
us marvelous insight into possible forms of reception. Lucretia’s approach is one of
identification and emotion:
On this sad shadow Lucrece spends her eyes,

And shapes her sorrow to the beldame’s woes […]
and later:
Which all this time hath overslipp’d her thought,

That she with painted images hath spent;
Being from the feeling of her own grief brought
By deep surmise of others’ detriment;
Losing her woes in shows of discontent.
It easeth some, though none it ever cured,
To think their dolour others have endured.235
What Shakespeare conveys here is that the reception of an image depends on the
viewer’s own experience. Lucretia is upset and berates the painter for depicting Sinon
the traitor so innocent-looking that one cannot see his malice. Then she remembers
Tarquinius and she changes her opinion on the painting:
88
‘It cannot be,’ quoth she, ‘that so much guile’ —
She would have said ‘can lurk in such a look’;
But Tarquin’s shape came in her mind the while,
And from her tongue ‘can lurk’ from ‘cannot’ took:
‘It cannot be’ she in that sense forsook,
And turn’d it thus, ‘It cannot be, I find,
But such a face should bear a wicked mind.’ 236
Reaction on Rembrandt’s Lucretias will have been as diverse as their viewers’

experience, but most likely settled between empathy and compassion, induced by the
idea of a ‘terrible fate,’ which is still prevalent today. One example of the many instances
where we find the idea perpetuated is the Washingtonian catalog text from 1995, where
even Wheelock speaks of fate: “In the Gallery’s haunting image, Rembrandt has evoked
both Lucretia’s profound sadness and her resignation to the fate forced upon her.” 237
Radical positions
Since I am deeply interested in the question of what was conceivable in a specific
historical context within our culture in terms of gender discourse, I began to retrace the
most radical positions. This is the only way to clarify how alternative Rembrandt’s por
trayals of Lucretia and other female tropes truly are.
In her acclaimed monograph on Artemisia Gentileschi, Mary Garrard described
her version of Lucretia (1621 – 25) as the most unusual and most radical variation of the
subject in early modern painting (fig. 36).238 Garrard stresses that this is not a repre
sentation of the suicide, but rather the moment
just before, the moment the decision is made.
234 Haiko Wandhoff, Ekphrasis: Bildbeschreibungen in Here Lucretia is portrayed as a decision-making
der Literatur von der Antike bis in die Gegenwart,
in: Horst Wenzel, Wilfried Seipel, Gotthart Wunberg subject. Because the painting’s subject is the
(eds.), Audiovisualität vor und nach Gutenberg, Schrif-
ten des Kunsthistorischen Museums Wien, vol. 6, moment of decision-making, it becomes pos
Vienna 2001, p. 175 – 184. sible to question whether her action makes any
sourceshakespeare.org/views/poems/poem_view. sense. Garrad quotes Shakespeare and John
236 Ibid.
Donne, who reflected the right to doubt and the
237 Wheelock 1995, p. 282. Among Rembrandt scholars, right to commit suicide. As opposed to Rem
only Bal 1991 and Gilboa 2003 fully acknowledge the
fact that Lucretia and similar images are about rape. brandt’s Lucretia who is more of a compassion-
238 Garrard 1989, p. 210 – 244. inducing ‘Woman of Sorrows,’ we here have the
239 I would like to point out the remarkable similarity be
tween Gentileschi’s Lucretia and an etching by Hans representation of a femme forte, a strong
Sebald Beham from 1520. Here we see Dido sitting
on a stone pedestal. She leans over the dagger she is heroine.239 While Gentileschi’s Lucretia gazes
holding in her right hand. The similarity lies in the per- upwards in hope of finding salvation through
ception of the female body, which Beham also depicts
as strong and muscular, in the emphasis on pain and God, Rembrandt’s version in Minneapolis is left
conflict in the women’s faces at the expense of beau-
ty and in the general staging, which is directed at the
contemplation of the act (fig. III, Bartsch 15, formerly
vol. 8/2, New York 1978, p. 67, fig. 80). 89
Fig. 36: Artemisia Gentileschi,
Lucretia, c. 1621 – 25, canvas,
Genoa, Palazzo Cattaneo-Adorno
to herself. What stays the same is the fundamental problem: male sexual violence is
rendered invisible. I am not propagating the concept of women’s art history, which
exclusively traces the representation of femininity, but am rather in favor of an approach
that investigates the structure of gender relations: gender studies instead of women’s art
history. If we assume relational structures, we will find different questions and issues. I
believe it is important to insist on the fact that the story at hand is one of rape. In
representations of this story the male part has been rendered invisible — so invisible, in
fact, that even feminist art historians no longer see it. The reflective space that both
Rembrandt and Gentileschi visualized and Shakespeare formulated is limited by the
story’s structure. And these limits are quite narrow. Even controversial interpretations
of the figure of Lucretia by Christian exegetes, humanists, or literary critics today are
forced to remain within the tight boundaries of the story’s dispositif and thus to deal with
the absurd question whether it was right for Lucretia to commit suicide or not. Shakes
peare gave a voice to Lucretia, but her words continue to revolve around her chastity,
which is finally confirmed by her suicide. She is not a complex figure full of ambiguities
like Tarquinius, who, torn between desire and morals is designed as a truly tragic indi
vidual.240 There is no alternative telling of the story, Lucretia is not an ambivalent figure
like Judith.241 So what were her options? Tossing the dagger out the window to put an
end to the story?
90
Querelle des Femmes
And so it is not surprising that the topic of Lucretia was only rarely picked up by
radical thinkers dealing with issues on gender. A search for the most advanced and
pronounced position fighting for gender equality inevitably leads to contributors of the
Querelle des Femmes. The Querelle des Femmes is a Europe-wide242 debate on gender
order that primarily took place in polemic,
controversial texts written between the early 15th
240 Kahn 1991, p. 146 ff.
241 Hammer-Tugendhat 1997. and late 18th century.243 The term describes both
242 The best-known and most influential participants in a debate between women and a debate about
the Querelle in Europe include: France: Christine de
Pizan, see below. Marie de Gournay (1565 – 1645) was women (and the definition of femininity),
a friend of Montaigne and editor of his essays. Her
most important contribution to the debate was the es- complaints, accusations and refutations.244
say Egalité des Hommes et des Femmes, in which she However, scholars have recently pointed out
decidedly rejects the concept of a superior or inferior
sex and instead claims the equality of soul and mind. that the Querelle was a more complex pheno
This reasoning was later adopted and further devel
oped by the Cartesian Poullain de la Barre. Italy:
menon, which also included the definition of
Around 1600 the Querelle peaked mainly in Venice masculinity. Thus, the term Querelle des Sexes
with Moderata Fonte, Lucretia Marinella and Cristo-
fano Bronzini. Germany: Agrippa von Nettesheim, would be more fitting.245 Women and men
Declamatio de nobilitate et praecellentia foeminei sexus,
participated in the debate, the latter including
1529. England: Jane Anger (pseudonym). Spain: Sor
Juana Inés de la Cruz, see below. Holland: Anna Maria both deeply misogynist as well as philogynist
van Schurman, Johannes Beverwijck, see below.
243 Joan Kelly, Early Feminist Theory and Querelle des positions. In our context, knowing about the
Femmes, in: Signs 8, 1982, p. 4 – 28; Elisabeth Göss- Querelle is not only relevant when it comes to
mann (ed.), Ob die Weiber Menschen seyn, oder nicht?
München 1988; Margarete Zimmermann, Vom Streit evaluating the figure of Lucretia. It is rather
der Geschlechter. Die französische und italienische
Querelle des Femmes des 15. bis 17. Jahrhunderts, about acknowledging that a debate explicitly
in: exh. cat. Düsseldorf 1995, p. 14 – 33; Gisela Bock, dealing with gender issues was taking place in
Margarete Zimmermann (eds.), Die europäische Que-
relle des Femmes: Geschlechterdebatten seit dem 15. the early modern period, during Rembrandt’s
Jahrhundert, Stuttgart et al. 1997; Gisela Engel, Friede-
rike Hassauer, Brita Rang, Heide Wunder (eds.), Ge- lifetime. The debate also included remarkably
schlechterstreit am Beginn der europäischen Moderne. radical positions, thus proving that an aware
Die Querelle des Femmes, Königstein/Taunus 2004.
244 Margarete Zimmermann, “Querelle des Femmes,” ness of gender differences actually existed.
entry in: Renate Kroll (ed.), Metzler Lexikon Gender
Studies, Geschlechterforschung, p. 329 f. The first ref
These issues are not merely projections from
erence to La Querelle des Dames can be found in Martin our present day into the past. What made the
Le Franc’s Le Champion des Dames from 1440. During
the early modern period, terms such as debate, con- Querelle so unique was its polemic character
troversy and defense were more commonly used for and the phenomenon that both adversaries and
the phenomenon; the term Querelle did not become
established until 1900. defendants of women joined the dispute and
245 Andrea Maihofer, Die Querelle des Femmes: Lediglich
literarisches Genre oder spezifische Form der gesell- reacted to each other. The Querelle included
schaftlichen Auseinandersetzung um Wesen und Sta- more than one specific type of text; it encom
tus der Geschlechter?, in: Heide Wunder, Gisela Engel
(eds.), Geschlechterperspektiven. Forschungen zur passed all literary genres, theater, theology,
Frühen Neuzeit, Königstein/Taunus 1998, p. 262 – 272;
here: p. 263. Bock, Zimmermann 1997, p. 16. philosophy, medicine, popular culture and art.
246 This was during the conference “EuropaGestalten. Die As Friederike Hassauer fittingly described it, it
Querelle des Femmes,” organized by the former Zen-
trum zur Erforschung der Frühen Neuzeit, Frankfurt was the “hot knowledge 246 within gender know
University, Frankfurt a. M., November 2003; see also
Friederike Hassauer, ‘Heiße’ Reserve der Modernisie-
rung. Zehn Blicke auf das Forschungsterrain der Que
relle des Femmes, in: Engel 2004, p. 11 – 19. 91
ledge.” The contents debated may have shifted over time, from its beginnings to the
French Revolution, but some subjects were persistently topical. This especially applies
to defining and ascribing what was considered masculine or feminine. The debate was
about the superiority, inferiority or equality of a certain gender; about marriage; about
the division of labor; about social positions within society as a whole and thus about
power; about women’s access to education, knowledge and insight. Within this process
something that could be described as an early form of women’s encyclopedia developed,
as well-known and significant female figures from the bible, Antiquity, history and the
respective present were compiled. The contributors and their contributions formed a
female memoria, in other words, specifically female knowledge. The most radical authors
even identified gender as a cultural construction instead of a biological category.
Following this idea, they unmasked the bias and ideologies propagated in misog ynist
texts. This is a remarkable finding: a certain form of feminist thinking and writing existed
as early as the onset of the early modern period!
Questions of this sort were also discussed in Rembrandt’s circles. One of the
most accomplished women of the time lived nearby, in Utrecht: Anna Maria van
Schurman (1607 – 1678).247 Her dissertation, written in Latin, was printed in 1638:
Dissertatio: Problema practicum, num foemina christianae conveniat studium litterarum.
Schurman’s text belongs to the literary genre of the Querelle; she deduces women’s right
to education in all disciplines and arts in a line of logical arguments. However, she only
argues for the right to obtain knowledge and education and does not strive for any
further women’s rights. For her Dutch peers, who respected her as much as Huygens,
Cats, Barlaeus or Beverwijck, she was considered an absolute exception, a miracle of
nature, or, as the French Carmelite Louis Jacob wrote in his praise for Schurman, a
monstrum naturae.248 A doctor from Dordrecht, Johan van Beverwijck, was in close
contact with Schurman and also wrote a text — in Dutch, not Latin — on the subject in
1639: Van de Wtnementheyt des vrouwelicken geslachts (On the excellence of the female
sex).249 He mainly praises women for their moral superiority and thus argues that they
should have the right to education — but nothing further. Fully conforming to the
tradition of Erasmus, Vives and Cats, Beverwijck has no doubts that a woman’s place in
life is marriage and that female learning is a private matter that could never lead to public
office. But there was (at least?) one radical, albeit isolated and marginal voice in Holland:
Charlotte de Huybert. Huybert wrote a poem to Beverwijck, explaining how reason and
experience had shown that women and men were equally fit for professional life and
leadership, and that only law prevented women from taking public office. She continues
to ponder the reasons for these restrictions: jealousy, men’s fear of women and pure
imperiousness.250
92
Christine de Pizan (born 1365 in Venice, died ca. 1430 in Paris) was the first con
tributor to the Querelle des Femmes. The debate first flared up in reaction to one of the
most popular and most read medieval texts, the Roman de la Rose by Jean de Meung,
which was written in 1270 and was still widespread around 1400. Christine dared to
criticize the text as misogynist and adversary to marriage. Her critique broke the text’s
authority and sparked a gender specific form of literary criticism. In 1405, her book La
Cité des Dames was published.251 Pizan postulated a female persona as the author, con
fidently speaking of je, Christine. Conversations
with the allegorical female figures Reason, Recti
247 Schurman spent most of her life in Utrecht until she
became a devout follower of the pietistic preacher Jean tude and Justice help construct the City of Ladies,
de Labadie in 1666. Originally from a wealthy back-
ground, she could afford to stay unmarried. Schur- which is built on famous and important women
man knew several languages: next to Latin, Greek and from the bible, Antiquity and other historical
Hebrew, she also knew Arabic, Syriac, Aramaic and
modern European languages; she was versed in the periods. Christine intentionally wrote her book
sciences, philosophy and theology; she played musi-
cal instruments and painted. Scholars from a range of as a defense for women against defamatory and
European countries were in correspondence with her. slanderous writings by male authors. Through
Her publications include poems and short essays. Mir-
jam de Baar, Machteld Löwensteyn, Marit Monteiro, the guise of three allegorical female figures,
Agnes Sneller (eds.), Choosing the Better Part. Anna
Maria van Schurman (1607 – 1678), Dordrecht, Boston, Christine de Pizan even found a way to voice her
London 1996. A critical analysis of Schurman’s rather doubts on the great philosophers.252 She ela
conservative views can be found in Marijke Spies,
Charlotte de Huybert, en het gelijk. De geleerde en de borates on the plethora of possible causes for
werkende vrouw in de zeventiende eeuw, in: Literatuur
1986/6, p. 339 – 350.
misogyny, ranging from ignorance, resentment
248 Mirjam de Baar, Brita Rang, Anna Maria van Schur- and jealousy to malice and lust for power.253
man. A Historical Survey of her Reception since the
Seventeenth Century, in: Baar et al. 1996, p. 1 – 21, here: Particularly impressive is her analysis of the
p. 5; in a letter to Huygens, Caspar Barlaeus pictures social conditionality of education and knowledge
what could have been if Schurman had been a man:
“si vir esset.” See Agnes Sneller, “If She had Been a and her evidence that if women had access to
Man …” Anna Maria Schurman in the Social and Lite-
rary Life of her Age, in: ibid., p. 133–149, here: p. 148 f. schools and science, they would be equal to
249 Lia van Gemert, The Power of the Weaker Vessels: men in all domains.254
Simon Schama and Johan van Beverwijck on Women,
in: Kloek 1994, p. 39 – 50; Sneller 1996, p. 143 ff. It is telling how Pizan positions and
250 Spies 1986. Huybert’s argumentation obviously fol-
lows the tradition of Agrippa von Nettesheim. Except contextualizes the story of Lucretia in The City
for the poem that Beverwijck published, none of her of Ladies. The title of chapter 44 in the second
work is known. For the text, see Spies 1986, p. 344.
251 Christine de Pizan, The Book of The City of Ladies, book is “Refuting those men who claim women
English by Earl Jefferey Richards, London 1983.
252 Pizan 1983, p. 6 ff.: “Do you not know that the best
want to be raped, Rectitude gives several
things are the most debated and the most discussed? examples and first of all Lucretia.” 255
[…] It also seems that you think that all the words of
the philosophers are articles of faith, that they could The three following chapters explicitly
never be wrong.” deal with rape. The thematic frame is neither the
253 Pizan 1983, e. g. p. 17 – 20.
254 Pizan 1983, p. 63 f: Lady Reason says: “If it were custo founding of Rome, even though it would seem
mary to send daughters to school like sons, and if they
were then taught the natural sciences, they would fitting because of the motif city, nor is it praising
learn as thoroughly and understand the subtleties of chaste women. Instead, Christine expresses her
all the arts and sciences as well as sons.” In the fol-
lowing Lady Reason explains to an astounded Chris- sorrow:
tine that women were forced to stay in the house and
therefore could neither gather practice nor experience
and that this was due to the structure of society.
255 Pizan 1983, p. 160 – 162. 93
[…] when men argue that many women want to be raped and that it does
not bother them at all to be raped by men even when they verbally protest.
It would be hard to believe that such great villainy is actually pleasant for
them. She answered: ‘Rest assured, dear friend, chaste ladies who live
honestly take absolutely no pleasure in being raped. Indeed, rape is the
greatest possible sorrow [douleur sur toutes autre] for them.’ 256
Christine’s sorrow is not only caused by the fact that women are raped, but also by
the way rape is discussed. A brief narration of Lucretia follows, ending with the Utopian
sentence claiming that some people believe Lucretia’s violation inspired a law that put
the rape of a woman under capital punishment. Christine adds that this was surely an
adequate, just and holy law. She continues to recount further episodes under the subject
of rape, intended to present alternative options for women to react to male sexual
violence. Women should not commit suicide out of shame, instead they should defend
themselves.257 In the following chapter she tells the story of a Galatian queen who was
captured by the Romans and raped by a centurion of the Roman army. This narrative is
originally from Boccaccio’s De claris mulieribus. Christine, however, significantly changed
the original by letting the queen avenge herself: She single-handedly beheads the
centurion and thus dismantles the idea of the passive victim and revenge as an
exclusively male act. The following chapter recounts a series of stories illustrating the
horrors of rape. The last episode is particularly inventive: In a Lombardian city taken over
by enemies, the lord’s daughters,
thinking that the enemies were going to rape them, found a strange
remedy, for which they deserve much praise: they took raw chicken
meat and placed it on their breasts. This meat quickly rotted because
of the heat […].
The men let them be immediately.
But this stink made them quite fragrant indeed.258
A truly unique concept of honor!
I found the most radical interpretation of the Lucretia narrative in the writings of
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz 259, who lived between 1648 and 1695 in colonial Mexico, where
she spent part of her youth at the Spanish viceroy’s court. She later joined a Hieronymite
order, where she stayed the rest of her life. The decision to join an order was obviously
94
less about religion and more about her aversion against marriage.260 Primarily, how
ever, life in a cloister was the only opportunity for women in Catholic countries to study
science and literature. Sor Juana is best known for her worldly poems, particularly her
text Primero Sueño, which follows the tradition of the philosophical dream. As a female
scholar, she not only proposed an explicitly female subject of cognition, but also dared to
refute the treatise of a well-known Jesuit in her theological polemic.261 Sor Juana thus
confidently ventured into a male-dominated field, namely theological discourse. In
defense of her theological writing, she wrote a letter to the bishop of Puebla, who had
written the introduction to Primero Sueño under the pseudonym of Sor Filotea. Following
the tradition of the Querelle, Respuesta a Sor Filotea is a passionate defense of women’s
right to knowledge, insight and writing.262 It must have been an immense amount of
pressure and innumerable repressions that forced a woman with this deep knowledge
and awareness to give up all her books and instruments two years prior to her death.
As her biographer Calleja triumphantly states, she “declared war on herself and succeed
ed in fully defeating herself.” 263
There is no direct link between the Dutch painter who lived in the tolerant and
open-minded atmosphere of Amsterdam and the poet from Mexico, except that they both
lived during the 17 th century and shared the same pool of general knowledge. Mexico
under the reign of Catholic Spain was surely not
more liberal than Amsterdam. And so Sor
256 Ibid., p. 161.
257 Maureen Quilligan, The Allegory of Female Authority. Juana’s poem She Proves the Inconsistency of the
Christine de Pizan’s Cité de Dames, Ithaca, London Desires and Criticism of Men who Accuse Women
1991, p. 156 – 161. Quilligan compares versions of Lu-
cretia by Boccaccio and Christine de Pizan (p. 159): of What They Themselves Cause 264 is all the more
“Boccaccio interprets Lucretia’s suicide to be the
act by which women’s response to rape in the future astounding. The story of Lucretia is not retold in
should be judged. By contrast, for Christine, Lucre- full detail, but poignantly apostrophized. I shall
tia slays herself to demonstrate how awful it is to be
raped, as well as to save women from feeling shame only quote the pertinent verses of this 17-stanza
for her — not to shame them into doing the same.”
258 Pizan 1983, p. 164. poem in English; the decisive verse is also quot
259 Octavio Paz, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz oder die Fall- ed in the Spanish original:
stricke des Glaubens, Frankfurt a. M. 1994 (1991);
Christopher F. Laferl, Birgit Wagner, Anspruch auf das
Wort. Geschlecht, Wissen und Schreiben im 17. Jahr-
hundert. Suor Maria Celeste und Sor Juana Inés de la
Silly, you men — so very adept
Cruz, Vienna 2002, p. 71 – 143; The Sor Juana Project by at wrongly faulting womankind,
the Spanish Department of Dartmouth College: www.
dartmouth.edu/~sorjuana/, retrieved March 10, 2013. not seeing you’re alone to blame
260 Laferl 2002, p. 87. for faults you plant in woman’s mind.
261 Ibid., p. 102 ff.
262 She confidently defends her talent and hunger for After you’ve won by urgent plea
knowledge as god-given and thus as not only good,
but also inviolable (Laferl 2002, p. 113). the right to tarnish her good name,
263 Laferl, 2002, p. 116 ff. The specific reasons for this you still expect her to behave —
immense act of self-denial and punishment are un
known. you, that coaxed her into shame.
264 The Redondilla is no. 9, titled Arguye de inconsecuentes
el gusto y la censura de los humbres que en las mujeres
acusan lo que causan in the edition of complete works.
Obras completas, Mexiko 1985, p. 109. 95
You batter her resistance down
and then, all righteousness, proclaim
that feminine frivolity,
not your persistence, is to blame.
When it comes to bravely posturing,
your witlessness must take the prize:
you’re the child that makes a bogeyman,
and then recoils in fear and cries.
Presumptuous beyond belief,
you’d have the woman you pursue
be Thais when you’re courting her,
Lucretia once she falls to you
For plain default of common sense,
could any action be so queer
as oneself to cloud the mirror,
then complain that it’s not clear?
[…]
Either like them for what you’ve made them
or make of them what you can like.
[final stanza]
[…] your arrogance is allied
with the world, the flesh, and the devil!
The Spanish original of the stanza on Lucretia:

Qure’reis, con presuncio’n necia,
hallar a la que busca’is,
para pretendida, Thais,
y en la posesio’n, Lucrecia 265
The ideal woman is supposed to be a “Thais,” a whore, a frivolous being willing to

be seduced, yet every man wants a chaste wife. The whore and the saint desired at once.
The dichotomous concept of femininity is revealed as a male fantasy, a figment of imagi
nation. It is not about two contrary female personae (whore, saint), but rather about one
paradox figure who is supposed to embody one persona one time, and at other times, the
other. Sor Juana explicitly addresses this male hypocrisy. She implicitly deconstructs the
story of Lucretia and demonstrates that it — like many other images of femininity — was
created by men.266
96
Among the most distinguished women of the early modern period, Lucretia does
not figure as an ideal of femininity. Quite the opposite, for Christine de Pizan she is the
sad proof that rape is the worst thing that can be done to a woman. Pizan envisions
tough laws and tough female revenge; Sor Juana Inés de La Cruz deconstructs her as a
figure of male projections and for many others, this icon of chastity is plainly uninter
esting compared to female scholars and not really worth mentioning. Christine de Pizan
also provides an eloquent response to the unfortunately still widespread opinion which
Roy Porter’s explicitly words as “rape was not on the minds of pre-industrial women.” 267
As ‘proof’ for the theory that rape was a rare phenomenon during the early modern
period and that the anxiety that comes with it is merely a current projection created
particularly by US-American feminists, Porter calls on the lack of legal documents and
women’s witness accounts that could serve as sources. I sincerely hope that the reasons
for this vacuum have become clear; violence rendered invisible does not mean that it did
not exist, for every void calls for interpretation.268 The few sources that we do have, such
as the ones cited above, are simply not acknowledged; neither by Roy Porter, nor by
scholars who work as meticulously as Galinsky.
Ovid’s Metamorphoses already demonstrate how these voids, these gaps in

cultural memory, are produced. We learn how the female voice that wishes to speak of
sexual violence is silenced. Book VI of Ovid’s Metamorphoses includes the story of
Philomela who was raped by Tereus, her sister’s husband. To ensure that she could never
speak about the abuse, he locked her up and cut off her tongue. So she wove crimson
thread into white wool to tell her story and sent the tapestry to her sister who understood
what had happened. The same Book VI begins with the story of Arachne who had dared
challenge the goddess Athena by claiming that
she was the undisputed master in the art of
265 I thank Marlen Bidwell-Steiner for helping me under- weaving. Arachne’s offense was not only her
stand the Spanish version precisely.
266 In another poem titled Engrandece el hecho de Lucre arrogance, but also the motives she chose to
cia Sor Juana specifically deals with Lucretia and weave into her tapestry: They were 21 scenes of
condemns her suicide, but without the hypocrisy of
Augustine. Janice A. Jaffe, Sor Juana, Artemisia Gen- abduction and rape committed by the gods in
tileschi, and Lucretia: Worthy Women Portray Worthy
Women, in: Romance Quarterly 40/3, 1993, p. 141 – 155.
the guise of animals. The most prominent
267 Roy Porter, Rape — Does it have a Historical Meaning? perpetrator of all was, of course, Jupiter. Athena
in: Tomaselli, Porter 1989 (1986), p. 216 – 236, here:
p. 221. As a counterpoint: Diane Wolfthal, ‘Douleur “ripped the web, and ruined all the scenes that
sur toutes autres.’ Revisualizing the Rape Script in the showed those wicked actions of the Gods” 269
Epistre Othea and the Cité de Dames, in: Marilynn Des-
mond (ed.), Christine de Pizan and the Categories of and subsequently turned Arachne into a spider.
Difference, Minneapolis 1998, p. 41 – 70. Also see note
172. Women who attempt to reveal their own or
268 For an analysis of these voids under psychological and other women’s rape were silenced in the most
historical aspects, see the exemplary essay by Chaytor
1995. brutal manner, by mortals and gods alike. It is
269 Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book VI, 131. Agnes Sneller,
Pallas and Arachne, in: J. F. Van Dijkhuizen et al. (eds.),
Living in Posterity. Essays in Honour of Bart Wester-
weel, Hilversum 2004, p. 259 – 265. 97
striking how the female ‘voice’ could neither articulate itself in words, nor in real images.
It could only exist after being shifted into the verbal description of an imaginary image.
The imaginary image of ekphrasis became the only possibility to represent otherwise
invisible sexual violence.270
Rembrandt devised an alternative image of Lucretia, yet he remained faithful to

the structure of the traditional Lucretia narrative; his boundaries were the boundaries of
our culture. A few dared to cross these boundaries, but their discourse has remained
marginal to this day.
98
2 On Male Representation
or
On the disappearance of
female protagonists from
the field of representation
In the works discussed so far, we have encountered masculinity mostly as a void.

Even though the respective narratives call for male protagonists, they were rendered
invisible in Rembrandt’s Bathsheba, Susanna and Lucretia. In order to understand the
meaning of this phenomenon, we will examine how masculinity is represented in
Rembrandt’s oeuvre and identify the contexts in which masculinity becomes invisible.
Male representation in Rembrandt’s works has never been questioned before. Even the
relatively small number of scholarly texts with a feminist approach or at least a per
spective inspired by gender debates, treats the term ‘gender’ as one limited to female
representation. This problem is a general one that goes well beyond the subject of
Rembrandt. Masculinity was and is largely still considered equivalent to the universal
norm, humanity, gender neutral and per se unmarked. This misconception is constitutive
both for male identity and the fiction of autonomy.271 Only women were perceived and
described as gendered beings. Their alleged ‘difference’ to men was ascribed to precisely
this conditionality of gender. The use of l’homme / man in French and English, respec
tively, is symptomatic for the idea: The terms both mean human being and male. In the
early days of feminism, feminists (understandably) focused their energy on processing,
analyzing and deconstructing the idea of femininity and women. It was not until the
1980s that debates within feminist theory developed further into gender studies, which
define gender as a relational link between femininity and masculinity. However, men and
masculinity often remained a negative canvas for extensive research on women and
femininity. It was not until the late 1980s that broader research on masculinity emerged.272
This is not the place for an extensive overview of theoretical approaches on men and
masculinity, a field which developed — thanks to the groundwork laid by women’s rights
movements and feminist theory — alongside gender studies, LGBT studies and queer
theories.273 All I would like to note is that in
analogy to femininity, masculinity is considered a
270 Heffernan 1993, p. 46 – 90. category produced by discourse, with varying
271 Sigfried Kaltenecker, Georg Tillner, Offensichtlich
männlich. Zur aktuellen Kritik der heterosexuellen formulations in different historical and cultural
Männlichkeit, in: Texte zur Kunst 17, Feb. 1995, p. 37–47. contexts. Masculinity is closely linked to other
272 This new wave of research began in the US during
the 1970s: for example Joseph H. Pleck, Jack Sawyer categories such as social class, ethnicity and
(eds.), Men and Masculinity, Englewood Cliffs, NJ
1974; in German-speaking countries: Klaus Theweleit,
Männerphantasien, Reinbek bei Hamburg, vol. 1 1977,
vol. 2 1978. 99
sexual orientation. Drawing its roots from Antonio Gramsci, R. W. Connell coined the
term hegemonic masculinity in the 1990s. This concept continues to mark the field of men
and masculinities274 as it describes both the historical mutability of male ideals and the
multitude of masculinities. Hegemonic masculinity thus not only constitutes itself in its
difference to femininity, but also in its repudiation of ‘other,’ particularly homosexual
masculinities. It conforms to the male ideal of a social elite constituted by excluding men
belonging to lower social classes or non-white
ethnicities.275 The term also pinpoints how
power relations more complex than physical
273 Harry Brod (ed.), The Making of Masculinities. The
domination shape relationships between New Men’s Studies, Boston 1987; BauSteineMänner
(ed.), Kritische Männerforschung. Neue Ansätze in
different groups of men and women. Principles der Geschlechtertheorie, Berlin 1996; Walter Erhart,
such as submission, complicity and marginal Britta Herrmann (eds.), Wann ist eine Mann ein
Mann? Zur Geschichte der Männlichkeit, Stuttgart,
ization can all play a role in shaping gender Weimar 1997; Hans Bosse, Vera King (eds.), Männlich-
keitsentwürfe. Wandlungen und Widerstände im Ge-
relations. One of the disputed points of schlechterverhältnis, Frankfurt a. M., New York 2000,
Connell’s theory is the assumption that there esp. R. W. Connell’s essay Die Wissenschaft von der
Männlichkeit (The Science of Masculinity), p. 17 – 28;
is only one type of hegemonic masculinity.276 Annette Pussert, Auswahlbibliographie: Männerbilder
und Männlichkeitskonstruktionen, in: Zeitschrift für
R. W. Connell postulates her concept for the time Germanistik, N. F. XII, H. 2, 2002, p. 358 ff.; Claudia
after 1450, yet in modernity and especially today, Benthien, Inge Stephan (eds.), Männlichkeit als Mas-
kerade. Kulturelle Inszenierungen vom Mittelalter bis
we can observe various patterns of hegemonic zur Gegenwart, Cologne, Weimar, Vienna 2003; Martin
Dinges, Stand und Perspektiven der “neuen Männer-
masculinity.277 For the 17 th century Netherlands, geschichte” (Frühe Neuzeit), in: Marguérite Bos, Bet-
this concept is highly relevant because: tina Vincenz, Tanja Wirz (eds.), Erfahrung: Alles nur
Diskurs? Zur Verwendung des Erfahrungsbegriffs in
der Geschlechtergeschichte, Beiträge der 11. Schwei-
Hegemonic masculinity exists zerischen HistorikerInnentagung 2002, Zurich 2004,
p. 71 – 96; Willi Walter, Gender, Geschlecht und Män-
where — in regard to social nerforschung, in: Stephan, von Braun (eds.) 2005,
p. 97 – 115; l’HOMME. Zeitschrift für feministische
ideologies and to some extent Geschichtswissenschaft, Krise(n) der Männlichkeit?,
social practices — social strata eds.: Christa Hämmerle, Claudia Opitz-Belakhal, Vien-
na 2008/2; for English literature on the subject, see
become permeable and The Men’s Bibliography: http://mensbiblio.xyonline.
net/, retrieved Aug. 2, 2013.
different social groups have 274 R. W. Connell, Masculinities, Cambridge 1995. For
(a minimum amount of) further literature, see http://www.raewynconnell.net/
search/label/Publications%20full%20list, retrieved
contact. Here, the social status Aug. 20, 2013.
275 On the meaning of competition in homosocial po-
of (male) individuals is the wer relations see also: Pierre Bourdieu, La domina
result of individual achievement tion masculine, Actes de la recherché en sciences
84, 1990, p. 2 – 31. “As a rule, the male habitus is built
and no longer a matter of and realized only in relation to the reserved space in
birth status. This applies to which the serious games of competition are played.”
(Engl. quote after Marie Pierre Le Hir, Cultural Studies
bourgeois society, whose (male) Bourdieu’s Way: Women, Leadership and Feminist
Theory, in: Brown, Nicholas, Szeman, Imre (eds.),
protagonists consequently Pierre Bourdieu: Fieldwork in Culture, Oxford 2000,
function as ideal types of p. 123 – 144, here p. 134.)
276 For a differentiating analysis of R. W. Connell’s theories,
hegemonic masculinity.278 see Martin Dinges (ed.), Männer — Macht — Körper.
Hegemoniale Männlichkeiten vom Mittelalter bis heu-
te, Frankfurt a. M. 2005.
277 For Connell, the current ideal of masculinity is repre-
100 sented by the top manager.
Despite the fact that the artistic field dealt with the constructedness of masculinity
as early as the 1970s — in parodic demonstrations by artists such as Jürgen Klauke, Urs
Lüthi or Michel Journiac — the academic field of art history was late to focus on male
representation and to this day only does so marginally.279 When some of my colleagues,
students and I organized the Third Conference for Women Art Historians (Dritte Kunst
historikerinnen-Tagung) in 1986, we included a segment titled Men — Images — Myths
(Männer — Bilder — Mythen).280 Within the
German-speaking field of art history, this was
the first event that addressed male represen
278 English by translator. German original: Michael Meu-
ser, Sylka Scholz, Hegemoniale Männlichkeit. Versuch tation.281 In 1995, the University of Applied Arts
einer Begriffsklärung aus soziologischer Perspektive,
in: Dinges 2005, p. 211 – 228, here: p. 215. Vienna hosted a symposium fully dedicated to
279 One of the first publications on the subject was the subject of Constructions of Masculinity and
Margaret Walters, The Nude Male. A New Perspective,
Michigan 1978. Male Myths in Art and Visual Media (Konstruk
280 The articles were published in the corresponding epo-
nymous volume: Barta et al. (eds.) 1987. tionen von Männlichkeit und Männer-Mythen in
281 The approaches developed here were continued at the der Kunst und in den visuellen Medien).282
following conferences: Mirrorings / Reflections. Identifi
cation Patterns of Patriarchal Art History (Spiegelungen. The first collection of art-historical essays in
Identifikationsmuster patriachaler Kunstgeschichte),
Fourth Conference for Women Art Historians in Berlin, German was published as late as 2004; it com
1988; the Sixth Conference for Women Art Historians prises texts from the symposium A View on
in Tübingen: Myths of Authorship and Femininity in the
20th Century (Mythen von Autorschaft und Weiblichkeit Masculinity. Visual Stagings in Art since the Early
im 20. Jahrhundert), with an eponymous publication
edited by Kathrin Hoffmann-Curtius and Silke Wenk,
Modern Period (Männlichkeit im Blick. Visuelle
Marburg 1997; several contributions at the Conference Inszenierungen in der Kunst seit der Frühen Neu
for Women Art Historians in Trier: Projections. Rascism
and Sexism in Visual Culture (Projektionen. Rassismus zeit).283 To my knowledge, there is no specific
und Sexismus in der visuellen Kultur), publication edi- research on masculinity in Holland in the fields
ted by Annegret Friedrich, Birgit Haehnel, Viktoria
Schmidt-Linsenhoff, Christina Threuter, Marburg of visual art, literature, culture or social studies.284
1997. For individual art-historical essays and publi-
cations on the representation of masculinity, see the This is particularly unfortunate considering the
bibliography in Pussert 2002 and Mechthild Fend, special situation of 17 th century Netherlands,
Marianne Koos (eds.), Männlichkeit im Blick. Visuelle
Inszenierungen in der Kunst der Frühen Neuzeit, Co- where a specific form of bourgeois masculinity
logne, Weimar, Vienna 2004.
282 Unfortunately, the texts from this symposium were originated and subsequently spread to other
never published in one volume; a few of them were European countries. I do not claim that the fol
published individually, including: Victoria Schmidt-
Linsenhoff, Male Alterity in the French Revolution: lowing observations are a comprehensive
Two Paintings by Anne-Louis Girodet at the Salon of
1798, in: Ida Blom, Karin Hagemann, Catherine Hall
analysis of different forms of male representa
(eds.), Gendered Nations. Nationalism and Gender tion in Rembrandt’s oeuvre; I can only point
Order in the Long Nineteenth Century, Oxford, New
York 2000, p. 81 – 105; Silke Wenk, Nike in Blau. Yves out a number of problematic aspects.
Kleins Transformationen des Weiblichen im Zeitalter
der Weltraumfahrt, in: Silke Wenk (ed.), Versteinerte
Weiblichkeit. Allegorien in der Skulptur der Moderne,
Cologne 1996; Kathrin Hoffmann-Curtius, Im Blick-
feld. John der Frauenmörder von Georg Grosz, exh.
cat. Hamburger Kunsthalle, Stuttgart 1993.
283 Fend, Koos 2004.
284 Exceptions are: Thomas Röske, Blicke auf Männerkör-
per bei Michael Sweerts, Fend, Koos 2004 p. 121 – 135;
Alison McNeil Kettering, Gentlemen in Satin: Mascu
line Ideals in Late 17th Century Dutch Portraiture, in: Art
Journal 2, 1997, p. 41 – 47. 101
Differences
Let’s begin with a thought experiment and recall the paintings discussed in pre
vious chapters (Bathsheba, Woman in Bed, Susanna, Diana and Lucretia). Can we picture
images with the same or similar contents, but with male protagonists? Are reversals even
possible? Does Rembrandt’s oeuvre include any works portraying a man experiencing
sexual violence by women? If so, how is the abuse staged? Is there such a thing as an
eroticized male body intended for a female gaze?
The impossible reversal I — women as ‘rapists’ or Potiphar’s Wife

Of course there is no male equivalent to Lucretia: women cannot rape men. Even
though a direct reversal of these roles is not possible, we find it depicted in Western art,
as Wolfthal writes:
In fact, despite the great number of known male rapists, the most
frequently depicted sexual aggressor was a woman, Potiphar’s wife,
whose story is related to Genesis, 39.285
Potiphar’s wife — who unsurprisingly does not even have a name — had her sights
set on an attractive young man named Joseph who had just been nominated head of the
household by her husband, who was captain of the Pharaoh’s palace guard. She attempt
ed to seduce Joseph, but he adamantly refused. One day, when the servants were all out
of the house, she once again lusted for him and grabbed him by his coat, but Joseph
slipped out of it and ran away. As retaliation, Potiphar’s wife claimed that he had tried
to rape her, which led Potiphar to incarcerate him. This episode has been depicted
innumerable times, but the context it was set in and the function it was ascribed are even
more potent than the sheer quantity of images that was produced. In fact, it is a central
element in the discourse on rape. The biblical narrative is supposed to be proof that wo
men are the ones who abuse men and, even more so, that women who feel rejected will
falsely accuse men of being raped. As I have elaborated in the previous chapter, the
already small number of charges brought against sexual abusers rarely ended in convic
tions, while women were often convicted of defamation. In medieval literature, parti
cularly the Bibles Moralisée, Potiphar’s wife became a figurehead for the lewdness and
deceitfulness of all women.286 Even more striking is the fact that Joseph and Potiphar’s
Wife was used to illustrate the Tenth Commandment (You shall not covet your neighbor’s
wife …) instead of a more fitting image such as Susanna and the Elders.287 Lucas Cranach
was commissioned by Phillip Melanchton to produce a series of woodcuts of the Ten
Commandments in 1527. The Tenth Commandment is illustrated with the seduction
102
Fig. 37: Rembrandt,
Joseph and Potiphar’s
Wife, 1634, etching,
Paris, Bibliothèque
Nationale
scene from Joseph and Potiphar’s wife. Martin Luther reused the cycle in his Large Cate
chism, which was distributed to a mass audience. The Catechism was unparalleled in
shaping people’s beliefs and views. The images of Joseph and Potiphar’s wife were re
ceived in this context and interpreted as the social practice of how rape is dealt with;
simultaneously they contributed to denying the reality of male sexual violence while instead
perpetuating the idea of women making false accusations.
Rembrandt also painted a panel on the story in his late work, but he did not
choose the moment of seduction (Gen. 39, 7–12) as he did in the etching of Joseph and
Potiphar’s Wife from 1634 (fig. 37). For the more official medium of panel painting, he
chose the scene that follows, in which Potiphar’s wife accuses Joseph before her husband
(Gen. 39, 13–18).288 The significant difference between the two media will be discussed in
detail further below. Researchers have unanimously agreed on an engraving by Antonio
Tempesta as the source for Rembrandt’s etching (fig. 38). I do not necessarily consider this
a given, since Rembrandt was able to draw from
a wealthy tradition.289 Tempesta’s engraving
285 Wolfthal 1999, p. 162. In the following I refer to the
chapter Potiphar’s wife in Wolfthal 1999, p. 161 – 179. follows a popular iconography, with Joseph’s
However, Wolfthal only examines examples from the pose and gestures clearly marking a person
Middle Ages and early modern period up to the 16th
century. fleeing. Rembrandt’s Joseph, however, is not on
286 Ibid., p. 172.
287 Ibid., p. 173 ff. the run; he rather seems to push himself away
288 Dated 1655, Berlin, Gemäldegalerie. The version in the from the nude woman, his hands reaching out
National Gallery of Art in Washington, D. C. is a studio
copy. The episode was only rarely depicted in panel toward her as he tries to defend himself. This
painting; it is drawn from elaborate illumination cycles
of the Joseph story.
289 The only thing clearly reminiscent of Tempesta’s ver
sion is the diagonal position of the bed. 103
Fig. 38: Antonio Tempesta, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1600, engraving, London, British Museum
unusual pose stems from a rare artistic tradition showing Joseph facing Potiphar’s wife
as he attempts to get back his coat (fig. 39).290 Rembrandt kept the gesture and pose of
pushing away, but without justifying it with a physical act. Joseph does not try to grasp
the coat, so the pose can be interpreted as one of defense against seduction. Contrary to
an outright gesture of flight, we here have the visualization of inner drama and conflict.
The woman lying in bed is unique in her obscenely exposed body, her legs spread and her
crotch clearly visible for the viewer. The female sexual aggressor is far from being made
invisible (unlike Tarquinius in Lucretia); neither a heroine, nor subdued in any way, we are
confronted with a drastic, full-fledged presentation. In German graphic works from the
16th century there are a few rare folios that stage the episode like a dramatic love play:
Hans Sebald Beham produced a number of engravings in which Joseph is completely
naked (due to the coat being pulled off) and in his pose almost seems connected to
Potiphar’s wife in a dancerly fashion; in one of the engravings he is even depicted with an
erect penis (fig. 40).291 In Rembrandt’s version, the struggle against one’s own desires is
not demonstrated on a physical level, at least not using a male body. And yet, there is
a hint of struggle in Joseph’s peculiar pose, even if it is an inner, psychological struggle.
Unlike the often-repeated claims that Joseph is turning away from Potiphar’s wife in
disgust or that Rembrandt portrayed the opposites of good and evil, we can see the
staging of a struggle between desire and resistance. In support of this argument I would
like to point out a play about Joseph by Joost van den Vondel from 1640.292 It is well
104
Fig. 40: Hans Sebald Beham, Joseph
and Potiphar’s Wife, 1544, engraving,
Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale
Fig. 39: Paolo Finoglio, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1622/23, canvas, Cambridge, Fogg Art Museum
known that painters and poets in Holland had close ties and it has been confirmed that
Rembrandt and Vondel both referred to each other’s work.293 Vondel’s play dates from a
few years later than the engraving. I am not assuming any direct influence, but under
stand the proximity as an indicator of shared cultural ideas. In Vondel’s Joseph in Egypt,
Potiphar’s wife actually has a name: Jempsar. She falls in love with young, attractive
Joseph, becomes lovesick and can neither eat nor sleep. In a long conversation she
confesses her love and desire for Joseph and explains her idea of sexual freedom:
“Mijn wellust zy mijn wet” (May my lust be my law).294 Joseph suggests she tame her
passion and confine her love to her marriage. Joseph does not become insecure and turn
away from Jempsar until she stops arguing, lets her emotions take over, throws herself
at his feet and threatens to die. Jempsar is not portrayed as an evil woman; the intense
description of her passionate feelings offers
a high degree of identification for the audience.
290 Also related is a version by Giovanni Biliverti from Similar to Rembrandt’s engraving, the drama
the early 17th century, Rome, Galleria Nazionale d’Arte
Antica, Pal. Barberini, ill.: Garrard 1989, p. 81, fig. 74. lies in the struggle between arousing and re
291 Walter L. Strauss, The Illustrated Bartsch, vol. 15, New straining desire, between body and mind. What
York 1978, p. 45, nos. 13, 14, 15.
292 Joost van den Vondel, Joseph in Egypten, Amsterdam is crucial here is that both Vondel’s and Rem
1640, in: De werken van Vondel, vol. 4, 1930. See: Kåre
Landvik Johannessen, Zwischen Himmel und Erde. brandt’s work (adhering to tradition) identify
Eine Studie über Joost van den Vondels biblische Tra- the physical with femininity while the mental is
gödien in gattungsgeschichtlicher Perspektive, Oslo
1963, esp. p. 143 – 150; Konst 1999, p. 7 – 21. equated with masculinity.
293 Schenkeveld 1991, esp. p. 119 ff. J. A. Emmens, “Ay Rem-
brandt, maal Cornelis stem,” in: Nederlands Kunsthis-
torisch Jaarboek 7, 1956, p. 133 – 165.
294 Vondel 1640, quoted after Johannessen 1963, p. 145. 105
Fig. 41: Codex Manesse, Jacob van Warte,
c. 1320, Heidelberger Univeristätsbibliothek,
Cod. Pal. Germ. 848, fol. 46v
The impossible reversal II — erotic images of men for a female gaze?

Let’s take a look at the second question: Does Rembrandt’s oeuvre include any male
nudes in an erotically connoted context? Are there any male equivalents to Bathsheba,
Woman in Bed or Susanna? A naked man lost in thought over a love letter while his feet
are being washed; a man nervously attempting to protect his nudity from hidden viewers;
a man in bed expectantly pushing aside a curtain? The answer, ‘naturally,’ is no. The
analogy of gender configurations seems silly to us. But why? It is not anything specific
about Rembrandt’s work, but rather a problem of our culture. The male gaze was and
remains a central issue in feminist criticism of art and images. The resulting asymmetry,
however, goes well beyond the fact that artists were mostly male and (nude) models were
mostly female. The result is not the obvious outcome of any male artist / female model
constellation. I would like to note that medieval courtly art offered a broad spectrum of
erotic images, which also included male protagonists, for example the Codex Manesse
(fig. 41), border drawings in the Wenzel Bible (fig. 42), or the abundance of images of the
Fountain of Youth (fig. 43) in illuminations, frescoes and tapestries.295 Male depictions
were not slowly faded out of images until after the first third of the 16th century.296 These
developments should not be thought of as a linear process; and yet it is possible to
detect a tendency that became manifest in the 18th and 19th century. After all, it was so
persistent that, for us today, a reversal of genders in these images seems inconceivable
while the fixed link between femininity and erotic image seems ‘natural.’
106
Fig. 42: Wenzel Bible, Bathing scene (title page, detail, book of Joshua), c. 1390, Vienna, Österreichische
Nationalbibliothek, Cod. Vindob. 2759 – 2764, vol. 1, fol. 214 r
Fig. 43: Fountain of Youth, c. 1430, fresco, Piemont, Manta Castle near Saluzzo
Rubens is a remarkable exception. He addresses male sensuality, sexuality, male

desire and male violence. However, it would also be futile to look for conceptions of
masculinity that are analogies of the aforementioned female nudes. In Rubens’s oeuvre
male sexuality is always active and potent. Contrary to courtly Catholic Flanders, history
painting, and with it nude painting, was not considered very relevant in bourgeois 17 th
century Holland. Erotically staged male nudes were surely not common fare — with one
exception: paintings with male nudes by Michael Sweerts. His depictions of male nudes
have an “arcane air of mystery” that was convincingly identified by Thomas Röske as
unsuccessfully suppressed homoerotic desire.297
Self-Images — Self-Portraits
Like no other artist before or after him, Rembrandt created a remarkable number
of self-portraits, ranging from oil paintings to graphics, to drawings. He is the first artist
whose self-portraits hold a significant position
295 Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Erotik und Geschlechter-
differenz. Aspekte zur Aktmalerei Tizians, in: Daniela within his oeuvre. Not only their number is
Erlach, Markus Reisenleitner, Karl Vocelka (eds.), Priva-
tisierung der Triebe? Sexualität in der frühen Neuzeit,
remarkable, the phenomenon that Rembrandt
Frankfurt a. M. et al. 1994, p. 367 – 446, esp. p. 394 – 401. portrayed himself in several guises marks them
296 Ibid., p. 395. See below: Asymmetry. Gender Relations
in the Field of Sexuality. A symptomatic example is unparalleled. The roles he assumes go well
Lucas Cranach’s Fountain of Youth from 1546 (Berlin, beyond the broad spectrum of artist personae.
Gemäldegalerie): Only women are depicted nude and
frolicking in the water while the men are dressed and We can find Rembrandt in oriental attire with a
ready to receive them after their rejuvenating bath.
This development would need greater scholarly at- poodle, Rembrandt as the Prodigal Son, as
tention, particularly in regard to differences between Apostle Paul and many others. In courtly society,
more northern, Protestant countries and the counter-
reformatory south. Differences in media would also clothing was a distinctive marker for a person’s
need more investigation, along with examinations of
contextual particularities (clerical, urban, courtly, etc.).
297 Thomas Röske, Blicke auf Männerkörper bei Michael
Sweerts, in: Fend, Koos 2004, p. 121 – 135. 107
social status. In his self-portraits, Rembrandt combines costumes that partially neither
match his status, nor the era. It seems like “experimenting with the yet unlived possi
bilities of life.” 298 Rembrandt designs a self that seems able to freely choose its social
status.299 His art is what gives the self the freedom to do so. He, Rembrandt, is the creator
of his own self. In our context the question is: What variations of male identity did he
create for himself? Since Rembrandt not only portrayed himself as an artist and Amster
dam burgher, but also slipped into various fictitious roles, an at least marginal shift in his
conception of masculinity seems possible.
Research on Rembrandt reveals diverging opinions on the meaning of his self-

portraits.300 Perry Chapman’s Rembrandt’s Self-Portraits. A Study in Seventeenth-Century
Identity from 1990 is probably still the most well-founded study, as it also deals with the
different costumes and their semantic meaning. Chapman no longer assumes the self-
portraits to be true, authentic expressions of Rembrandt’s character and feelings, as older
research still did, but she does interpret them
as a search for identity and autonomy within
a constituting bourgeois society. Alongside 298 Pächt 1991, p. 72.
these social changes, she identifies Rem 299 One symptomatic example is the fact that Rembrandt
often wears a golden necklace, even though (and un-
brandt’s depictions as an attempt to redefine like Rubens) he was not entitled to wearing one be-
cause he was neither born nor promoted into nobility.
his position as an artist no longer producing He did not draw his nobility from birthright or social
art primarily for individual commissions, but status as a courtly artist, but rather from his personal
artistic talent. See Chapman 1990, p. 58 ff.
rather for the art market. Contrary to these 300 Christopher Wright, Quentin Buvelot (eds.), Rem
findings, Harry Berger does not interpret brandt by Himself, exh. cat. London National Gallery
and The Hague, Royal Cabinet of Paintings, New Ha-
Rembrandt’s self-presentation as an other as ven 1999. The catalog to the most seminal exhibition
on Rembrandt’s self-portraits unfortunately only re-
a search for identity, but rather believes that presents one scholarly approach, namely that of Ernst
Rembrandt deals with and questions the genre van de Wetering and the Rembrandt Research Project.
According to the authors, Rembrandt only painted
of portraits and self-portraits and the poses such a great number of self-portraits because of his
hunger for fame and as a means to appeal to the new
they include.301 art clientele and its great interest in larger-than-life ar-
We will not revisit the often-posed tist personalities. For a review of the catalog, see Ste-
phanie S. Dickey in: Art Bulletin 82, 2000, p. 366 – 369.
question why Rembrandt repeatedly dealt Ernst van Wetering, Rembrandt’s Self-Portraits. Prob-
lems of Authenticity and Function, in: Ernst van We-
with his own face.302 The question itself is too tering (ed.), The Self-Portraits 1625 – 1669, RRP, vol. 4,
attached to the idea that his self-portraits 2005, p. 89 – 317. On the expression studies in the mirror,
see p. 170 f.; on the tronies, see p. 172 ff.; on the reduc-
exclusively originated from himself; it thus tionist view of limiting the invention of self to the new
adheres to a paradigm that the self-portraits commodity value of art and the necessity of marketing
it, see Svetlana Alpers, Rembrandt’s Enterprise. The
themselves helped create: the fiction of the Studio and the Market, Chicago 1988.
301 Harry Berger, Jr., Fictions of the Pose. Rembrandt
autonomous self.303 I believe it makes much against the Italian Renaissance, Stanford 2000.
more sense to investigate the effects that the 302 For newer findings on this question, see, for example,
Marieke de Winkel, Costume in Rembrandt’s Self-Por-
variety of self-stagings had. Moreover, the traits, in: Rembrandt by Himself 1999, p. 60 – 74, here
p. 60: “What could have been his reasons for depicting
himself time and again in different guises?”
303 In light of current debate on the status of the subject, I
108 find it remarkable that, concerning his subject concep-
path Chapman cleared needs to be pursued further so we can contextualize Rembrandt’s
portraits in even greater detail. For example, a connection can be drawn to similar self-
representations in literature like Montaigne’s essays, the rising popularity of autobio
graphies at the time, or Descartes’s philosophy. The love for costume and disguise, or the
effect of theatricality, are not sole inventions by Rembrandt.304 Apart from the close ties
between Dutch painting and theater, I would like to point out the portrait historié that also
gained appeal in Holland in the 17 th century, particularly among courtly circles.305
Especially the ladies of the court loved to present themselves in mythological, biblical,
historical or literary costumes, preferably of the Arcadian genre. Rembrandt translated the
courtly form of portraiture into his own self-portraits, but adhered to his own realistic
painterly style instead of adopting the typical idealizing classicist style. This is what led to
the effects that disturb the allegorical reading inherent to the genre. His clients, in the
meantime, commissioned portraits of themselves in their civilian clothing. There are only
few examples of portraits by and of Rembrandt that can truly be counted as a portrait
historié. Only the late self-portrait as Apostle
Paul from 1661 (Amsterdam) is unquestionably
tion, Rembrandt seems to have entertained the notion one; van de Wetering also names the self-
of a complex, conflicting, constantly shifting identity. portrait as Zeuxis from Cologne. The double
Comparing the self-portraits to Cindy Sherman’s film
stills from the 1980s is enlightening; not only because portrait from Dresden with Saskia depicting a
Sherman is a woman artist representing herself in
different roles, albeit in the medium photography,
scene from the Prodigal Son also exhibits some
but because her images signal the crisis of the sub- traits of the genre. Unlike a true portrait historié,
ject. In Rembrandt’s images we still find a sense of
autonomy behind all the complexity and irony. In Sher Rembrandt usually did not fully slip into a
man’s work, only masks and clichés (in this case of biblical, mythical or historical role; instead he
femininity) are left, while an authentic self is no longer
detectable. either wore fantastical costumes or only masked
304 Alpers (1988, 2003) uses this term and sees a literal
connection to theater. However, she reduces this re- himself with one or two props. The important
lation to the matter of disguise alone without asking point here, however, is that the practice of
whether, for example, cross dressing also existed in
Netherlandish theater like it did in other countries portraits in costume was known at the time.
such as Renaissance Italy and Shakespeare’s theater
in Britain. Alpers also denies any visual tradition and Next to self-portraits in costume we also have so
explains Rembrandt’s particularity by speculating that called tronies.306 Tronie, derived from old French
he brought actual people into his studio, dressed them
up and used them as live models for his drawings and troigne, means head or face. The term was used
paintings.
305 Rose Wishnevsky, Studien zum “portrait historié” in
in 17 th century Holland for head or bust-length
den Niederlanden, Bamberg 1967; Stephanie S. Dickey, portraits of different character types that were
Rembrandt and Saskia: Art, Commerce, and the Poet
ics of Portraiture, in: Alan Chong, Michael Zell (eds.), individualized and based on actual models, but
Rethinking Rembrandt, Zwolle 2002, p. 17 – 47. not fully individual portraits. During the 16th
306 L. De Vries, Tronies and other Single Figured Nether-
landish Paintings, in: Leids Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek century, tronies were only produced as studies
8, 1989, p. 185 – 202; Jaap van der Veen, Faces from
Life: “Tronies” and Portraits in Rembrandt’s Painted for studios. Rembrandt and his circle were the
Oeuvre, in: exh. cat. Melbourne, Canberra 1997, first ones to produce them for sale on the open
p. 69 – 73; Marieke de Winkel in: exh. cat. London, The
Hague 1999, p. 60 ff.; van de Wetering, in: RRP, 2005, market. The depicted characters often wore
p. 172 ff. On the meaning and function of costumes in
Rembrandt’s oeuvre, see Marieke de Winkel, Fashion
and Fancy. Dress and Meaning in Rembrandt’s Paint
ings, Amsterdam 2008. 109
Fig. 44: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait with Gorget, c. 1629, panel, Nuremberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum
Fig. 45: Circle of Giorgione, Man in Armor, panel, Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland
Fig. 46: Giorgione, Self-Portrait as David, c. 1500–10, canvas, Braunschweig, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum
fantastical or exotic costumes. What was the meaning of this new interest in individual
faces that were neither portraits nor part of a narrative context? It certainly demonstrates
a fascination with the phenomenon of individuality. The indistinct quality of the tronies
served as a trigger for the imagination and associative thoughts. Many of Rembrandt’s
images blur the line between self-portrait and tronie: Is it Rembrandt himself or a tronie
with Rembrandt’s features? One example is the Self-Portrait with Gorget from 1629 at
the Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg (fig. 44). Could Rembrandt have been
inspired by a Giorgionesque invention? In Giorgione’s circle we can find several portray-
als of men oddly combining attributes of military armor with melancholic and pensive
facial expressions (fig. 45). The invention can clearly be traced back to a self-portrait by
Giorgione as David (fig. 46).307 So is the Nuremberg painting an ‘authentic’ portrayal of
Rembrandt or is it a fictitious character? The prop-like quality of the attribute — only the
gorget refers to military armor — emphasizes the impression of a masquerade. It is not
Rembrandt as warrior, much less as Mars, but merely Rembrandt costumed with a piece
of armor.
Some of the more narrowly defined self-portraits also show Rembrandt wearing
archaic or fantastical garments. It is often difficult to distinguish whether Rembrandt
identified himself with the meaning of the respective attribute and presented possible
versions of his self, as Chapman argues, or presented the poses and costumes as an
ironic statement, as Harry Berger claims. Perhaps we do not need a final answer to this
question, especially since Rembrandt’s true intention can never be revealed with cer
tainty. The effects of his stagings, in turn, allow multiple readings: One could be that,
thanks to his artistic genius, Rembrandt the man and artist could take on any role inde
110
pendent of birth right or status. This idea of a free, autonomous subject is a deeply
bourgeois fiction. Holland’s bourgeois elite, for example, wore certain, quite strictly
defined clothing — in other words bourgeois clothing — which was usually held in distin
guished-looking black. Rembrandt’s fragmentary and fantastical costumes thus further
emphasize the impression of masquerade and imaginary: clothing, poses, gestures as
theater, play and illusion. After all, masquerades can open potential space, broaden the
conceivable and visualize anything extraordinary, taboo and suppressed. 308
Let us take a closer look at some of the actual roles Rembrandt imagined him
self in. His self-stagings range from representations as an autonomous individual or
melancholic artist to different types of painter, to virtuoso, to presentations wearing a
beret and gold chain, to fantastical disguises as someone from the Orient, biblical figures
and costumes with military attributes. He presents himself in quite ambivalent situations,
like in the double portrait with Saskia, in which he plays the role of the Prodigal Son
(fig. 54). He even slips into the negative role of one of the henchman who erected the
cross. Later self-portraits show him marked by age. Never, however, does Rembrandt
present himself as a devoted lover like he, for example, portrayed Saskia. He never repre
sents himself in his physicality; quite contrary, his self-portraits are almost exclusively
limited to his face. In the bust-lengths, the body seems to melt into the darkness. The
usually black bust serves as a contrast to the meticulously elaborated face, making the
latter the clear center of importance.309 In the few three quarter-length and the single full-
length Self-Portrait as an Oriental Rembrandt’s
body is hidden under huge amounts of
307 In his second edition of artist biographies, Vasari de- fabric. His gaze never expresses the vague,
scribes a self-portrait by Giorgione as David. Scholars
assume that the self-portrait from Braunschweig is the dreamy air that many of his female portraits
cut original. Sylvia Ferino-Pagden, in: Sylvia Ferino- exude. Rembrandt always directly faces the
Pagden, Giovanna Nepi-Scirè (eds.), Giorgione: My-
thos und Enigma, exh. cat. Gallerie dell’Accademia, viewer and remains in full control of his gaze,
Venice, Vienna, Milan 2004, p. 234 – 236. Wenzel
Hollar made an engraving modeled after Giorgione’s even when his eyes are cast in shadow or barely
painting in 1650, including Holofernes’s severed head; visible (Chapman describes them as
ill.: ibid., p. 238. On the variety of paraphrases also see
ibid., nos. 10, 11, 12, 20 and Portrait of a Man in Armour melancholic). There is nothing reminiscent of
by Sebastiano del Piombo from 1511/12 (Hartford):
David Alan Brown, Sylvia Ferino-Pagden (eds.), Bellini,
the Arcadian genre, which first became popular
Giorgione, Tizian und die Renaissance der venezia- at court in Holland and in the later 17 th century
nischen Malerei, exh. cat. Washington, D. C., Vienna,
Milan 2006, cat. no. 51, ill.: p. 259. For an interpreta- was also widespread in a classicist manner
tion of the example from Edinburgh and its relation among the higher strata of the bourgeoisie.
to the Petrarchan love discourse, see: Marianne Koos,
Bildnisse des Begehrens. Das lyrische Männerportrait
in der venezianischen Malerei des frühen 16. Jahr-
hunderts — Giorgione, Tizian und ihr Umkreis, Ems An example I find symptomatic is a
detten/Berlin 2006, p. 190 ff. comparison between one of the artist’s most
308 Hartmut Böhme, Masken, Mythen und Scharaden des
Männlichen. Zeugung und Begehren in männlichen famous self-portraits and a portrait of his wife
Phantasien, in: Benthien, Stephan 2003, p. 100 – 127,
esp. p. 102 – 104.
309 On the meaning of the face in Rembrandt’s work, see
below; Koerner 1986. 111
Fig. 48: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait, 1640, canvas, London, National Gallery
Fig. 47: Rembrandt, Saskia with a Flower, 1641, panel, Dresden, Staatl. Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie
Saskia, from the same time. I am referring to the self-portrait of Rembrandt as a 34 year-
old from 1640 and the portrait Saskia with a Flower from 1641 (fig. 47 and fig. 48). Chapman
even assumes that “the two paintings in Titianesque guise form a complementary pair
and perhaps were conceived as such.”310 We know that Rembrandt referred to Titian’s
portrait of the famous Italian poet Ariosto (fig. 49)311, the portrait of Castiglione by Raphael,
which Rembrandt copied in pencil (fig. 50) and Dürer’s self-portrait from 1498 (fig. 51).312
Rembrandt represents himself at the peak of his career as an artist, whose fame is further
heightened by associating himself with Dürer, Raphael and Titian. Referencing Dürer’s
self-portrait represents his affiliation with artistic tradition from the north. He also claims
Raphael’s mastery of drawing and Titian’s colorism. The triangular composition of the
painting and Rembrandt’s pose and costume all serve to represent a humanistically
educated Renaissance artist. Moreover, he also claims the traits associated with those
depicted in the quoted artworks: the poetic ingenuity of Ariosto and the courtly ideal of
Castiglione. However, Rembrandt’s realism has replaced the harmonizing and idealized
facial features in Raphael’s portrait of Castiglione, giving his face a new form of vividness
and presence. This presence is further intensified by the spatiality of the self-portrait that
Rembrandt achieves by orchestrating light and shadow. This is also detectable in the
positioning of his body, particularly his arm, which, leaning on the balustrade, seems to
reach into the viewer’s space. The brilliance of the steel blue silk costume in Titian’s
112
Fig. 49: Titian, so-called Ariosto, c. 1510, canvas, London, National Gallery
Fig. 50: Rembrandt, after Raphael’s portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, drawing, 1639, Vienna, Albertina
Fig. 51: Albrecht Dürer, Self-Portrait, 1498, panel, Madrid, Prado
portrait has been replaced by more subtle brown tones; glamorous colors and fabrics
would only distract from the center of attention, which is clearly Rembrandt’s face. The
lighting emphasizes the face’s centrality, and the dark framing of beret, hair and clothing
amplifies its luminance. Rembrandt’s gaze is directed right into the viewer’s eyes — this
is not an automatic effect created by the mirroring effect of the self-portrait. The impres
sion of a critically examining artist is accentuated by a hint of a crease on his forehead and
the slight shadowing of the top left part of his face. The sum of these features adds up to
a staging that creates the impression of a differentiated, reflective, autonomous subject.
Despite the multitude of roles, masquerades, gestures and facial expressions,

Rembrandt’s self-portraits are marked by an unmistakable individuality, with the
exception of a few tronies, in which the lines between portrait and fictitious image are
blurred. We cannot detect this kind of individuality in his female portraits, even though
they exhibit a similar abundance of expression. Current research rightly asserts that
former identifications of female depictions as Artemisia, Bellona, or Flora and the many
drawings of women in bed as Saskia and later Hendrickje are no longer tenable. 313 These
representations of women are not individualized enough to identify them as a specific
person with certainty, even if they may have been inspired by Saskia or Hendrickje. Not
even the silverpoint drawing from 1633 that Rembrandt himself documented as Saskia
shows clearly individual facial features. The
310 Chapman 1990, p. 74. The measurements are almost portrait from Dresden from 1641 is one of the
identical, especially considering the fact that the self-
portrait was originally square-shaped; self-portrait: very few works — alongside the mentioned
93/80 cm, Saskia: 98.5/82.5 cm.
311 Current research no longer upholds the interpretation silverpoint drawing from 1633 and the etching of
that this is Ariosto. the self-portrait with Saskia from 1636 — that
312 Usually only Titian and Raphael are named: both were
exhibited in original in the collection of Alfonso Lopez scholars have unanimously identified as a
in Amsterdam; Rembrandt’s etching from 1639 is very
close to Titian’s original.
313 See the respective recording in RRP; Dickey 2002,
p. 23; exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001. 113
Fig. 52: Titian, Flora,
c. 1515, canvas, Florence,
Galleria degli Uffizi
Fig. 53: Circle of

Giorgione, Portrait of a
Man, so-called Brocardo,
c. 1510, canvas, Budapest,
Szépművészeti Múzeum
portrait of Saskia (fig. 47).314 Wearing a red velvet gown, Saskia fully faces the viewer,
resting her left hand on her heart and presenting a carnation in her right hand to
Rembrandt, or rather to the viewer. Behind her to the left, more flowers are strewn on a
balustrade. Saskia’s dress is slightly opened and reveals a hint of her undershirt while a
delicate veil covers her right breast. Lavish jewelry in her hair, on her body and on her
clothing emphasizes the splendorous effect of the portrait. The carnation is a traditional
symbol of love and martial fidelity.315 The left hand on her breast is a gesture of
affirmation and veracity. Thus, we have an image affirming love and devotion: Saskia as a
wife who gives love to her husband and herself. The association with Flora, goddess of
flowers and spring, is intentional. Rembrandt also painted the goddess in 1634 and in
1635 and once again resorted to the motive in 1657. His inspiration comes from Titian’s
Flora from 1515 (fig. 52), which he was able to study in the Lopez Collection along with
Raphael’s Castiglione and Titian’s Ariosto. As Julius Held demonstrates, Flora had a double
meaning: one was goddess of flowers and spring, the other was the name of a Roman
courtesan who is said to have sponsored the ancient Floralia games, according to the
early Christian author Lactantius.316 Joachim von Sandrart had a verse describing Flora as
Titian’s lover printed on his copy of Titian’s Flora.317 The fusion of Flora in her erotic
connotation with a lover and wife was thus also a plausible connection for Rembrandt
and his contemporaries. Rembrandt never portrayed his wife as a bourgeois wife like
many of his colleagues did. Heightening a lover and loved one by depicting them as a
mythological figure, therefore transcending everyday bourgeois existence into divine
spheres, has a clear tradition linked to humanist Renaissance. Petrarch’s sonnets to Laura
are the archetype; the ideal of love they embody was quite vital in bourgeois Holland and
common in poetry by Vondel, Vos and others.318 Following the new ideal of marriage in
114
bourgeois-protestant Holland, Rembrandt transferred the courtly ideal of the unattain
able lover to his wife. Like Laura and her painted companions in Italian, particularly
Venetian painting, Rembrandt’s Saskia/Flora is set somewhere bet ween private intimacy
and publicity.
The difference between Rembrandt’s self-portrait as a 34 year-old and the nearly

concurrent painting of Saskia could not be greater. He, the ingenious artist and bearer
of culture, and she, the private and erotic wife, ‘tuned to love cap-à-pie.’ I imagine this
may be met with a certain lack of understanding from my readers, who might find
nothing unusual about this division. I would, however, like to point out that there actually
was a male counterpart in the Petrarchan love discourse, albeit a geographically and
temporally limited one. Marianne Koos compiled a group of male depictions from the
Giorgionismo in her doctoral thesis Bildnisse des Begehrens. Das lyrische Männerporträt in
der venezianischen Malerei des frühen 16. Jahrhunderts — Giorgione, Tizian und ihr Umkreis
(Images of Desire. The Lyrical Male Portrait in Early 16th Century Venetian Painting —
Giorgione, Titian and their Circle). These portraits stand in remarkable contrast to the
usual Renaissance portrayal of men, as those depicted typically have a vague, dreamy and
enigmatic gaze (fig. 53).319 The representation of an affective, subjective and desiring self is
what distinguishes these images from other male representations. We can conclude that
desire and devoted love were traits that were also attributed to men. Koos, basing her
arguments on findings by Elizabeth Cropper, links the phenomenon to a Petrarchan group
of artists around the poet Pietro Bembo. Two things make these portraits so remarkable:
firstly, the fact that alternative concepts of masculinity have existed in our culture; and
secondly, that they remained marginal and were forgotten. Rembrandt was familiar with
early 16th century Venetian painting and even referenced its ideal of femininity; perhaps
he was even directly inspired by the military costumes in Giorgionesque works. And yet he
did not adopt this alternative concept of masculinity in his wide range of male portraits,
whether they were of himself or of others. In regard to self-staging, the double portrait of
him and Saskia from 1635 (fig. 54) marks the limits of what was possible: costumed, even
bearing an épée, active and salacious, yet tied to the discourse of sin set by the Prodigal
Son. In his history paintings we can find a
certain shift in the conception of masculinity.
314 RRP, vol. 3, A 142.
315 David R. Smith, Masks of Wedlock, Ann Arbor 1982, Rembrandt does not portray heroes as we find
p. 59 – 63, 77. them in the Renaissance or Baroque: no figures
316 Julius S. Held, Flora, Goddess and Courtesan, in: De
artibus opuscula. Essays in Honour of Erwin Panofsky, characterized by physical strength or beauty;
New York 1961, p. 201 – 218.
317 Exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001, p. 208. quite to the contrary, many of them are marked
318 Dickey 2002, p. 29 ff.; Alison McNeil Kettering, Ter by age and physical decline. Yet there are heroes
Borch’s Ladies in Satin, in: Franits 1997, p. 98 – 115.
319 Koos 2006; Cropper 1995, p. 159 – 205. The direct com- of a different kind: heroes of the mind, of know
parison between male and female images from early
16th century Venice in the exhibition Bellini, Giorgione,
Tizian at Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien in 2006
was very enlightening in this regard, see note 307. 115
Fig. 54: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait with Saskia, c. 1635, canvas, Dresden, Staatliche Kunstslg., Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 55: Rembrandt, A Woman Bathing, 1654, panel, London, National Gallery
ledge, like Homer, Aristotle and biblical figures. Rembrandt’s affinity to negative heroes
like Judas, the Prodigal Son or Haman is remarkable as well. 320 Not only the choice of
figures is striking, but even more how these anti-heroes are set at the center of the visual
narrative as complex and ambiguous characters. He takes them seriously as figures, often
making it impossible to distinguish between ‘good’ and ‘evil’.
Despite the pronounced differentiation of masculinity in its representations, an

image like A Woman Bathing from 1654 is still unthinkable with a male figure (fig. 55).
Painted in an open style, yet signed by Rembrandt, we can assume that it was indeed
completed. The sketch-like painting, fully focusing on effects of light and dark, gives the
scene an air of mystery and a Giorgionesque atmosphere. Scholars have tried to explain
the unusual painting by either ascribing it to traditional iconography (Bathsheba, Susanna)
or interpreting it as a moralizing allegory (mulier impudica), or claiming the model was
Hendrickje.321 Even if the starting point for the image’s conception lay in the iconography
of Bathsheba or Susanna, there is no obvious narrative indication to one of the biblical
stories. The painting is rather an indicator for the gradual dismissal of biblical or mytholo
gical themes and the adoption of freer inventions in which the female nude becomes the
sole subject of the image. Once again, comparing contrasting interpretations can deliver
116
Fig. 56: Rembrandt, Men Bathing, 1651, etching, London, British Museum
new insights: As mentioned above, there are no obvious signs determining whether the
depicted female figure is an incarnation of pudicitia (Susanna), or the opposite, mulier
impudica, the incarnation of impurity. As soon as we look beyond iconographic motifs
(in this case the shirt-lifting) and include the aesthetical staging into our interpretation,
it becomes unthinkable that this painting could bear any reference to unchasteness. Why
do art historians — women and men alike — always feel the need to put a moral coating
on all images that seem even remotely erotic? The female figure is not posing for the
viewer, she does not even realize that someone may be watching her. With her shirt
gathered up, she slowly makes her way into the water, seeming completely absorbed in
thought, in her reflection. The water probably also reflects her lower body and with it, her
crotch, which remains invisible to the viewer. Bound to end in a zone of dark shadows,
any voyeuristic gaze is futile. The smiling young woman is fully focused on immersing
herself in the water and thus on experiencing a pleasurable physical sensation. Therefore,
she is not merely a passive object staged for the (male) gaze; she becomes active by con
centrating on what her body is feeling. Since we
are dealing with an image painted by a male artist
320 Jan Bialostocki, Der Sünder als tragischer Held bei and not with a real woman with real feelings,
Rembrandt, in: Kelch, von Simson 1973, p. 137 – 150.
321 For a display of various interpretations, see Jan Kelch, we must assume that Rembrandt translated his
in: exh. cat. Berlin 1991, p. 246 – 249. Kelch himself in-
terprets the figure as a seductive Bathsheba. J. Leja,
Rembrandt’s Woman Bathing in a Stream, in: Simiolus
24, 1996, p. 320 – 327. 117
own sensations into the painting. He can only describe the depicted form of physical
pleasure through a woman — after all, there is no equivalent image of a bathing man.322
He did make an etching of this theme using men in 1651 (fig. 56), but it seems more like a
compositional sketch. The men are arranged additively, and the representation of the
sensual experience of touching water, the idea of becoming one with nature or physical
pleasure are clearly neither the subject nor the artistic aim. In 1646 Rembrandt created
three etchings with male nudes, but they were all intended only as didactic models for his
students.323 I would like to once again point out that these ascriptions are not as ‘natural’
as they may seem to some: In late medieval courtly art, male protagonists in erotic bathing
images and fountain-of-youth themes were a fairly common sight (figs. 41– 43).324
De Staalmeesters or Public representation is male
The issue we are looking at in Rembrandt’s work is not only that women and men
are represented differently,325 but that they inhabit different spaces or rather never become
part of representations in certain spaces and contexts. The gravity of this gender-specific
differentiation becomes more obvious when we add Holland’s general image production
to the equation. Differences in the representation of gender in Dutch painting not only
took place through the marking of bodies and different characterizations of its protago
nists, but most of all by drawing spatial boundaries. In short, this meant ascribing public
space to males and private space to females. Space has a double meaning here: it refers
to both the imaginary, painted space and to actual social space.
Public space was marked by group portraits. They are a unique phenomenon;
the political, social, religious and cultural specificities in Holland, which held an excep
tional status in Europe at the time, found a unique artistic form in the genre of group
portraiture.
It is indeed no exaggeration to say that on the level of images, public space was
fully occupied by group portraits. A kind of void had appeared in the field of religious
representation, because Catholics were no longer allowed to hold public services and
reformed churches had eliminated virtually all images. In the field of secular represen
tation, courtly art, which determined all neighboring countries’ art, was almost reduced
to nothing. Courtly-baroque representation was limited to the politically and culturally
rather irrelevant House of Orange in The Hague.326 The still preserved royal palace at the
outskirts of The Hague commissioned by Amalia of Solms-Braunfels and her husband,
stateholder Frederik Hendrik, gives us an excellent impression of how the House of
Orange was represented. The paintings in the completely painted Oranjezaal all have
118
mythological or allegorical themes aimed at heightening the House of Orange. The style
fully conforms to the contemporary baroque taste common in other European courts. It
is no coincidence that most of the artists were from the southern Netherlands, such as
Jacob Jordaens, Thomas Bosschaert or Theodor van Thulden. The stateholder’s abundant
painting collection also predominantly included Flemish painters. 327 The Dutch painters
working for the court were usually from Utrecht, among them Gerrit van Honthorst. With
the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 and the official recognition of the Netherlands as an
autonomous republic no longer dependent of Habsburg Spain, the House of Orange lost
more and more influence. Willem II, who had taken over the stateholdership after his
father Hendrik’s death in 1647, died as early as 1650. The Republic of the United Nether
lands decided to no longer fill the position of stateholder: The True Freedom, as the rule
of the regents was called by the Netherlanders, lasted from 1650 to 1672. In the catastro
phic year 1672, war was simultaneously declared on the Netherlands by France, Britain
and the German cities Cologne and Münster; Jan de Witt, Great Pensionary of Holland
and thus the country’s most central political
figure, was killed by an angry mob. In this pre
322 I would like to once again point out Michael Sweerts’s
‘bathing’ pictures, which are indeed an exception in carious situation Willem III was reinstated as the
Netherlandish painting, see Röske 2004, p. 121 – 135. new stateholder.
323 Bartsch 193, 194, 196. Emmens (1968, p. 154 ff.) even
speculated that these etchings could have been part of
a drawing manual.
324 Hammer-Tugendhat 1994, p. 394 – 401.
Historical summary
325 Gender-specific differentiations were least prevalent What were the Netherlands in the 17 th
in portraiture. Rembrandt did not idealize female por-
traits by omitting age or flaws. However there are tell- century? 328 Since the Union of Utrecht in 1579,
ing details, for example in the parallel images from the seven northern provinces Holland, Utrecht,
around 1665 in New York, where the man holds a mag
nifying glass while the woman holds a carnation, or Zealand, Guelders, Overijssel, Friesland and
the portraits of a married couple from around 1633 at
the KHM Vienna, in which the man seems to make Groningen had united themselves as the Repub
contact with the viewer in a speaking gesture while lic of the United Netherlands in their struggle
the wife is portrayed in a demure position, her arms
close to her body and her gaze directed into the void. against Spain. Holland held the most powerful
On equality but simultaneous differentiation in Dutch
portraiture, see: Helga Möbius, Die Moralisierung des position, followed by Zealand and Utrecht; the
Körpers. Frauenbilder und Männerwünsche im früh- northeastern provinces were rural and poor and
neuzeitlichen Holland, in: Barta et. al. 1987, p. 69 – 83;
Möbius, in: Möbius, Olbrich, 1990, p. 80 – 134, esp. did not have much to say.329 The Netherlands
p. 88 – 122.
326 Bob Haak, The Golden Age: Dutch Painters of the
were not a centralized state, but rather a
Seventeenth Century, London, New York 1984; Frijhoff, confederation of cities with Amsterdam in the
Spies, 2004, p. 494.
327 Haak 1984 includes a listing of all paintings in state- lead. Government was formed by the States
holder Frederik Hendrik’s collection according to an General, the magistrates of each province. The
inventory from 1632 and 1634.
328 Tibor Wittmann, Das Goldene Zeitalter der Nieder- Great Pensionary, appointed by Holland, was
lande, Leipzig 1975 (1965); Jonathan Israel, The Dutch
Republic: Its Rise, Greatness, and Fall 1477 –1806, 2 responsible for foreign and trade policy. Power
vols., Franeker 1996; Frijhoff, Spies 2004. was bundled in the patriciate of regents, old
329 The provinces of Friesland, Groningen and Drenthe
remained under the stateholdership of the Duke of wealthy families who also assigned the city
Nassau. It is often forgotten that stateholdership was
divided between the family branches of Orange and
Nassau, which can probably be ascribed to the relative
irrelevance of the northeastern provinces. 119
council and burgomasters from their own ranks. After a truce with Spain had been reached
in 1609, the Netherlands grew to the most influential economic power in Europe, culmi
nating by mid-century. 1608 – 1611 the Amsterdam Stock Exchange was built, in 1602 and
1621, respectively, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and the Dutch West India
Company (WIC) were founded. The Netherlands became the largest colonial and sea
power in Europe, with colonies in India, Indonesia, Australia, Africa, North and South
America. Amsterdam was the international trade and financial center. Between 1650 and
1672, the period of True Freedom, the Netherlands were an autonomous republic without
a ruling sovereign. This meant they had a remarkably unique position in Europe, whose
other countries were all firmly under feudalist and absolutist rule.330
Frijhoff and Spies were the first to point out the tensions and conflicts within this
federal construction in their seminal work Hard-Won Unity. The notion of harmonious
unity was a repeatedly eulogized ideal and not social reality. “Concordia res parvae
crescunt” was the republic’s motto: “Through harmony small things grow,” or “Unity
means strength.” This ideal was perpetuated by scholars of Dutch culture and history. 331
Johan Huizinga, whose research on Dutch culture had a long-lasting influence on the image
of the Netherlands from the 1930s to today, devised the notion of a united, peaceful and
thoroughly bourgeois Dutch society.332 The country’s military momentum and the ques
tionable points of the aspiring colonial power were glossed over along with the pressure
exerted by the Calvinist Church. A. Th. Van Deursen refutes this image and points out the
two-sided face of the Netherlands: tradesman and priest. 333 This contrast serves as the
starting point for Simon Schama’s cultural studies examination Embarassment of Riches.
Schama identifies a fundamental contrast between the ascending bourgeoisie’s unpre
cedented wealth and luxury and Calvinist teachings, and concludes that this is the
controversial core of Dutch self-conception.334 However, Schama also simplifies the
image and underestimates the multiplicity and its resulting tensions. The Netherlands
were by no means a homogenous structure, quite the contrary: The struggle to negotiate
opposing interests was surely decisive in shaping a specifically Dutch mentality. Nego
tiations were necessary between the (military-monarchist) interests of the stateholder
and the States General; between individual, sometimes very different provinces; between
competing cities; between bourgeoisie and nobility; between the wealthy patriciate and
middle-class citizens or simple folk. We must also not forget a division that lead to one of
the worst wars of the 17 th century: religious differences. The Netherlands were not purely
Calvinist, but rather regionally diverse: half of Utrecht’s population was Catholic; in
Haarlem there was an equal number of Calvinists, Mennonites and Catholics. Deventer
was orthodox Calvinist, while Amsterdam was pronouncedly liberal, also towards non-
Christians, particularly Jews. At the Synod of Dordrecht in 1618–1619, the Calvinist Church
120
asserted itself over the more liberal and tolerance-proposing Remonstrants, but the
municipal administration ensured tolerance. In the second half of the century, the
Calvinist church was ratified as Church of State, which, of course, increased its power.
Official office was reserved for Calvinists only and public Catholic services were prohib
ited, but Remonstrants, Mennonites and Lutherans were widely tolerated. After all, the
80-Year War had been fought in the name of religious freedom. Freedom of conscience in
religious questions was thus one of the fundamental ideas of the republic. International
trade also contributed to this form of acceptance. Frijhoff and Spies convincingly elabo
rate how the necessity to handle the myriad of differences profoundly shaped the
Netherlands’ structure and, as the authors describe it, lead to a culture of discussion.
Power was situated in cooperation both in questions of politics and economy. It was
neither left in the hands of a single, absolutist
sovereign, nor up to aristocratic families or
330 The situation might be compared to Venice, which was
ruled by a Doge, though, to cantons in Switzerland, single individuals, but rather remained the
which never achieved such an economic status, or a responsibility of groups. These groups, in turn,
few free German cities.
331 Frijhoff, Spies 2004, p. 62 – 66. had to bundle and coordinate opposing inter
332 Johan Huizinga, Holländische Kultur des 17. Jahrhun-
derts. Ihre sozialen Grundlagen und nationale Eigen- ests: the General States, the city councils, the
art, Jena 1933. head managers of VOC and WIC, the guild
333 A. Th. van Deursen, Cultuurgeschiedenis bij Huizin-
ga en in de Oude Algemene Geschiedenis der Neder- regents, etc.
landen, in: Theoretische geschiedenis 13, 2, 1986,
p. 197 – 208, here p. 206.
334 Simon Schama, The Embarrassment of Riches: An In- The group portrait
terpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age, New
York 1987. On the relation between capitalism and The adequate form of representation for
Protestantism see: Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic this form of power was the group portrait.335
and the Spirit of Capitalism, New York 2009 (1904/05
transl. 1930). Instead of church or court, the
335 Essential on Dutch group portraiture: Alois Riegl,
The Group Portraiture of Holland, Los Angeles 1999 institutions of the wealthy patriciate were the
(1902); on schuttersstukken, see: M. Carasso-Kok, most relevant patrons of art. A wide range of
J. Levy-van Halm (eds.), Kracht en zenuwen van de
stad, exh. cat. Frans Hals Museum Haarlem, Zwolle groups found a shared form of representation
1988, especially the essay by Christian Tümpel, De
Amsterdamse Schutterstukken; Frijhoff, Spies 2004, in group portraiture: the militia companies or
p. 143 – 145; Bob Haak, Group Portraits in the Amster- schutters guilds regents of merchant guilds
dam Historical Museum, vol. I, Civic Guard Portraits,
Amsterdam 1986 (with many illustrations); Paul Knevel, and governors of welfare institutions. Group
Armed Citizens: The Representation of the Civic Mi-
litias in the Seventeenth Century, in: Arthur K. Whee-
portraits were omnipresent in public life;
lock, Jr., Adele Seeff, The Public and the Private in they hung in the doelen (militia assembly
Dutch Culture of the Golden Age, Newark, London
2000, p. 85 – 99. On regent portraits, see: Mechthild halls), the guilds and welfare facilities like
Beilmann, Das Regentenstück in Leiden, doctoral the- orphanages, nursing homes and hospitals.
sis, Munich 1989; Bob Haak, Group Portraits in the
Amsterdam Historical Museum, vol. II, Regents, Re- In contrast the factual government, the States
gentessen and Syndics, Amsterdam 1986; for a com-
pilation of the most well-known regent portraits and General, the mayors and city councils, almost
an analysis of their function in public life, see: Michiel exclusively resorted to history paintings or
Jonker, Public or Private Portraits: Group Portraits of
Amsterdam Regents and Regentesses, in: Wheelock allegorical images for city government
2000, p. 206 – 226. Also see Möbius, Olbrich, 1990,
p. 80 – 134 (individual and community in portraits and
collective portraits); Haak 1984; Berger 2000, esp.
p. 288 – 89, 316 – 348. 121
Fig. 57: Dirck Jacobsz. Group-Portrait of Seventeen Members of the Kloveniers-
doelen, 1529, panel, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
buildings. 336 The earliest form of group portraiture is the schuttersstuk, a portrait of a
militia company. The oldest still-preserved work of this kind is by Dirck Jacobsz. from
1529 (fig. 57). The militia companies went back to the 14th century, when they were formed
to defend the cities. These guilds experienced a revival in the second half of the 16th
century, during the war against Spain. Their members were armed citizens. 337 The
shutters (shooters or arquebusiers) were considered the heart of the city, symbol of a free
city that answers to no master. Thus the meaning of their guilds surpassed their military
function and they significantly contributed to the cultural process with parades and
festivities. The doelen were not only used as assembly halls, but also served as a place for
social gatherings and public representation; trade agreements were signed, receptions
and banquets were held and guests of honor were accommodated there. A commission
for a schuttersstuk was one of the highest signs
of social approval. Rembrandt’s famous Night
336 As far as I know, no one has ever sought an expla-
Watch was one of seven group portraits that nation; Michiel Jonker (in: Wheelock 2000, p. 207)
the Cloveniersgilde in Amsterdam commission only states: “It is remarkable that the highest official
bodies, such as the city corporation or the burgo-
ed between 1638 and 1645 for the ballroom of masters, seldom or never appear in group portraits,”
their new clubhouse.338 Huizinga compares the but never asks why. Perhaps the ideal of society (as
a whole) was better represented in general allegories
significance of the militia companies and cham or history paintings. Maybe the reason was to keep
power, which in fact lay in the hands of a very small,
bers of rhetoric to the role of the academies in very wealthy elite, detached from specific, identifi-
Italy, the salons in France, or the clubs in Britain. able people. On Amsterdam, particularly the city
hall, see: Albert Blankert, Kunst als regeringszaak in
After the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, the Amsterdam in de 17e eeuw. Rondom schilderijen van
Ferdinand Bol, Amsterdam 1975. One exception is a
group portrait of Deventer’s city council by Gerard
ter Borch from 1667 in: Haak 1996. On the stringent
122 relation between politics and art in the time of the
Fig. 58: Werner van den Valckert, Regents of the Groot Kramergild, 1622,
panel, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
production of schuttersstuks abruptly declined even though the militia companies con
tinued to exist. But the Netherlands continued all their warfare overseas.339 Especially
after 1650, in the stateholderless era of regent government, the Netherlands wished to
present themselves as a peaceful community. Even though it still existed in social reality,
militant action was to disappear from the public aesthetic field and thus from Dutch
identity.340 The main focus of public representation shifted from armed militia portraits
to peaceful regent portraits (fig. 58). Regents were the directors of municipal institutions,
especially welfare institutions; they were all members of the social elite. Translating the
mode of representation for two such contrary groups was facilitated by the unspecific
aesthetic staging of the group portrait. After all, the shooters were not portrayed in action
or during shooting practice, but instead opted for a representation of themselves as
individuals in a group. This concept led to
pronounced difficulties in regard to aesthetic
truce, see: H. Perry Chapman, Propagandist Prints,
Reaffirming Paintings: Art and Community during the
presentation: an assembly of singular
Twelve Years’ Truce, in: Wheelock, Jr., Seeff 2000, characters, in which each individual had to be
p. 43 – 63.
337 The shooters all came from wealthy families and the recognizable as such while also representing a
officers all belonged to the urban patriciate. unified group. This double referential
338 The other commissions went to Flinck, Backer, Sand-
rart, van der Helst und Pickenoy. On The Night Watch, character — to the unique individual and the
see: Egbert Haverkamp-Begemann, Rembrandt. The
Nightwatch, Princeton 1982. group — is what marks Dutch group portraits.
339 Next to the Anglo-Dutch Wars 1652 – 54, 1665 – 67 and In his seminal analysis Group Portraiture in
1672 – 74 this includes warlike operations in and about
the colonies against Spain, Portugal and the respec Holland, Alois Riegl described them as
tive native peoples.
340 There are, however, depictions of naval battles which
were commissioned by admirals and were quite popu-
lar with private collectors. 123
Pl. 7: Rembrandt,
De Staalmeesters
(The Syndics), 1662,
canvas, Amsterdam,
Rijksmuseum
depictions of a democratic society.341 Contrary to Riegl, I do not believe that an egalitarian

image structure can be transferred directly to social reality. Despite any justified criticism
of Riegl’s observations we can use his findings productively: the insight that the aesthetic
structure carries a message about the content, in this case the message of the ideal of
equality.342 Representations of the militia and the regents are not illustrations of social
reality, but rather of their imaginary, ideal image; the fiction of a harmonious, conflict-free
union of individuals and community, unity and equality.
Rembrandt painted four group portraits; they are among his most important
commissions. Alongside The Night Watch, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp and
Dr. Deyman, the regent portrait of the Staalmeesters is the one we shall take a closer look
at. With his specific staging, Rembrandt managed to transcend the pure representation
of a corporation, heading towards generalization: the Utopia of an ideal society.
De Staalmeesters
Rembrandt’s De Staalmeesters (plate 7) is one of six group portraits that hung in
the great hall of the draper guild’s doelen.343 We know who the patrons were because the
sampling officers that were in office in 1662 are documented. 344 From left to right, they
are: Jacob van Loon, the oldest at 67, Catholic; Volckert Janszoon, Mennonite, art collec
tor; chairman Willem van Doeyenburg, Calvinist; Jochen de Neve, the youngest at 33,
Remonstrant; and finally, Aernout van der Meije, Catholic and like van Doeyenburg from
one of the wealthiest and most respected families in Amsterdam. Behind him is servant
Frans Hendrickszoon Bel who had invented a successful new coloring technique. All
124
depicted syndics were cloth merchants. What I find most remarkable is the representation
of members of the social elite with four different religions: a symbol of Amsterdam’s
society, its power and its tolerance. 345
Iconographically, the painting closely
follows the tradition of the schuttersstuk: a
341 In Dutch portraiture all action was frozen and those
portrayed were fully turned towards the viewer. Riegl
relatively small number of men assembled
(1902) described this as the ‘extra-pictorial unity’ (aus- around a table, most of them sitting, a few of
serbildliche Einheit) as opposed to the ‘inner pictorial
unity’ (innerbildliche Einheit) in Italian and Italian- them standing. We can already find this staging
related art, where figures within the image stand in
in Werner van den Valckert’s 1622 portrait of
relation to each other. For Riegl, group portraiture is
the quintessence of ‘Dutch artistic volition’ (des hol- Five Regents of the Groot-Kramergild or Govert
ländischen Kunstwollens).
342 The sociological approach in the exhibition catalog Flinck’s Governers of the Kloveniersdoelen from
Schutters in Holland 1988 misses, in my opinion, the 1642, a group portrait that together with
meaning of the schuttersstuk; Riegl is only mentioned
negatively and dismissed as a proponent of Hegelian Rembrandt’s Night Watch decorated the great
idealism in Christian Tümpel’s essay (De Amster
damse Schutterstukken) (p. 76). The catalog’s authors hall of the newly built Kloveniersdoelen.346
argue that Holland’s unique situation somehow auto-
matically caused group portraiture. They thus directly
conclude from social reality to image. Even though they The unique effect of De Staalmeesters
seem to be doing the opposite of Riegl, their belief in
a mimetic relationship between image and social real is based on the juxtaposition of unified space
ity is structurally closely related to Riegl. The shooters and action, and thus time, and the protago-
could have chosen another form of representation, for
example in action or in reference to historical or my- nists’ psychological awareness for the viewer.
thological themes. See Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat,
Rembrandt und der bürgerliche Subjektentwurf, in:
Rembrandt combines a very close vantage
Ulrich Bielefeld, Gisela Engel (eds.), Bilder der Nation. point with an extremely low viewpoint. The
Kulturelle und politische Konstruktionen des Nationa-
len am Beginn der europäischen Moderne, Hamburg confrontation this provokes with the viewer is
1998, p. 154 – 178. substantially emphasized by the fact that
343 The analysis of this image is based on my essay Rem
brandt und der bürgerliche Subjektentwurf from 1998; (almost all) protagonists are visually fixating the
however, the text’s central question was what function
group portraiture had in the constitution of a specif viewer. In similar works by Rembrandt’s pre
ically Dutch identity. On De Staalmeesters, see: Tolnay decessors, the viewer’s gaze is usually directed
1943, p. 31 ff.; H. Van de Waal, De Staalmeesters en
hun legende, in: Oud Holland 71, 1956, p. 61 – 105 (Eng- at the scene from a slightly raised perspective
lish summary p. 105 – 107); H. Van de Waal, The Mood
of the Staalmeesters. A Note on Mr. De Tonlnay’s In- and with more distance to those seated at the
terpretation, in: Oud Holland 73, 1958, p. 86 – 89; Tol- table, thus ensuring the impression of remote
nay, A Note on the Staalmeesters, in: Oud Holland 73,
1958, p. 85 f; J. H. Van Eeghen, De Staalmeesters, in: ness. One exception is a painting from 1653 by
Oud Holland 73, 1958, p. 80 – 84; Christian Tümpel,
Rembrandt. Mythos und Methode, Königstein im
Van der Helst, which also has a low viewpoint
Taunus 1986, cat. no. 256, p. 418; André Chastel, Im- (fig. 59). The fact that the figures are in full-
pressions. The Board of the Clothmakers’ Guild, in:
FMR, no. 43, April 1990, p. 17 – 20; exh. cat. Berlin 1991, length, however, inhibits any immediate con
no. 48, p. 278 – 283. nection and, even more importantly, only one of
344 Eeghen (op. cit.) identified those portrayed.
345 On the significance of religion and reciprocal religious the protagonists is looking directly at the viewer.
tolerance in 17th century Holland, see: Heinz Schilling,
Nationale Identität und Konfession in der europäi- In group portraits before Rembrandt’s, we can
schen Neuzeit, in: Bernhard Giesen (ed.), Nationale find an entire range of gestures, some of which
und kulturelle Identität. Studien zur Entwicklung des
kollektiven Bewusstseins in der Neuzeit, Frankfurt are symbolical. They rarely, if at all, refer to each
a. M. 1996, p. 196 ff.
346 Govert Flinck, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum; ill.: exh. cat.
Haarlem 1988, p. 97, fig. 69; see also there for further
examples and images. 125
Fig. 59: Bartholomeus van der Helst, The Four Governors of the Archers’
Civic Guard, 1653 – 57, canvas, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
other and only few are aimed in the viewer’s direction; often two or more people seem to
be speaking at the same time, or no one seems to be listening. The additive quality of the
depicted symbols makes it impossible for these paintings to emit a sense of immediacy.
The opposite is true for Rembrandt’s group portrait, where almost all figures
direct their attention to the viewer. The exception is the person who has just been speak
ing as we can tell from his speaking gesture. Oddly, the viewer feels like the figures are
reacting to her/him. This effect is increased by subtly turned heads; the movement of
getting up; the look of the second man from the right who was just concentrating on the
book in his hands a moment ago; and the man at the far right lifting his arm in a mo
mentary gesture. All this provokes the impression of the group reacting to the viewer as
if they had all been concentrating on the chairman’s words when the viewer ‘interrupted’
their meeting. This means that the viewer is constitutive for the image. (It would be a
different image if the viewer did not exist.) This stringent effect of presence, of present
time was interpreted naturalistically, or anecdotally for a long time: entire stories were
invented explaining the alleged conversation and reactions between the figures and a
supposed party just outside the picture plane. 347 In his essay on De Staalmeesters from
1956, van de Waal clearly refutes these interpretations as absurd ideas. 348 However, the
aesthetic structure that caused this reception cannot be interpreted as a mere “tectonic
function” within purely artistic principles.349 It has a deeper level of meaning. Research in
reception aesthetics has asserted that images construct a viewer, that there is an inter
action between image and viewer.350
126
The protagonists here are highly individualized in their facial features, their
expressions, their gestures and their specific reactions. Each one of them seems to react
differently to the viewer. We can find a range from quiet looking to standing up and
wanting to leave. The diverging gestures create a sense of disquiet, yet the painting as a
whole exudes a deep sense of calm. This calmness is created by the aesthetic structure
and the planar organization of the panel: the table is positioned at a slight angle that
almost seems parallel to the picture plane due to a low viewpoint. The heads are aligned
at the projection line even though they are spatially disparate. The figures’ hands are
arranged in one connecting line. And finally, the back wall parallel to the picture plane
further emphasizes the sense of planarity. However, there is still a strong spatial effect,
achieved through the optical tool of light and dark. Rembrandt creates the impression of
a unified group in a space. In other words, the autonomy of each personality and indi
viduality achieves full harmony within the group. The chairperson is only marked as such
by the speaking gesture; he neither occupies the painting’s center, nor is he highlighted in
the image’s composition. He also does not wear special clothing or have prominent facial
features. The center of the painting is instead filled by the servant who, even though he
stands in the background, is fully incorporated into the group, forming the top point of a
triangular composition with the two middle figures. Despite this subtle allusion to social
difference, the impression of a unified group consisting of equal individuals prevails.
Merging the figures’ bodies also emphasizes the feeling of unity: especially the middle
group seems to be a single dark mass of fused bodies. It becomes even clearer how
specific this form of representation is when we
compare it to feudal representational images
347 Bürger Thoré (Musées de la Hollande, Amsterdam,
The Hague, Paris 1858, p. 25 ff.) was the first to come from the Baroque, which usually have a clear
up with the idea that there must have been a party in
front of the image to which the figures are supposedly center that all movement is directed at or coming
reacting. from. The center in this example of Dutch group
348 Waal 1956.
349 “[…] It is shown that elements which were considered portraiture is the viewer and — typically for
to be interpretable as motifs of movement are to be re-
garded as solutions of problems of composition. The Rembrandt — the word, spoken words, invisible
gestures in such pieces have in the first place a tectonic text.351 In De Staalmeesters, the group appears
function.” (Waal, p. 106). This controversy gives us deep
insight into the problem of art-historical approaches. as a close-knit unit of equal members, a group
Waal’s formal-analytical method, the anecdotal ap-
proach or the empathetic-psychological approach of
whose individuals are taken seriously in their
his opponents as well as Tümpel’s iconographic-so- reactions and psychological structure.
ciologist method all encompass essential aspects of
the painting. Differences aside, their views all fall short Individual reaction is also granted to the
of fully grasping the complexity between artistic pro- viewer. If we follow the figures’ gazes, we can
duction and social reality. The aesthetic structure of an
image cannot only be argued formally or as immanent find them diverging slightly, which means that
to the image. It must be questioned in regard to the
meaning of its content, which in fact is closely tied to there is not a single anticipated viewer, but
social reality, but must not be understood naively as a multiple ones: several viewers who subjectively
pure mimesis of said reality.
350 Kemp 1985. react in their own right. This genius constellation
351 It is unusual that only the gesture of the hand points to
speaking, while the chairman’s mouth is closed. Thus
he just has spoken. On the meaning of the word in
Rembrandt’s work, see: Held 1973; Häslein 2004. 127
of gazes has tempted scholars to presume a party before the picture time and again.
The subjectivity that Rembrandt grants both his figures and the painting’s recipients is
responsible for the diverging interpretations of the protagonists and their mental states.352
In conclusion, Rembrandt not only demonstrated the idea of subjectivity and individuality
in his figures, he made it tangible for the viewer through the aesthetic structure.
Human individuality and freedom as a condition for harmony for all is a concept
that finds a remarkable parallel in the political theories of Baruch Spinoza. At the same
time Rembrandt created De Staalmeesters, Spinoza wrote Tractatus Theologico-Politicus,
which was published in 1670.353 In the same decade he also wrote Tractatus Politicus, his
thoughts on the state, which was still in its hand-written form when he died in 1677.354
Spinoza created a utopia of human society that far surpassed the existing oligarchy of the
regents’ rule. In his treatise he defends the individual freedom of each individual and
declares it the base and condition for a democratic and peaceful state. He emphasizes
the difference between humans’ feelings and thoughts and their natural right to think
what they want and say what they think. According to Spinoza, freedom of thought does
not endanger the state, but is rather the condition for a democratic state and guaranteed
peace. A state in which the highest law is the wellbeing of its people, the will of the
government will ultimately coincide with the individual’s will.
Of course I am not claiming that Rembrandt was directly influenced by Spinoza.
I rather believe that the specific political, denominational and social situation in the
northern Netherlands enabled a culture that allowed ideas of individuality and their har
monious relation in a community of freedom and statehood to develop. These ideas, in
turn, found their respective expression in the fields of philosophy and visual art. At the
same time philosophy and visual art are more than products of these social circumstan
ces, they actively contribute to the development of culture.
Rembrandt envisioned the utopia of harmony between individual autonomy and

community. He based his vision on the Dutch tradition of group portraiture as it is
embedded in a specific context of social debate. While the individual portraits and
varying gestures and reactions of those depicted evoke individuality, the structuring of
the viewer-image relation explained above is an authentication of subjectivity. Commu
nity, on the other hand, is generated through the fused bodies, isocephaly and, most of
all, the space and organization of the picture plane (emphasis of the horizontal), which
creates a common frame for the group.
Doesn’t the ideality of this presented community make us forget the exclusions
that are taking place? Isn’t the fact that this ideal society is entirely made up of the social
128
elite and only of men pushed aside? This is not an image of equality, it is an image of
equality within hegemonic masculinity. Masculinity here is equated with spiritualization
and disembodiment. The Staalmeesters are not portrayed at work, sampling fabric. All
sensual aspects related to fabric and the abundance associated with it are only materi-
alized in the striking red carpet spread on the table. The extremely low viewpoint helped
Rembrandt get rid of the many objects that would usually lie on the table. The remaining
and thus central object is the opened book that the protagonists were obviously all con
centrating on. Therefore the syndics are not characterized by their occupation or attri
butes, but rather by self-representation. This is how the referential character to one
specific corporation transcends into generality. At the same time the elimination of signs
referring to physicality or sensuality represents a specific form of masculinity. The por
trayed figures seem to have no bodies: the black, undifferentiated, merging shapes have
engulfed their actual bodies. Not a single ray of light illuminates their bodies, only their
faces and hands, which become the sole carriers of expression. The connective, com
prehensive element in this group is the invisible word, the intellectual / mental / spiritual
(das Geistige). The fact that hegemonic masculinity is not immediately recognizable, but
rather appears as universality shows how successful the concept is. 355
I have mentioned several times how eminent the visualization of spoken words is
in Rembrandt’s oeuvre.356 Time and again, Rembrandt sought to depict his figures while
speaking, for example Captain Cocq in The Night Watch, Dr. Tulp in The Anatomy Lesson,
or the drawing of Joseph Telling his Dreams, et al. Visualizing an act of speech in the past,
making the viewer realize that a figure has just spoken, takes this talent to the next level.
Painting portraits that seem to speak is an old topos that was also a criterion of quality
in Netherlandish writing. This form of praise was reserved for male portraits, we know of
no female parallels. A double portrait of the
Mennonite preacher Anslo and his wife (fig. 60)
352 The descriptions of the depicted affects vary drasti- provides some insight on the issue. Simon
cally. Riegl identified “the feeling of a certain sense of Schama rightly described the painting as a
satisfaction and agreement, but not the kind of mali-
cious pleasure that arises from schadenfreude” (das “Protestant icon” that shows “the living
Gefühl einer bestimmten Befriedigung und Zustim-
mung, nicht aber dasjenige einer hämischen Genug-
word.”357 The visualization of spoken words is
tuung und Schadenfreude); Tolnay (1943, p. 64): “In- further intensified by the depiction of listening.
timidated by these cold and penetrating glances, the
spectator feels morally himself delivered up to these The gender roles ascribed here are loud and
men whose judgement will decide his fate.” clear: he speaks, while she listens.
353 Baruch Spinoza, A Theologico-Political Treatise [Tracta-
tus Theologico-Politicus], translated by R. H. M. Elwes;
http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/spinoza/benedict/
treatise/index.html, retrieved Aug. 27, 2013. Rembrandt never created a female
354 Baruch Spinoza, A Political Treatise [Tractatus Politi- parallel to De Staalmeesters. In fact, Dutch
cus], translated by R. H. M. Elwes; http://ebooks.ade-
laide.edu.au/s/spinoza/benedict/political/chapter11. painting only offers very few portraits of female
html#chapter11, retrieved Aug. 27, 2013.
355 Meuser, Scholz in: Dinges 2005, especially p. 225.
356 Held 1973; Häslein 2004.
357 Schama 1999, p. 479. 129
Fig. 60: Rembrandt, Portrait of Cornelis Claesz. Anslo and his wife
Aeltje Gerritsdr. Schouten, 1641, canvas, Berlin, Staatliche Museen,
Gemäldegalerie
regents. Their work was mostly limited to poor houses, orphanages and hospitals,
institutions belonging to municipal welfare — areas that were previously supervised by
the Catholic Church.358 Nonetheless, paintings of these institutions were also dominated
by men. Portraits of females that did exist were mostly displayed in the regents’ cham
bers and thus had a rather private character.359 There are no female group portraits of
guild governors, anatomies or schuttersstuks. One could believe that virtually no women
held these positions. Which is true: there were no women in these positions. Even in the
period of True Freedom women were excluded from most political and leading official
functions. Furthermore, social life in the militia companies, which played such a central
role in Holland’s culture, was exclusively male. In the charter of the Haarlem civic
guard from 1621, women and children are explicitly prohibited from participating in any
festive banquets, which at times went on for days.360 A symptomatic example is an
early schuttersstuk by Cornelis Anthoninsz. from 1533, in which femininity is not physically,
but at least symbolically present in the form of a love poem on a piece of paper one of the
guardsmen holds in his hands (fig. 61).361 A panel by the Master of Frankfurt depicting a
militia festival (still) shows men and women celebrating together (fig. 62).
The boundaries between public and private life became an increasingly pressing
subject of debate. Jacob Cats, who further developed ideas by Erasmus and Vives and, as
I have discussed earlier, deeply marked the normative discourse on women’s rights and
duties, codified and normed gender-specific places and spaces in his writings. Cats never
130
Fig. 61: Cornelis Anthoninsz., Banquet of Members of Amsterdam’s Crossbow Civic Guard,
1533, panel, Amsterdam, Historical Museum
tired of repeating that a woman’s place was the home — the home and nothing but the
home. Female life was drastically limited to marriage and motherhood. Even non-con-
formist thinkers like Spinoza, who was so firm in his claim for equal rights for every
individual, never doubted that this only applied to men. All men, except servants or
criminals, had the right to political participation, as he explains:
I added, besides, “who are independent,” except in so far as they are

under allegiance to the laws of the dominion, to exclude women and
slaves, who are under the authority of men and masters, and also
children and wards […] 362
In an earlier chapter, I mentioned Doctor Johan van Beverwijck, who wrote on

health-related subjects and dedicated his book Van de Wtnementheyt des vrouwelicken
geslachts (On the excellence of the female sex) to
358 For example The Regentesses of the Old Men’s Alms Anna Maria Schurman. Even this proponent of
house — the parallel portrait to The Regents of the Old
Men’s Almshouse by Frans Hals 1664, Haarlem, Frans women in the Querelle conceded intellectual
Hals Museum. On Amsterdam, see: Jonker 2000, talents and education to women, but only in a
p. 206 – 226.
359 Ibid. private, never in a public scope. Anna Maria
360 Möbius, Olbrich 1990, p. 123.
361 Amsterdam, Historical Museum. The text says “In mij- Schurman, one of the most educated women at
nen sin heb ick vercoren een meysken.” For an illustra- the time and author of a pamphlet arguing for
tion showing the detail of the paper with legible notes
and text, see: Haak 1986, vol. 1, p. 1. women’s right to education, also only fought for
362 Baruch Spinoza, A Political Treatise [Tractatus Politi-
cus], translated by R. H. M. Elwes; http://ebooks.ade-
laide.edu.au/s/spinoza/benedict/political/chapter11.
html#chapter11, retrieved Aug. 27, 2013. 131
Fig. 62: Master of Frankfurt, Guards
Festival, second half of the 15th
century, panel, Antwerp, Museum
voor Schone Kunsten
private scholarliness.363 As far as we know today, only one female voice protested against
the exclusion of women from public office in written form. I am talking about Charlotte
de Huybert and her poem (mentioned above) dedicated to Beverwijck.364 In it, she laments
that work by female scientists and scholars is ignored (“der vrouwen wetenschap voor
niets gehouden wordt”), that women have no rights and are not even allowed to work in
trades, even though reality is different:
Of maakt de wet daarom, door hun gemaakt, gewag als dat een
vrouwsperoon geen staat bedienen mag? Zij hebben, zeggen sij,
zo’n grote recht verkregen: Geen vrouw kan zonder man noch
recht, noch handel plegen. De rede leert ons toch het tegendeel
daarvan, En d’ondervinding zelf, die wijst ons anders an.365
She demands that all women be admitted to public office. Marijke Spies, who
published and commented Huybert’s text, points out how many centuries it would still
take until women were permitted to bring their intellectual achievements into the
public.366
132
It is remarkable that women seem to have participated in public life more than
written legal sources and didactic writings lead us to believe. Of course the relatively
advanced capitalization of the Netherlands and the outsourcing of production from the
private home that came with it formed an economic basis for the increasingly stricter
separation of public and private space.367 Yet there was somewhat of an intellectual
overstatement that went beyond social reality. We can also detect this exaggeration in
visual representations. During the 17 th century, Dutch painting created a dichotomy of
female / private space and male/public space, not only illustrating gender segregation, but
actually promoting it and thus contributing to the formation of gender-specific identity. In
regard to group portraiture one could argue that it is only a depiction of specific
corporations and thus not a representative image of (bourgeois) Dutch society per se.
(Of course lower social classes are not represented at all.) Because these (very different)
groups all chose this specific form of representation and especially because they chose it
to mark public space, we can conclude that group portraiture indeed determined the
public representation of Dutch society to a great extent. However, governmental sites,
namely city halls, were not decorated with group portraits, but rather with history
paintings.368 Amsterdam’s city hall, built by van Campen between 1648 and 1655 was the
most significant building at the time. Due to Amsterdam’s importance as a city, one
could say that this building was the center of
power in all the Netherlands. Paintings by the
363 In her argumentative essay Num foeminae Christianae most renowned artists of the time, including
conveniat studium litterarum? (published 1648 as part
of her collected writings, Opuscula, by Elzevir in Ley- Ferdinand Bol, Govert Flinck, Jan Lievens, et al.
den), Schurman pleads for the education of women in mostly depict scenes from Roman history. In
all arts and sciences. She argues that by nature, wo-
men have the same talent as men and, as individuals this case we are not predominantly interested in
of the human species, feel the same need for know-
ledge and education. Contemporaries such as Cons- the surely well contemplated visual scheme,
tantijn Huygens, Jacob Cats, Johan van Beverwijck, which clearly aimed at legitimizing the ideology
Caspar Barlaeus, et al. all greatly admired Schurman,
but also considered her an accident of nature. De Baar of the regents’ rule.369 We are more interested in
1996; see also notes 247, 248.
364 Spies 1986, p. 339 – 350. one aspect that has not yet received any
365 The poem is reproduced ibid., p. 343. scholarly attention: the fact that none of these
366 Ibid., p. 350: “[…] dat het nog eeuwen zou duren voor-
dat Charlotte de Huybert haar zin kreeg en ook de in- paintings include women. The two works in the
tellectuele vrouw een werkende vrouw kon worden.”
367 Martha Howell, Women, Production and Patriarchy
burgomaster’s hall are by Ferdinand Bol and
in Late Medieval Cities, Chicago 1986; Merry E. Wies- Govert Flinck (fig. 63), sized 3.5/4.85 m each. We
ner, Working Women in Renaissance Germany, New
Brunswick 1986. see episodes of two Roman consuls whose
368 See note 336. incorruptibility and steadfastness were to set an
369 Blankert 1975; Möbius, Olbrich 1990, p. 185 f.; Frijhoff,
Spies 2004, p. 444 – 449. example for all future mayors.370 Women are not
370 See Ferdinand Bol’s: Fabritius and Pyrrhus, ill.: Blankert
1975, fig. 5. Also telling is a painting Bol made for the even present in supporting roles or among the
assembly hall of the newly built admirality: Imperia crowds. In these images aimed at representing
Manliana. The son of Roman Consul Titus Manlius
Torquatus embarks on a warlike mission against the Dutch identity, women were not depicted at all,
enemy against his father’s orders. Despite winning,
the father has his son beheaded. The law of the father
is confirmed as the ultimate law. Blankert, op. cit.,
fig. 34. 133
Fig. 63: Govert Flinck,
The Steadfastness of Consul Marcus
Curius Dentatus, 1656, canvas,
Amsterdam, Royal Palace Foundation
not even in allegorical form.371 The outrageousness of this omission becomes even more
striking when we compare visual representation in the public and the private sphere. The
contrast could not be more blatant. An endless number of domestic scenes that were not
only exhibited in interiors, but also explicitly addressed the private home and the newly
created site of the private image, almost exclusively depicted female figures. We will take
a closer look at this in the second part of this book.372 The separation of a male coded
public sphere and a female coded private sphere is even more distinct than in courtly cul-
ture. Also in contrast to feudal representation, group portraiture appears to claim social
equality. The egalitarian image structure in Dutch group portraits evokes the fiction of an
egalitarian society, in which exclusions are no longer noticed because they have been
rendered completely invisible.
Space is used to shape individuals, either by ascribing them to certain spaces or

by excluding them from certain spaces. This also includes the staging of space and the
symbolic occupation of space in the field of representation.373
134
3 Asymmetry.
Gender Relations in
the Field of Sexuality
Summing up our observations so far, we can identify a remarkably alternative

concept of femininity in Rembrandt’s work, yet at the same time find a significant
asymmetry in the representation of gender. In a nutshell, female figures are eliminated
from public representation, while male figures are omitted from any erotic context. This
gender-specific differentiation conforms to the visual codes and norms of 17 th century
Dutch art. The exodus of male protagonists from erotic images is an even more general
phenomenon during the shift from late medieval feudal culture to early modern cul
ture.374 My own observations as well as those by feminist-oriented art historians has lead
me to believe that sexuality in early modern art is almost exclusively represented with
nude female bodies, while male sexuality is rendered invisible. In the following I will
review this theory: how are gender relations staged when a sexual act requiring both
partners is depicted? The motif I am speaking about is coitus.
In post-antiquity occidental art, depictions of copulation are relatively rare. In art

from the Middle Ages and the early modern period, coitus is almost never shown expli
citly. Among the few exceptions is the Tacunium Sanitatis codex, a handbook on health
and well-being that was illustrated in Italy in the late 14th century and, unsurprisingly,
originates in Arabian culture.375 Medieval art did
371 On the issue of female allegories as a sign of the exclu- offer an abundance of metaphorical represen
sion of actual women, see: Wenk 1996; Sigrid Schade, tations of sexuality, including horseback riding,
Monika Wagner, Sigrid Weigel (eds.), Allegorien und
Geschlechterdifferenz, Cologne, Weimar, Vienna 1994. the key in the lock, the unicorn and the young
372 See Chapter 4: The Gender of Letters.
373 I would like to point out a conference in this context: lady, a man playing the organ for a woman and
Space and Self in Early Modern Europe, held by the different variations of sword and scabbard.376
Seventeenth and Eighteenth-Century Studies Center
and Clark Library at the University of California. The We most often find these metaphorical visuali
conference took place in 5 segments between 2007
and 2008 and was directed by David Warren Sabean
zations of sexual acts in graphic art, but they
and Malina Stefanovska. also appear on the ‘hidden’ sidelines such as
374 See Chapter 2: The impossible reversal 2 (figs. 41, 42,
43). Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Art, Sexuality and drolleries in illuminations or misericords in choir
Gender Constructs in Western Culture, in: Art in Trans- stalls. This should not be misunderstood as a
lation, vol. 4, issue 3, 2012 (2000), p. 361 – 382 (www.
artintranslation.org). complete suppression of sexuality, which pro
375 Otto Pächt, Early Italian Nature Studies and the Early
Calendar Landscapes, in: Journal of the Warburg and hibits all explicit depictions. The main reason for
Courtauld Institutes, vol. 8, London 1950, p. 13 – 47. the metaphorical representation of sexuality is
One can also find them in codices of canon law such
as Decretum Gratiani, see: Peter Dinzelbacher, Mit- that it is impossible to depict the full scope of a
telalterliche Sexualität — die Quellen, in: Erlach 1994,
p. 47 – 110.
376 Malcolm Jones, Sex and Sexuality in Late Medieval and
Early Modern Art, in: Erlach 1994, p. 187 – 304. 135
sexual act. Depictions will always remain imaginations of actual physical contact, as
sexuality’s fundamental qualities remain invisible. Imaginations thereof can thus often be
more effective in sparking recipients’ imaginations than any seemingly explicit image.
Danaë or How the male sex partner was made invisible
In Italian Renaissance coitus was often portrayed by depicting couples with

crossed / entwined legs.377 Satyrs were often shown visibly aroused or explicitly involved in
sexual acts. These caprine creatures are marked as male, but are not men; they represent
a type of uncivilized, libidinous masculinity. Their partners are usually nymphs who,
tellingly, do not differ from real women in their appearance. Sexual acts in history images
were only legitimate in the context of antique mythology. The most important source for
the depiction of erotic themes were Ovid’s Metamorphoses. From the Renaissance on
ward, the preferred form of sexual representation was mythological disguise, which
meant that the male protagonist, usually Zeus (Jupiter), disappeared in metamorphosis:
a swan with Leda, a bull with Europe, a satyr with Antiope, disguised as Diana with
Callisto, dissolved into fog with Io (fig. 35, p. 86) and as a golden rain with Danaë. In other
words, early modern art actually achieved the impossible: portraying copulation without a
male protagonist. We are left with the female nude. Basing this phenomenon on nothing
else but its antique sources is not satisfactory. Why did artists almost exclusively resort to
these narratives and what is the meaning behind the structure of these myths?
Danaë quickly became the star of godly love affairs. The story traces back to
Horace’s Carmina, Apollonius of Rhodes’s Scholia and Ovid.378 Danaë was locked in an
iron chamber by her father King Acrisius after an oracle had predicted her son would one
day kill him. Jupiter fell in love with her and ‘wed’ her by turning into golden rain.
(Danaë’s son Perseus actually killed his grandfather by accident later on.) Why Danaë
was the one who became the favorite motif of erotic depictions is quite understandable,
since the golden rain gives way to quite pleasant erotic associations (as a kind of auratic
semen), whereas animals such as swans or bulls are not really appealing figures for
identification. Jupiter as Diana bears the danger of ‘precarious’ lesbian connotations and
the fog surrounding Io is not very easy to portray. Additionally, Danaë was already the
popular identificatory motif for divinely legitimized seduction during Antiquity. In the
comedy Eunuchus by Terence a painting of Danaë sparks an erotic fantasy in the protago
nist’s mind, causing him to imagine himself in Jupiter’s place. By citing this episode — of
course as an example of reprehensible heathen morals — Augustine transported the story
into Christian tradition.379 The passage from Terence was recurred to again and again —
136
Fig. 64: Johannes Eyssenhuth, Danaë, Defensorium inviolatae Mariae of Franciscus de Retza, 1471,
woodcut, Regensburg
Fig. 65: Master L. D. (Leon Davent), after Primaticcio, Danaë, c. 1540 – 50, engraving, Vienna, Albertina
on one hand to verify the effect of erotic images and on the other hand as a positive or
negative exemplum. It was either used as a warning against the negative influence of
heathen stories or as an invitation to emulate Jupiter.380
377 Karin Orchard, Annäherung der Geschlechter. Andro Two contrary interpretations developed
gynie in der Kunst des Cinquecento, Münster 1992
(doctoral thesis 1988), p. 87; Leo Steinberg, The Meta-
in Christian tradition.381 Already during Antiquity,
phors of Love and Birth in Michelangelo’s Pietas, in: T. in Horace’s and Ovid’s writing, the golden rain
Bowie, C. von Christenson (eds.), Studies in Erotic Art,
New York 1970, p. 231 – 338, here: p. 239 ff. is interpreted as actual, physical gold and Danaë
378 Horace, Carmina III, 16; Apollonios of Rhodes, Argo- subsequently associated with prostitution.
nautica IV, v. 1091; in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Danaë
is only mentioned briefly in the stories of (her son) Adopting this notion, Danaë became a symbol
Perseus’s adventures, Met. IV, 610 f. Originally pro-
bably a myth of fertility, which is still found as a sort for corruptibility in Christian mythography,
of reflex on antique engraved gems. Usually Danaë particularly in Boccaccio’s work and the follow
is portrayed standing with opened garments. On
this, see: William S. Heckscher, Recorded from Dark ing humanist tradition. Thus the golden rain
Recollection, in: Millard Meiss, De Artibus Opuscula
XL. Essays in Honour of E. Panofsky, New York 1961, turned into coins.
p. 187 – 200, here: p. 194 f., fig. 4. Parallel to these developments there was
379 Augustine, De civitate Dei II, 7.
380 In the debate on the power and danger of images that a contrary set of interpretations, which turned
took place in the context of Reformation and Counter-
Reformation, the example of Danaë was frequently cit
Danaë into a personification of chastity, at times
ed as proof for the reprehensible effect of images. On even a prefiguration of Mary. In visual media she
this, see: Freedberg 1971, p. 229 – 242; Carlo Ginzburg,
Tizian, Ovid und die erotischen Bilder im Cinquecento, can, for example, appear fully clothed and
in: Carlo Ginzburg, Spurensicherungen. Über verbor- receiving moonbeams (fig. 64).382 When the
gene Geschichte, Kunst und soziales Gedächtnis, Mu-
nich 1988, p. 234 – 258; Grohé 1996, p. 249 – 261. story’s sexual content is active, Danaë is a
381 Erwin Panofsky, Der gefesselte Eros. Zur Genealogie
von Rembrandts Danaë, in: Oud Holland 50, 1933, negative figure, a symbol of avaritia (avarice), a
p. 193 – 217; Heckscher 1961. whore.383 We only find a positively connoted
382 Panofsky 1933, p. 207.
383 On the connection between images of the figure Dan Danaë when all sexual content is suppressed or
aë, notions of prostitutes and depictions of courte
sans, see: Grohé 1996, p. 250 ff.; Cathy Santore, Danaë:
The Renaissance Courtesan’s Alter Ego, in: Zeitschrift
für Kunstgeschichte 54, 1991, p. 412 – 427. 137
Fig. 65: Master L. D. (Leon Davent),
after Primaticcio, Danaë, c. 1540 – 50,
engraving, Vienna, Albertina
denied. In Italian and Dutch humanist writing, the negative image clearly outweighs
the positive. She represents greed, for example in the writings of Erasmus or van
Mander.384 At the same time there are several instances where the scene in Terence’s
work was used to legitimate behavior following the footsteps of Jupiter. 385
Depictions of Danaë in the early modern

384 Grohé 1996, p. 255 ff.
period essentially followed inventions by 385 Ibid. A Dutch translation was available after 1555 (see
p. 274, note 88). One of the most popular Dutch come
Correggio, Primaticcio (fig. 65) and most of all, dies, Moortje, from 1617 by Bredero is a paraphrase of
Titian (fig. 66).386 Titian found a genius solution Terence’s antique material (p. 255 ff.).
for the dichotomous interpretation of Danaë: In 387 English by translator. For the original quote: “[…] die
his second version from 1554, he split the figure michelangeleske Kühnheit des Hauptmotivs nicht
mehr ertragen wurde […],” see Panofsky 1933, p. 210.
into two women: actual Danaë, young, beautiful, 388 The subject of Danaë remained an inspiration for
erotic phantasies in literature and visual art well into
fair-skinned and fully erotic — without being the modern era. Gustav Klimt’s version from 1907/08
tainted by negative associations. The second (private collection, Graz) is symptomatic as it freezes
the sexual act into an autistic moment of autoeroti-
figure is an old nurse with rough features, dark cism and stages it as a masturbatory act (Daniela
Hammer-Tugendhat, Art, Sexuality 2012 [2000]). In
skin and low social status, greedily snatching the his novel Green Henry, Gottfried Keller recounts an
coins. Titian’s decisive innovation, however, is erotic dream in which he plays a god flying a giant
bee that hovers above the city and lets golden rain fall
that, unlike Correggio and Primaticcio, he on all girls at a marriageable age (New York, 1960 [Zu-
rich 1879]; quoted here after Heckscher 1961, p. 191,
explicitly depicts the sexual act. In Correggio’s note 15).
version, a cloth covers Danaë’s crotch, while 389 Panofsky 1933, p. 193 – 217; Heckscher 1961, p. 187 – 200;
Madlyn Millner-Kahr, Danaë: Virtous, Voluptous, Venal
Primaticcio’s version bans the golden rain to the Woman, in: The Art Bulletin 60, 1978, p. 43 – 55; Ernst
background where it is reduced to an attribute van de Wetering, Het formaat van Rembrandt’s Da-
naë, in: Met eigen ogen. Opstellen aangeboden door
instead remaining of the central point of action. leerlingen en medewerkers aan Hans L.C. Jaffé, Ams-
terdam 1984, p. 67 – 72; RRP, vol. 3, 1989, p. 209 – 223;
Titian let the golden rain fall right between Bal 1991, p. 142 ff.; Grohé 1996, p. 225 – 276 (Chapter
Danaë’s spread thighs, marking it as what it is: 3: “Der entfesselte Eros — Danaë”); Eric Jan Sluijter,
Emulating Sensual Beauty: Representations of Danaë
male semen. This open eroticism was new and from Gossaert to Rembrandt, in: Simiolus 27, 1999,
p. 4 – 45; Sluijter 2006, p. 221 ff. Today the painting
is in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, a canvas of
185 /203 cm, cut on all sides. De Wetering reconstruc-
138 ted the original size by comparing it to a paraphrase by
Fig. 66: Titian, Danaë, 1553/54, canvas, Madrid, Prado
Fig. 67: Orazio Gentileschi, Danaë, c. 1621/22, canvas, Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art
stayed unique. Almost all subsequent versions were based on Titian’s, but not a single
artist followed suit in this regard, because, as Panofsky sublimely puts it, “the Michel
angelesque audacity of the central motif was no longer endured.” 387 And so, Danaë’s pose
was ‘corrected’: She once again reclines on her bed like Venus, with closed thighs, usually
covered with a piece of cloth while the golden
rain falls above or behind her, or is intercepted
Rembrandt’s student Ferdinand Bol on the subject of
Isaac and Esau. Analysis revealed that it was completed by the nurse (in rare cases by Cupid). Thus
and varnished in a first version in 1636, but later paint
ed over by Rembrandt. Due to the date of a second
Danaë advanced to one of the most popular sub-
paraphrase by Bol, David and Salomon from 1646, the jects of erotically charged nude painting during
authors of RRP (vol. 3, 1989, p. 219) assume this as the
terminus ante quem for the final version. Grohé (1996, the Renaissance and Baroque.388
p. 226 – 234) convincingly proposes that Rembrandt
cut the image himself when he was repainting it and
that the similarities between Bol’s David and Salomon Rembrandt’s Danaë follows in the foot
and Rembrandt’s Danaë are not imperative. For stylis
tic reasons the second and final version of the pain- steps of this tradition (plate 8).389 Scholars have
ting indicates that it was made in the latter half of the named versions by the following artists as
1640s. The work was well preserved until as recently as
1985, when it was attacked with sulfuric acid and cut, predecessors for Rembrandt’s version: Annibale
causing extensive damage to the nude.
390 Panofsky 1933, p. 212; Millner-Kahr 1978, p. 51. Carracci390, Orazio Gentileschi (fig. 67) 391, Denys
391 Grohé 1996, p. 244. Calvaert392, Hendrick Goltzius393, Hieronymus
392 Ibid., p. 247.
393 Sluijter 1999 also mentions the other Dutch predeces- Wiericx394 , Jacob Matham (engraving after
sors and at the same time emphasizes the close relation
to Titian.
Abraham Bloemaert)395 and Frans Menton
394 Panofsky 1933, p. 213, as opposed to Grohé 1996, (engraving after Frans Floris)396. Rembrandt was
p. 247.
395 Sluijter 1986, p. 437. surely familiar with these and similar works, but
396 Millner Kahr 1978, p. 53; Tümpel 1969, p. 107 – 198, here: he expunged all traces that depreciate Danaë as
p. 159, fig. p. 161; Grohé 1996, p. 247 f. Already cited in
Richard Judson’s review of Heckscher’s Rembrandt’s a prostitute or signal any moralizing interpre
Anatomy of Dr. Tulp, The Art Bulletin 42, 1960, p. 309.
397 In his etching, Menton already omitted the coins and tation: there are no more coins.397 The golden
replaced them with a beam of light. However, I do not rain is sublimated into pure light. The nurse is
detect any tangible connection to Rembrandt’s solu-
tion. The light beam in Menton’s folio is bundled like freed of her function as the greedy hag trying to
the tail of a comet and is aimed directly at Danaë’s
crotch. The original idea of golden rain is still detect
able and the beam has no influence on the lighting of
the entire scene. 139
Pl. 8: Rembrandt, Danaë,
1636 and 1643 – 49, canvas,
St. Petersburg, Hermitage
Pl. 1: Rembrandt, Bathsheba,

1654, canvas, Paris, Louvre
Pl. 3: Rembrandt, Susanna, 1636,

panel, The Hague, Mauritshuis
snatch the gold. She still participates in the scene, taking in the light beams at Danaë’s
side as she pushes aside the curtain. However, the coins / the golden rain are what trad
itionally marked a nude as Danaë. The lack of this symbol produced a myriad of inter
pretations, of which Smith already captured the essence in the catalogue raisonné of
1836 by titling the work The Lover Expected.398 Later Panofsky’s seminal iconographic-
iconologic analysis fully confirmed that the painting is indeed a depiction of Danaë. He
explains the missing coins with the supposed re-adaptation of the chastity allegory from
medieval tradition. Referencing the myth of Anteros, Panofsky interprets the fettered
Cupid as a sign of forced chastity overcome with
the arrival of Jupiter. His interpretation of the
fettered Cupid motif that is unique in Danaë 398 J. Smith, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Work of the
399 Most Eminent Dutch, Flemish and French Painters,
iconography seems plausible to me. vol. VII, London 1836, no. 173. For at least 12 different
Representing elements from a dramatized plot titles, see RRP, vol. 3, 1989, p. 220.
399 In my opinion, Grohé (1996, p. 236 ff.) goes a bit too
in a performative sense is characteristic for far in his otherwise justified critique of Panofsky. He
exaggerates Panofsky’s interpretation of the painting
Rembrandt: The fettered Cupid represents the as a pure allegory of chastity: “For him [Panofsky]
past, Danaë with her outstretched arms sym Rembrandt’s Danaë is strictly an allegory of chastity.”
(English by translator; p. 269 f., note 37) I do not see
bolizes the present reaching for the liberating this suggested in Panofsky’s text: He rather speaks
future in the form of Jupiter’s bright golden of “forced chastity” (1933, p. 216) and of “unwillingly
suffered loneliness” (p. 217). I agree with Grohé that
light. We are witness to the point in the story explaining the conversion of golden rain into light
does not necessarily require recourse to medieval pu
where one extreme replaces another. In dicita iconography; Panofsky does not equate his ico-
Rembrandt’s early works, the staging of these nographic recourse with an identical interpretation of
content. Grohé, in turn, pays too little attention to the
dramatized plots still seemed very close to the fettered Cupid when he writes: “that he [Rembrandt]
left the Cupid in the image could be explained as an
attempt to preserve a final reference to the identity of
the depicted figure.” (p. 258) However, the fettered Cu-
140 pid was never part of Danaë iconography. When Grohé
theater-like stagings that were typical in Baroque painting. 400 However, Rembrandt’s
Danaë is surely not an allegory of chastity. We do not see a fully clothed allegorical figure
like in medieval depictions, but rather a nude female body. The nudity itself may not
entirely contradict an allegorical reading, but its specific aesthetic staging clearly does.
Rembrandt does everything he can to increase the erotic tension of the scene: the female
body is fully turned to the viewer, there is no fabric to cover her crotch. We are not only
invited to see this body, we are supposed to feel like we could touch it. Rembrandt
achieves this tactile effect with the figure’s pose, the depiction of her skin’s surface and
the staging of light. Unlike versions by Titian and
his successors, Danaë’s body here is not ideal
writes “we cannot speak of a fettered Cupid, it rather ized, linear, or almost geometrically abstract.
encourages an unleashing,” he employs an antagonism
that is not visible as such in the image; the polarity be Instead, it seems like we can feel the heaviness
tween fettering and unleashing Cupid can be defused by of her inclining belly; we see a real body propped
reading the image as a performative temporal sequence.
400 See, for example, The Rape of Europe. Amy Golahny on the bedding and pillows. This becomes most
(Rembrandt’s Europa. In and Out of Pictorial and Tex-
tual Tradition, in: Freedman, Huber-Rebenich 2001,
obvious in the positioning of her left breast,
p. 39 – 55) was able to identify a correspondence to which is squeezed together as it rests upon her
Aristotle’s concept of peripeteia and Vondel’s Staetve-
randeringe. hand and the pillow. The contact between hand
401 See below, Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Kunst der and breast further heightens the impression of
Imagination / Imagination der Kunst. Die Pantoffeln
Samuel van Hoogstratens, in: Klaus Krüger, Alessan- tactility. The slippers in front of the bed empha
dro Nova (eds.), Imagination und Wirklichkeit. Zum
Verhältnis von mentalen und realen Bildern in der size the erotic character of the painting. In Dutch
Kunst der frühen Neuzeit, Mainz 2000, p. 139 – 153, painting (and poetry), shoes and slippers were
here: p. 148; Eddy de Jongh, Erotika in vogelperspec-
tief: de dubbelzinnigheid van een reeks zeventiende- metaphors for female genitals. 401 The shoes’
eeuwse genrevoorstellingen, in: Simiolus 3, 1968 – 69,
p. 22 – 74, here: p. 36 – 37; Eddy de Jongh 1976 (exh. cat.
Amsterdam), p. 259 – 261; Handwörterbuch des deut-
schen Aberglaubens 1987, 7, cols. 1292 – 1354. 141
Fig. 68:
Giulio Bonasone,
Danaë, engraving,
Vienna, Albertina
position accentuates the turning point in the story: lying directly beneath Cupid and
Danaë, only the opening of the left shoe, pointing towards Jupiter, faces the viewer.
Considering the above, how can we interpret the transformation from gold coins
into immaterial light? Light is a central category in Rembrandt’s work, it is a fundamental
signifier. 402 Its source here can be assumed in the top left corner. The light beam enters
through the curtain held open by the nurse and pours itself onto Danaë. Her body, in
turn, is composed of light and dark parts — even more than in other nudes by Rembrandt
like the concurrently produced first version of Susanna (plate 3) or Bathsheba (plate 1), which
he painted later. Danaë’s entire body is illuminated by the light and the white bedding
enveloping her produces the impression of a glowing aureole. Jupiter’s beam seems to
create Danaë’s physical body while she also appears to glow from within. This auto-
illuminating effect is also noticeable in the fettered Cupid, his golden glowing body not
only stands out from the background, but is accompanied by a halo-like beam of light on
the left. This light from two sources, or doubled light, corresponds to Danaë’s pose: she
actively turns towards the light, or Jupiter. The ambivalent gesture of the outstretched
arm is reminiscent of expectation or greeting, and maybe also expresses surprise by the
light’s glare. Her gaze is not directed upward, at the sky. Thus the light apparently is not
emitted by a stellar source, but rather comes from a male protagonist. Werner Weisbach
claims that the painting could not possibly be of Danaë because of this gaze; he sees Venus
awaiting Mars. 403 Danaë’s gaze, together with her active gesture and the sensuality of her
nude body, makes it impossible to read this painting as an allegory of chastity. Dissolving
the coins into light, on the other hand, signals that it also cannot be an allegory of
142
avaritia. The doubled light, which Panofsky and Grohé describe as “irrational” and
“diffuse and not quite logic” 404 , respectively, plays a substantial role for the conclusion
that this is neither a portrayal of chastity nor of avarice. After all, Danaë neither has to
look up at physical coins nor to a divine being. What we see before us is a sensually
staged female nude awaiting her (male) partner. Setting out from the story’s narrative
tradition, Rembrandt’s specific aesthetic staging achieves a shift in the interpretation of
the theme’s content by transcending the dichotomy of earlier interpretations. He does
everything to create a female figure that is as sensual and erotic as possible, while re
fraining from any moralizing judgment of said sensuality. Instead, the glowing light lifts
the entire scene into a ‘godly’ sphere. What we see here is the staging of desire — a desire
that turns into a form of elevation as the coins are turned into doubled light. Perhaps it is
even an ascent from desire to love. 405
Rembrandt indeed created an alternative Danaë figure and with it a new kind of
female representation. We have already encountered this remarkable concept of femini
nity that entitles women to be individuals who desire (without any negative connotation)
in our analysis of Woman in Bed. 406 In the case of Danaë, Mieke Bal and Madlyn Millner-
Kahr both address this type of femininity. Millner-Kahr describes Rembrandt’s conception
of Danaë as unique because she is depicted as a woman who can give and receive love.
The author adds: “A sexual woman is neither a
saint nor a sinner, victim nor seductress, but a
402 See, a. o. Pächt 1991, p. 79 – 96; Ernst van de Wetering, participant in full humanity.” 407 Mieke Bal
Rembrandt und das Licht, in: Klaus Albrecht Schröder, describes Danaë: “Her beauty, desired by both
Marian Bisanz-Prakken (eds.), Rembrandt, exh. cat.
Albertina, Vienna, Munich 2004, p. 27 – 39; Daniela the pre-textual desiring Zeus and the viewer, is
Hammer-Tugendhat, Gott im Schatten? Zur Bedeu-
tung des Lichts bei Caravaggio und Rembrandt, in: not an object for possession taking. She
Christina Lechtermann, Haiko Wandhoff (eds.), Licht, emphatically disposes of it herself.” 408 Stefan
Glanz, Blendung. Beiträge zu einer Kulturgeschichte
des Leuchtenden, Publikationen zur Zeitschrift für Grohé, who rightly emphasizes the image’s
Germanistik, NF, vol. 18, Bern 2008, p. 177 – 189.
403 Werner Weisbach, Rembrandt, Berlin, Leipzig 1926, eminent erotic quality, describes her as having
p. 242. “more dignity” and recognizes that she is “not
404 Panofsky 1933, p. 212; Grohé 1996, p. 229.
405 Herein lies the difference to related works by, for ex- made into an available object of lust to the same
ample, Carracci and Orazio Gentileschi, which also
aim at erotic stimulation, but adhere to Danaë’s sky-
extent as” in Bonasone’s engraving (fig. 68). 409
ward gaze and the coins. The subject here is not just a female nude.
406 It has been pointed out that Woman in Bed has many
similarities to Danaë. The female figure in the former, After all, Rembrandt could have just painted a
however, is reversed, reduced to a half-length and Venus. His Danaë follows the tradition of
no longer thematically tied to a specific iconography.
X-rays of Danaë have shown that the position of her Venus depictions, but without being a Venus.
hand was originally conceived differently; Grohé (1996,
p. 228) believes that she pushed aside the curtain on Rembrandt does not depict the main event of
her own in the first version, just like The Woman in the story, but rather the moment preceding it.
Bed. If Rembrandt painted over Danaë in the 1640s,
the two images would also have been painted around Therefore it is up to the viewer to imagine the
the same time.
407 Millner-Kahr 1978, p. 54 f.
408 Bal 1991, p. 169.
409 Grohé 1996, p. 259. 143
actual event: the actual sexual act. Millner-Kahr, and even more so Bal, explicitly pinpoint
the image’s eminent sexual content instead of studiously ignoring it. Their analyses not
only counter iconographic-iconologic readings of Danaë, but also keep the category of
gender in mind. 410 However, an exclusively female-oriented art history, focusing solely on
the representation of women, will fall short: the problem is the definition of gender
relations. Since the myth at hand is about (heterosexual) copulation, it is important to
also ask about male representation and male sexuality in the painting. In the field of
sexual representation, masculinity and femininity are ascribed diametrical roles. In
Rembrandt’s Danaë, the male protagonist is not even represented as golden rain (like in
Titian’s version and those of his successors). Instead, it is completely spiritualized into
light. In this image of a sexual act, masculinity is imagined as spiritual/mental/intellectual
(das Geistige). Danaë, on the other hand, is physically fully present. Masculinity is co-
constructed in the image, even or because it is not explicitly portrayed. What is striking
about this form of representation is how the male body and male desire during a sexual
act are rendered invisible. The presumed male viewer can fantasize himself into Jupiter’s
position and simultaneously imagine himself — also in regard to the sexual act — as a
spiritual form. The female body is the foil for projections of sexuality, eroticism and physi
cality, 411 while male sexuality and male physicality are not subjects of representation.
The philogynist depiction of Danaë also allows women to identify themselves with the
image. Ultimately, male and female viewers alike had internalized a set of gender-specific
patterns, which were also perpetuated by images like Danaë.
This construction of masculinity, and the polarization of gender relations that

comes with it, can also be found in the discourse on conception that was prevalent at the
time. During the 17 th century, different attempts were made to explain the phenomenon
of procreation. 412 Following Aristotle, it was assumed that male semen was immaterial.
Scientists associated with William Harvey interpreted conception as a type of infection:
“Male semen is not sperm; the mind and soul are what we call life and they are related to
light.”413 In medical theory, male semen was described as aura seminalis, or the energizing
essence of a spiritual substance. Rembrandt may not have been familiar with the theory,
but his paintings are just as much part of the discourse on gender differences as are these
theories on conception. In this particular discourse, masculinity — including sexuality —
is conceived as spirituality, while femininity represents matter and body. The basic idea
linking masculinity to activity, spirituality and culture and femininity to passivity, body
and nature can be traced back to Aristotle’s procreative theory. This theory, in turn, is
part of his substance theory, in which every thing consists of form and matter. The active
(male) form is morphe while hylae is passive (female) matter. Aristotle’s theories massive-
ly influenced all medical and natural philosophical theory that followed. 414 During the
144
17 th century, these notions were still highly productive in both common knowledge and
medical science. On an aesthetic level the male part of the sexual act in Rembrandt’s
work appears as light, while procreation theory from the time suggests the fully analog
notion of aura seminalis.
Pornography?
There are only few instances in art from the early modern age that explicitly depict
men performing sexual acts. We usually encounter them in graphic arts — we will take a
look at Rembrandt’s erotic graphic works further
below. The most famous instance of an explicit
410 Grohé (1996, p. 258) also lays emphasis on the
image’s erotic content, which preeminently addresses representation are undoubtedly I Modi by Marc
the visual desires of the viewer, “whose erotic fanta-
sies are supposed to be stimulated by the sensual antonio Raimondi, a cycle of sixteen folios after
nude” (English by translator); Sluijter (1986, p. 195 f.) drawings by Giulio Romano, depicting different
generally describes the contemporaneity of “zinneprik-
keling” (tingling sensation) and “bevestiging van de sex positions (fig. 69). 415 The Modi caused a huge
kuisheidsmoraal die op de gevaren van zinnelijkheid
wijst” (the consolidation of chastity morals, which scandal: Marcantonio, the engraver, was forced
point to the reception of sensuality) in this case ap- to destroy most of the printing plates and was
plied to Diana and her Nymphs Bathing, with Actaeon
and Callisto. The same can be found in Schama 1999, then imprisoned; the series was prohibited.
p. 387 – 389.
411 Grohé (1996, especially p. 258 f.) interprets the omis
Censorship was so efficient that only a few
sion of rain as an even more accessable possibility for marginal elements of the originals are left.
the viewer to identify himself. However, he does not
go beyond this statement and thus does not ask about However, a series of woodcuts — copies of the
the consequences for masculinity or the production of original engravings — with verses by Aretino was
gender difference.
412 Laqueur 1992, p. 165 – 171; Gianna Pomata, Vollkom- published shortly after and somehow managed
men oder verdorben? Der männliche Samen im früh-
neuzeitlichen Europa, in: L’HOMME, Zeitschrift für to escape the censors. The fact that I Modi were
Geschichtswissenschaft 2, 1995, p. 59 – 85. graphic art and thus available to a broader
413 Carlo Musitano, De morbis mulierum Tractatus, Genf
1709, 26B, quoted after Pomata 1995, p. 77, note 63. audience instead of a social elite is what made
414 Danielle Jacquart, Claude Thomasset, Sexualité et sa-
voir médical au Moyen-Age, Paris 1985; Isnard Frank, them so dangerous. 416 This was surely not the
Femina est mas occasionatus. Deutung und Folge- sole reason for censorship. The subjects were
rung bei Thomas von Aquin, in: Peter Segl (ed.), Der
Hexenhammer. Entstehung und Umfeld des Malleus deemed highly scandalous because they depict
maleficarum von 1487, Cologne 1988, p. 71 – 102.
415 Lynne Lawner, I Modi: the Sixteen Pleasures: an
ed sex positions without any trace of mytho
Erotic Album of the Italian Renaissance: Giulio Ro- logical pretense; male protagonists are fully
mano, Marcantonio Raimondi, Pietro Aretino, and
Count Jean-Frederic-Maximilien de Waldeck, Evanston visible during copulation. Around the same time,
1988; Bette Talvacchia, Figure lascive per trastullo de in 1527, Caraglio made the series Loves of the
l’ingegno, in: Giulio Romano, exh. cat. Milan 1980,
p. 277 – 287; Talvacchia, Taking Positions. On the Erotic Gods after drawings by Perino del Vaga and
in Renaissance Culture, Princeton 1999; Henri Zerner,
L’Estampe érotique au temps de Titien, in: Tiziano e Rosso Fiorentino, which also contain very expli
Venezia, exh. cat. 1980, p. 85 – 90. cit scenes (fig. 70). 417 They include a hitherto
416 Ginzburg 1988, p. 234 – 258; Bette Talvacchia 1989,
p. 277. unseen exposure of female genitals to the (male)
417 Suzanne Boorsch, John T. Spike (eds.), A. Bartsch. The
Illustrated Bartsch 28 (Le Peintre Graveur 15/1), New
York 1985, p. 86 – 100; see also the commentary and
the essay by Madeline Cirillo Archer, ibid., p. 97 – 99. 145
Fig. 69: I Modi, woodcut after
engraving from Marcantonio
Raimondi from 1527 (after drawings
by Giulio Romano)
Fig. 70: Gian Giacomo Caraglio

(after Perino del Vaga), Merkur and
Herse, from: Love of the Gods, 1527,
engraving, Hamburg, Kunsthalle
Fig. 71: Gian Giacomo Caraglio, Pan

and Diana, from: Love of the Gods,
1527, engraving
gaze of the viewer. However, the direct presentation of female sex organs did not seem to
cause much offence. The relationship between the protagonists in the incriminated Modi
are marked by an unusual degree of parity. The female figures are equally active and have
a gaze; at the same time, the male protagonists are visibly involved in the depicted sexual
acts. There are only few images in Caraglio’s series in which we see the male figures
engaged in sex. Unsurprisingly, none of these folios exist in their original form; the small
number of preserved later versions and copies are all damaged in the significant places
(fig. 71). 418 At the same time, engravings of Danaë, like the one by Bonasone (fig. 68), which
could not expose female genitalia any more voyeuristically do not seem to have irritated
censors that much.
I had suspected that the scandalous effect was caused less by the fact that
the images were not mythologized and more by the fact that men were rendered
visible during coitus. This was confirmed on closer examination of reception and art-
historic literature on these images. Cecil Gould, for example, writes about Correggio’s
Loves of Jupiter:
The fact that all four remain great art and not pornography is partly due
to the extreme skill and delicacy of the painter, and partly also to the fact
that none of them includes the form of a man, Jupiter having assumed
various disguises — an eagle, a swan, a cloud, and a shower of gold — in
order to further his designs. 419
146
The decision whether an image is deemed art or pornography, and thus whether
it is included or excluded from the higher realm of art, is not based on the obscenity of
an explicit depiction of female sexuality, but rather on the visibility of a male protagonist in
a sexual context. The denial of male sexuality and its sublimation into the metaphysical —
even during sexual acts — is perpetuated in art-
historic texts on mythological sexual themes.
Bock von Wülfingen, for example, makes the
418 Freedberg (1989, p. 362 – 365, figs. 172 – 174) points out
a similar case of censorship: The etching Venus, Vulcan following point in his text on Titian’s Danaë,
and Mars by Enea Vico after Parmigianino from 1543
is preserved in three different stages: The original which Panofsky described as a “remarkable little
version depicts Vulcan working in his workshop with monograph” 420:
naked Mars and Venus making love on a bed in the
background. In the second version, the lovers are
erased from the printing plate. The third, corrected
and final version shows only Venus, reclining on the A human being, in the form of a
bed with spread legs. woman surrendering herself, is
419 Cecil Gould, The Paintings of Correggio, London 1976,
p. 132. touched by the supernatural in
420 Erwin Panofsky, Problems in Titian. Mostly Iconogra-
phic, New York 1969, p. 12, note 10.
form of a divine rain that falls as
421 English by translator. German original: “Der Mensch, the sonorous tinkling of coins.
in Gestalt eines sich hingebenden Weibes, empfängt
eine Berührung aus dem Überirdischen in Gestalt von Behind the polarity of the sexes in
göttlichem Regen, der in klingenden Goldstücken her male action and female endurance
abspringt. Hinter der Polarität der Geschlechter im
männlichen Handeln und weiblichen Erleiden wird a second analog becomes visible,
analog eine zweite sichtbar, in der das Weibliche für
das Irdische, das Männliche für den Geist und das in which femininity stands for all
Metaphysische steht.” In: Ordenberg Bock von Wül- things earthly and masculinity for
fingen, Tiziano Vecellio, Danaë, Stuttgart 1958, p. 20.
I would like to thank Alexandra Pätzold for introducing spirit and the metaphysical. 421
me to von Wülfingen’s monograph. Our conversations
in front of Danaë at Vienna’s KHM were the starting
point and inspiration for me to further delve into the
subject. 147
Fig. 72: Coitus, fresko,
Pompeii, Casa del Centenario
IX, 8, 3 (Cubiculum 43),
1st century AD, Pompeii
Most often art-historic literature attempts to justify that women are portrayed in
suggestive positions and thus exposed to the male gaze with the fact that the artists who
made the images were men. Scholars claim that male artists naturally painted female
nudes without including male competition into the image and naturally constructed the
image so they could fantasize themselves into the position of the (divine) sexual partner.
I would like to counter this opinion with two thoughts. Firstly, it is necessary to look
beyond a purely phenomenological observation, because, as I have pointed out, the male
viewer cannot only envision himself as the invisible figure, but can even imagine himself
as spirituality within the sexual act. Secondly, the reasoning here is wrong: it has nothing
to do with anything being natural. For our own understanding it may be helpful to take a
closer look at alternative approaches. I have already pointed out that in medieval courtly
art, male figures were fully included in erotic depictions. A brief excursus into Antiquity
will help put modern conceptions in perspective.
In Roman society during the reign of Augustus, images of sexual scenes were
understood differently. Newer research has successfully demonstrated that coitus scenes,
most of which we know from Pompeii and Rome, not only decorated walls in brothels, as
was assumed for a long time. In the form of frescoes and small pictures, they could also
be found in the bedrooms of respectable Roman citizens (fig. 72). 422 Coitus scenes were
additionally found on daily objects such as lamps and mirrors. The scenes depict couples
in different sex positions, pleasuring themselves on beds mostly set in sparse interiors.
Giulio Romano must have been inspired by these antique images when drawing I Modi. 423
However, the highly dissimilar context reveals how truly different these images were: the
Roman images were socially accepted works of art openly displayed in the living quarters
of wealthy Romans; they were objects of daily use seen by both men and women. In
contrast, the Modi were graphics intended for private, perhaps secret use (by men only?).
148
Fig. 73: Rembrandt,
Ledikant, 1646,
etching, Paris,
Bibliotheque nat.
de France
They definitely did not officially adorn any married couple’s bedroom. Roman society did
not view these images as scandalous, unlike the 19th century archeologists who found
them during excavations in Pompeii and promptly labeled them as pornography. These
differing perceptions cannot be fully credited to a principally altered view on women;
Roman, 16th century and 19th century societies alike were fully patriarchal (albeit in differ
ent forms). What had changed, however, was the opinion on sexuality. Myerowitz convin
cingly demonstrates that for Roman men, erotic images were like mirrors of themselves.424
Not only women, but also men functioned as objects of desire in these images. At the
time in Rome, art was understood as a mirror, as a kind of doubling of real life. Sexuality
was one of many layers in representing a male self.
One objection and three possible answers — Rembrandt’s erotic graphic works
Above I observe that Rembrandt exclusively represented sexuality — in accordance

with prevalent image culture in Holland at the time — with female bodies and even trans
lated male protagonists partaking in sex into a spiritual concept. However, one could
argue that I have withheld works that counter this proposition: What about works such as
Ledikant (The French Bed) (fig. 73), Monk in a Cornfield (fig. 74, p. 152), or the two versions
of Jupiter and Antiope (fig. 75 and fig. 76)? The first two are depictions of coitus showing a
male protagonist, while the latter are explicitly erotic folios representing men as desiring
figures. In the following I will address this valid objection to my previous observations.
My three-layered answer can help us get a firmer
grasp on the problem of gender asymmetry in
422 Amy Richlin (ed.), Pornography and Representation in
Greece and Rome, Oxford 1992, especially the essay by the representational field of sexuality.
Molly Myerowitz, The Domestication of Desire. Ovid’s
Parva Tabella and the Theater of Love, p. 131 – 157.
423 Talvacchia 1980, p. 277.
424 Myerowitz 1992, p. 131 – 157. 149
Fig. 75: Rembrandt, Jupiter and Antiope, 1631, etching, London, British Museum
Fig. 76: Rembrandt, Jupiter and Antiope, 1659, etching, Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum
First, we must give some consideration to the prevalent tradition and the distinc
tive features of Rembrandt’s erotic folios. In the 17 th century there were two basic tradi
tions for erotica: One followed German-Dutch tradition, which was predominantly marked
by reformatory, moralizing and mostly anti-clerical attitudes. The other was oriented
toward the Italian Renaissance, resorting to antique and mythological themes. It makes
sense to further subdivide the Italian strain into two groups: works depicting the ‘loves
of gods’ and the Arcadian-pastoral genre, which developed in Venetian panel painting in
the early 16th century among Giorgione’s circles. Rembrandt catered to all three groups.
It has been verified that he owned a collection of erotica, labeled bouleringe (amours) in
the inventory from 1656, including works by Raphael, Rosso, Annibale Carracci and
Bonasone. 425 Both folios of Jupiter and Antiope (fig. 75 and fig. 76), from 1631 and 1659, be
long to the Italian mythologizing group. Almost all scholars agree that Annibale Carracci’s
folio of Jupiter and Antiope from 1592 was the model. 426 The pose of the reclining nude in
Rembrandt’s younger folio, however, is so strikingly similar to Correggio’s Venus in the
painting Jupiter and Antiope (or Terrestrial Venus) (fig. 77) that Rembrandt must have been
familiar with some sort of graphic reflex of the painting. 427 The tiny engraving of the Monk
in the Cornfield from 1646 (fig. 74, p. 152) clearly follows the tradition of Nordic reformatory
graphic art, which thrived at poking fun at sexual transgressions committed by the
Catholic clerus. This particular image goes back to an engraving by Heinrich Aldegrever
from the first half of the 16th century, which was copied and varied multiple times (fig. 78,
p. 152). 428 Rembrandt adopted the pastoral genre in the etching The Flute Player from 1642,
but included an ironic twist (fig. 79, p. 153): the rough shepherd aims both his gaze and the
flute directly under the skirt of the wreath-making shepherdess. 429 Thus the manifest
sexual content of the pastoral idyll is simultaneously spelled out and unmasked.
150
Fig. 77: Correggio, Jupiter and Antiope, c. 1528, canvas, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 73: Rembrandt, Ledikant, 1646, etching, Paris, Bibliotheque nat. de France
The most remarkable work among Rembrandt’s erotica is surely Ledikant or The
French Bed, an etching from 1646 depicting copulation in a large canopy bed (fig. 73). It
must have been a wholly new image for Rembrandt’s contemporaries, since it neither
follows the mythologized tradition nor the German-Dutch one. The sexual act is not
glossed over with antique themes; there is no god in disguise, no idealized female nude,
no abstract or antique setting. All we see is a boy, a girl and a bed in a domestic setting.
The folio can also not be ascribed to the genre of bordeeltjes, or brothel images, which
had been popular in Holland since the 16th century. Typical bordeeltjes reflect a shady and
semi-public atmosphere. They are marked by coupling figures as well as accompanying
activities such as food, drink and dance. 430 Debate on the appropriate role and site of
sexuality was sparked by the Reformation and
Luther’s plead for matrimony and was further
425 Strauss, van der Meulen 1979, p. 349 – 387, no. 232. intensified by Counter-Reformation. Ledikant is a
426 See exh. cat. Vienna 2004, p. 164, no. 67 and 68. Also
includes further literature. visual statement contributing to the discussion:
427 White 1999, p. 207 f.; Holm Bevers, Jasper Kettner,
Gudula Metze (eds.), Rembrandt. Ein Virtuose der it clearly asserts that the site of sexuality is the
Druckgraphik, exh. cat. Kupferstichkabinett Staatliche private home. Due to its aesthetic staging, the
Museen Berlin, Berlin, Cologne 2006, p. 165.
428 See the detailed contribution in: Erik Hinterding, Ger scene maintains an erotic atmosphere while
Luiten, Martin Royalton Kisch (eds.), Rembrandt the
Printmaker, exh. cat. Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Brit
refraining from any associations to ‘matrimonial
ish Museum London, 2000, p. 221 f., no. 53. duty.’ Man and woman are equally present in the
429 Alison McNeil Kettering, The Dutch Arcadia: Pasto-
ral Art and its Audience in the Golden Age, Montclair image; it is neither a scene of seduction nor of
1983. rape. Whether the man is actually a member of
430 On brothel images, see: Nanette Salomon, Early
Netherlandish Bordeeltjes and the Construction of So- the household or an (illegitimate) visitor — as
cial “Realities,” in: Wheelock, Seeff 2000, p. 141 – 163;
Konrad Renger, Lockere Gesellschaft. Zur Ikonogra- the hat displayed on the bedpost and the door
fie des Verlorenen Sohnes und von Wirtshausszenen left slightly ajar in the back left may suggest —
in der niederländischen Malerei, Berlin 1970; Lotte
C. van de Pol, Beeld en werkelijkheid van de prostitu- remains unclear.
tie in de zeventiende eeuw, in: Gert Hekma, Herman
Roodenburg, Soete minne en helsche bosheit. Seksu-
ele voorstelingen in Nederland 1300 – 1850, Nijmegen
1988, p. 109 – 144. 151
Fig. 74: Rembrandt, The Monk in a Cornfield, c. 1646, etching, Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale
Fig. 78: Heinrich Aldegrever, Monk and Nun in a Cornfield, early 16th century, engraving,
This leads us to our first question: How was this folio received? How the discipline
of art history has dealt with Rembrandt’s erotica in general and this folio in particular is
highly revealing. In Rembrandt’s Radierungen by Sträter and Bode from 1886, the authors
dismiss the mere thought that the erotica could be the work of this master. 431 In Singer’s
Klassiker der Kunst from 1906 on Rembrandt’s etchings, the erotica are the only images
not pictured. Christopher White was the first to discuss Rembrandt’s erotic folios in
Rembrandt as an Etcher from 1969: “To the best of my knowledge, Rembrandt’s interest
in erotic subject matter has never been fully emphasized or discussed.”432 It was not until
1983 that Ledikant was thoroughly analyzed: To this day Werner Busch’s analysis remains
the most elaborate and only one. 433 Busch still adheres to the notion that the depiction
needs “thematic justification,” which he believes to be the Prodigal Son. 434 Busch detects
relics of the respective iconography in the feathered hat and the glass on the table next to
the bed. In his actual interpretation, however, Busch emphasizes the uniqueness of the
etching and admits that the execution of the subject renders “the didactic usability of the
scene useless.” He continues: “This ambiguity, like emphasis itself, furthers the focus on
what is private, individual and unburdened by referential meaning.” 435 I highly doubt that
props such as a feathered hat and a glass are enough to identify the Prodigal Son.
Rembrandt loved feathered hats and, as someone who enjoyed masquerade and disguise,
portrayed several men wearing this type of hat who were definitely neither the Prodigal
Son nor soldiers. One example is the harpist in The Music Party from 1626. I find it at
least questionable to insist on a legitimizing motif in Rembrandt’s era. Perhaps the props
offered the option of a double entendre, thus providing cover for the erotic kick. Art
historians generally only relied on written sources by Calvinist moralists such as Cats,
152
Fig. 79: Rembrandt,
The Flute Player, 1642, etching,
London, British Museum
Camphuysen or Pels while ignoring other sources. One exception is Eddy de Jongh’s
well-founded survey A Bird’s-Eye View of Erotica. Double Entendre in a Series of Seventeenth-
Century Genre Scenes. 436 De Jongh points out
that the sexual innuendos found in Dutch im-
431 N. Sträter, W. Bode, Rembrandt’s Radierungen, in: Re-
pertorium für Kunstwissenschaft 9, 1886, p. 259. On
ages and poetic texts were not intended to be
this, see: Werner Busch, Rembrandts ‘Ledikant’— der moralizing and thus garnered attack by moral
Verlorene Sohn im Bett, in: Oud Holland 97, 1983,
p. 257 – 265, here: p. 257. ists. Other sources could be more useful, such
432 White 1969, vol. I, p. 165, note 29. as medical advice books like Schat der gesontheyt
433 Busch 1983, p. 257 – 265. Even Rembrandt the Print
maker (Amsterdam, London 2000, no. 52, p. 218 – 220), by Johan van Beverwijck, published 1643 in
the only of many exhibition catalogs on Rembrandt’s
graphic works to deal with the folio in more depth, Amsterdam; or the most popular handbook on
lacks all continuative thoughts. eroticism and sexuality, Venus minsieke gasthuis
434 Ibid., p. 259.
435 English by translator, German original: “die didakti- from 1683, the Dutch adaptation of Nicolas
sche Verwertbarkeit der Szene entfällt” and “Diese
Uneindeutigkeit jedoch fördert, wie die Hervorhebung Venette’s famous handbook.437 The latter includes
selbst, die Konzentration auf das Private, das Indivi- advice on how to maximize pleasure during
duelle, von verweisendem Sinn Unbelastete,” Busch
1983, p. 262. sexual intercourse. Dutch humanist Johan de
436 Eddy de Jongh, A Bird’s-Eye View of Erotica. Double
Entendre in a Series of Seventeenth-Century Genre
Brune wrote that Dutch men and women knew
Scenes, in: Questions of Meaning. Theme and Motif all kinds of variations and tricks and could thus
in Dutch Seventeenth-Century Painting, Leiden 2000,
p. 22 – 58 (Erotika in vogelperspectief: de dubbelzinnig- easily do without Aretino’s Poses.438 Even Calvinist
heid van een reeks zeventiende-eeuwse genrevoorstel- priest Petrus Wittewrongel agreed that lively
lingen, in: Simiolus 3, 1968 – 69, p. 22 – 74).
437 Hekma, Roodenburg 1988, especially Donald Haks, Li- sexuality was not only free of sin, but desirable —
bertinisme en Nederlands verhalend Prosa 1650 – 1700,
p. 85 – 107, here: p. 97; Wijnand W. Mijnhardt, Politics of course only within marriage. 439 Most of all,
and Pornography in the Seventeenth- and Eighteenth- however, I would like to point out the literature
Century Dutch Republic, in: Lynn Hunt (ed.), The In-
vention of Pornography: Obscenity and the Origins of of the time, the poems, songs and novels.
Modernity, 1500 – 1800, Cambridge 1993, p. 283 – 300.
438 Mijnhardt, op. cit.
439 On Wittewrongel’s Öconomia christiana from 1655,
see: Haks 1988, p. 97; Mijnhardt, op. cit. 153
Especially picaresque novels and comedies contained and praised extramarital sex with
out resorting to any moralizing legitimization. 440 Unlike the situation in the country of its
origin, the pornographic novel L’Ecole des filles was not only freely available in the
Netherlands during the 1660s, but even publicly put on display in bookshops. 441 It was
not until the mid-18th century that this (relative) permissiveness in the Netherlands was
restrained, leading to the censoring or destruction of certain works. Even the work of
Jacob Cats was cleared of all potentially erotic phrasings, even though it is considered
restrictive per se within 17 th century literature. 442 As I have noted, this subject is in great
need of interdisciplinary research. Nonetheless, it already seems apparent that our view
on how sexuality was perceived in 17 th century Holland is still strongly influenced by
19th century discourse and thus requires scholarly review.
In conclusion we can ascertain that Rembrandt’s etching of two clothed partners
copulating in a domestic setting is presented in an intimate and erotic manner. Art histo
rians deemed this portrayal intolerable and consequently excluded it from the master’s
oeuvre, contrary to images like Danaë. The motif in Danaë is also coitus and the female
protagonist is even nude, but the male protagonist in this image remains invisible.
In order to assess gender-specific differentiation in the field of sexuality and re-

presentation, we must examine how protagonists are depicted and placed. The two copu
lation scenes Ledikant and The Monk include a male protagonist, but in both cases he is
only shown from the back and wearing clothes. Traditionally, Jupiter and Antiope is a scene
of voyeurism and not copulation, unlike, for example, Leda, which is usually presented in
the Michelangelesque version of Jupiter in the guise of a swan in actu. Keeping the scene
voyeuristic in Jupiter and Antiope ensures that the tradition of only presenting a female
nude and female genitalia is adhered to. The satyr, meanwhile, fulfills the role of uncov
ering and watching the female figure. Moreover, male desire is not demonstrated with
a male figure, but with a satyr, regardless whether it is Jupiter as a satyr or just a satyr.
(This in turn would make the female figure Venus or a nymph and not Antiope, a ques
tion still disputed in literature.) As mentioned above, the figure of the satyr allowed the
representation of (male) sexual appetite and libidinous desire while maintaining a differ
ence to men. Christian tradition contaminated the traditional image of antique figures like
Pan and satyrs by turning them into devil-like, caprine creatures with hooves, horns and
tails. The semantic shift that these figures underwent illustrates the deep rift between
antique and Christian culture. In Christianity, libido and unbridled sexuality equaled evil.
In other words: the incarnation of evil in Christian culture was libido and sexuality. In the
terms of Ludwig Jäger, one could say: The process of transcription (Transkription) rewrites
the script (Skript) or original image, changing its meaning. 443 When we see a satyr, our
visual memory automatically associates it with an image of the devil.
154
As a result, the male viewer does not have to feel mirrored in the image. He is able
to desire the sleeping beauty while distancing himself from his own libidinous desire
through the satyr. Moreover, the two figures Jupiter/satyr and Antiope/Venus are depicted
in a highly contrasting manner. The female body is erotically staged to the maximum:
sleeping, passive and fully surrendered, this female body is the epitome of an object of
desire. Meanwhile the satyr is active and, like the viewer, has the power of the gaze. In the
early folio his body is only sketched out with a few lines, while it disappears in the
shadows in the later version.
Next to asking about reception within art-historical research and examining the
aesthetic staging, the crucial question is which medium is used. It has often been
pointed out that there is a correlation between the development of graphic art — and with
it the possibility to distribute erotic art to a mass audience — and the development of
pornography. 444 I would like to highlight another aspect. We can observe similar
differences between panel painting and graphic art as the ones Bachorski established in
varying discourses and genres of early modern literature. What we expect in one genre or
medium can be completely taboo in another (like drolls or farces).
If one defines genres as ‘relatively

stable literary schemata of meaning
(Sinnschemata) or bundles of norms
440 On songs, see: Nevitt 2003; on comedies, see: Leuker
1992; on picaresque novels, see: Haks 1988. (Normenbündel) […] which display
441 Mijnhardt 1993. themselves as patterns or expecta-
442 Ibid. Mijnhardt describes the special status of the
Netherlands. He demonstrates the connection be tions in the author’s or reader’s
tween pornography, philosophy and politics, which
gave pornography such a subversive edge, particularly roles,’ then one assumes that they
in England and France. In the Netherlands, however, take part in constituting meaning
bourgeois society prevented this development.
443 I am referring to the lecture: Transkriptive Verfahren. in discursive fields. 445
Zur medialen Logik der kulturellen Semantik, at IFK
Vienna, December 15, 2003 and our joint workshop,
also held at IFK Vienna on January 9, 2004. I would like to point out a link between
444 Ginzburg 1988 (1983); Hunt 1994.
445 English by translator. German original: “Definiert man media (panel painting and graphic art), different
Gattungen als ‘relativ stabile literarische Sinnschema-
ta bzw. Normenbündel […], die sich in der Autor- und
forms of representation (in the field of sexuality)
Leserolle als Muster, beziehungsweise Erwartungen and public or private space. 446 The point is that
abbilden,’ dann unterstellt man ihnen eine Leistung
bei der Sinnkonstitution in diskursiven Feldern”; there is a difference within the bourgeois home
Bachorski 1991, p. 534 with a quote from Jürgen Link, that goes beyond the already established differ
Ursula Link-Heer, Literatursoziologisches Propädeuti-
kum, Munich 1980, p. 393. ence between public life and private sphere.
446 In the medium panel painting overtly suggestive de-
pictions were taboo; a telling anecdote was told by Within the home there was a difference between
Arnold Houbraken (Grosse Schouburgh der nieder- sites of bourgeois self-representation and fully
ländischen Maler und Malerinnen, Amsterdam 1718,
translated into German by Alfred von Wurzbach, Vienna private and intimate spaces, which were literally
1880, p. 63). Houbraken recounts the story of a painter
named Johann Torrentius who was tortured to death
in 1627 because his pictures were too brazen. See: De
Jongh 1968/69, p. 68. 155
shifted into secrecy or defined as secret sites. Even in the medium of panel painting there
was a distinction between public and private representation in homes; the two portraits
of Willem van Heijthuysen by Frans Hals are an example for this. The more representa
tive, full-length portrait of Heijthuysen was displayed downstairs in the grote salet while
the other, showing him casually rocking on a chair with crossed legs, hung in his private
quarters. 447 The medium of graphic art created a new form of reception: graphic folios
did not have to be framed and openly displayed; it was also possible to keep them hidden
away in a drawer, safe from unwelcome eyes and only taken out to look at in private mo
ments. They were neither about representation nor about creating a public self-image.
Self-image did not necessarily have to be a portrait; one’s own ideal could also be repre
sented through objects or other motifs. 448 Rembrandt painted fairly erotic panel paintings,
such as Bathsheba, Susanna or Danaë, but there is no equivalent to his erotic graphic sheets.
Ledikant as a panel painting is unthinkable. How can we interpret the gap between
(representative) panel painting and private graphic work? (This, of course, does not mean
that all graphic works were exclusively consumed in private.) I see a discrepancy between
demands made by Protestant-bourgeois culture and private experience, emotions, wishes
and desires. This in turn produced the polarity between public self-representation and all
that was intimate and private.
The pressure to sublimate was not only directed at propriety and making sexual
images taboo, or rather reducing them to the private sphere. It went hand in hand with
creating gender-specific differences — differences that grew proportionally with the
development of the bourgeoisie. 449 Erotic subjects were almost exclusively dealt with
using the female body, while men were only found as viewers gazing at the image.
(Think of French Rococo images by Boucher or Fragonard; pictures by the French salons
or Impressionists; or even works by the 20th century avant-garde.)
We can conclude that Rembrandt could depict the male protagonist in copulation
scenes, but only in back-view, fully clothed and exclusively in the medium of graphic art.
Moreover, Ledikant is a unique exception. Conceding to all these restrictions, this type of
image was still possible in 17 th century Dutch culture, whereas it became intolerable for
the art historians of the 19th and 20th centuries.
156
4 Summary
Let us return to the question asked when we examined Bathsheba: Does Rembrandt
portray Bathsheba and other female figures as subjects? I am aware that this question
would call for a (philosophical) discussion of the term subject, including historical, 17 th
century concepts of the subject. Questions of gender-specific differences within concepts
of the subject from that time would require discussion in a much broader art-historical
and interdisciplinary context than the few exemplary ‘cases’ I have cited here. 450 More
over, questions on subject, subjectivity, individuality, autonomy, free will and agency are
modern issues marked by contemporary theoretical concepts.
The fact that terms like subject or individuality were not fully formulated in theory
at the time does not mean that they went unnoticed or were not negotiated in literature
or visual art. I think it is justified to ask to what extent female figures in Rembrandt’s oeuvre
were granted individuality, free will and thought in comparison to their male counterparts.
In contemporary Dutch drama, particularly in
Vondel’s work, precisely these issues — free will,
447 Herman Roodenburg, On “Swelling” the Hips and
Crossing the Legs: Distinguishing Public and Private responsibility and autonomy — are addressed,
in Paintings and Prints from the Dutch Golden Age, in:
Wheelock, Seeff 2000, p. 64 – 84, here: p. 77 ff.
albeit humankind’s self-determination being
448 On self-representation in Dutch portraiture, see Ber- limited by higher powers such as fate and God’s
ger 2000.
449 Hammer-Tugendhat 2000 (Kunst, Sexualität), p. 69 – providence. 451 However, questions of human
92. Erotic subjects were more liberally dealt with at free will and autonomy are demonstrated
Renaissance courts: male figures were also involved,
for example in the frescos by Giulio Romano at Pa- exclusively with male figures. Women are not
lazzo del Tè, paintings at Fontainebleau or images by
Spranger at the court of Prague. explicitly stripped of these privileges, they
450 It would be highly interesting to include women artists simply do not appear in significant parts. In
from the time into these observations, such as Frans
Hals’s student Judith Leyster (1609 –1660). At least Vondel’s plays, women are either martyrs,
in her self-portrait, Leyster presents herself as a con-
fidently smiling, self-assured author. Another examp- vamps or victims. 452 There seem to be only few
le is Gertruyd Roghman who is known for etchings exceptions and these were noted as such:
of working women. On Judith Leyster, see especially:
Frima Fox Hofrichter, Judith Leyster: A Woman Paint Bathsheba in David, or the women in Batavische
er in Holland’s Golden Age, Doornspijk 1989; Pieter
Biesboer, James Welu (eds.), Judith Leyster. A Dutch
Gebroeders. These are active women whose
Master and Her World, exh. cat. Frans Hals Museum actions were received positively. They act in
Haarlem, Worchester Art Museum, New Haven 1993.
451 Jan W. H. Konst, ‘Het goet of quaet te kiezen.’ De rol van place of and in the name of men. 453 Hecuba
de vrije wil in Vondels Luzifer, Adam in ballingschap en from Samuel Coster’s play Polyxena is also worth
Noah, in: Nederlandse letterkunde 2, 1997, p. 319 – 337;
Konst, Fortuna, Fatum en Providentia Dei in de mentioning as a woman who takes it into her
Nederlandse tragedie 1600 – 1720, Hilversum 2003.
452 Konst 1999, p. 7 – 21. own hands to avenge her children’s death, even
453 Ibid., p. 12, 19, 20. though she is ultimately killed. 454 All in all, we
454 Sneller 2001, p. 87: “[…] but a woman who does not
simply complain and who proves to be capable of can detect some small shifts.
fighting back without the protection of a man — this is
a very different matter. It makes Polyxena an exceptio-
nal literary and dramatic masterpiece because it over-
turns the old certainties.” 157
Within the frame of what was historically possible, Rembrandt indeed created an
alternative image of femininity. Women are granted subjectivity — when it comes to love.
Here they are even allowed an active gaze (The Woman in Bed), thoughts and doubts
(Bathsheba, Lucretia). Rembrandt presents his women with empathy, but they are mostly
passive, receiving or sacrificing themselves. They listen and read, but have no power over
words. Considering that words play a central role in Rembrandt’s work, this weighs quite
heavily. A search for a female hero of similar mind as Aristotle with a Bust of Homer
will be in vain. Rembrandt did conceive a strong female character in Judith, but later
painted over the image with none other than Flora!455 For Rembrandt’s contemporaries,
his images of women were legible despite their slight alterity; they were still within the
boundaries of thought and discourse. Jacob Cats brought the time’s normative frame of
thought to a point:
Man shall not think that he stands above his wife like a prince stands
over his subjects or like a shepherd over his stock, but rather like the
soul over the body, inseparably tied in natural friendship. 456
Despite his alternative portrayals of femininity, there is a marked asymmetry to

representations of masculinity in Rembrandt’s oeuvre. In short, femininity is tied to love,
eroticism, body and passivity, while masculinity is linked to mind, ratio and (active) word.
Masculinity, particularly in group portraiture, can be presented in public and represents
publicity, whereas femininity is situated in private space. Even though these differences
are not evaluated in Rembrandt’s work, they are intelligible within our culture. This is
where the asymmetry becomes a hierarchy; where activity, ratio and culture stand above
passivity, feeling, body and nature. Body and sexuality are dispelled from the ideal of
hegemonic masculinity. I believe it is time for a changed perspective: It is time to see this
specifically bourgeois-patriarchal dispositif as a loss on behalf of male identity as well.
Private graphic sheets were the most likely medium for Rembrandt to experiment
with alternative approaches of integrating male figures into erotic contexts. It is symptom
atic that his erotic folios were mostly excluded from his oeuvre by 19th and sometimes
even 20th century art historians. The discrepancy between possibilities in the private
realm and in the public field, as well as the broadening of this gap as bourgeois society
progressed, prove that the asymmetry between gender constructions with all their in
clusions and exclusions cannot be solely ascribed to Rembrandt’s personality or biography,
but are rather rooted in our culture.
158
Naturalism in Dutch painting and Rembrandt’s work in particular produced
effects of truth (Wahrheitseffekte): The idea was born that images of male and female
figures are depictions of natural reality and that differences between genders are natural.
These images have played a pivotal role in creating gender-specific identity. Consciously
dealing with the inclusions and exclusions that take place may help us cross these limits.
Finally, I would like to note a methodological aspect: The issue of gender construc
tion in Rembrandt’s oeuvre is not and cannot be apparent as long as only the depicted
subject is addressed. Quite to the contrary, we are spellbound by his empathetic and
compassionate portrayals of female characters such as Bathsheba, Susanna, Danaë and
Lucretia as well as his distinct and detailed rendering of male figures. When compared to
visual traditions and contemporary works, the differences strike us positively. The prob
lem does not come into focus until we go beyond analyzing what is represented and start
asking about what is not visible. This is an unusual approach. Because the other is not
depicted, the resulting difference (produced by this void) is not apparent. Difference is
not represented as such, it is not named, not recognizable and thus not consciously
detectable. This ‘strategy’ is not limited to visual art or gender issues, it can be expanded
to include all constructions of difference and exclusion, particularly in regard to social
status and ethnicity. Media politics in our day and age follow this pattern. They rather
resort to rendering issues invisible than openly defaming them. Others simply do not find
their way into the image, do not have a voice — they are invisible; neither seen nor heard:
they simply do not ‘exist.’
This is why I plead for an art history of invisibility that always asks who or what in
which context is not part of representation. Who has no voice, who is made invisible?
455 X-ray images have revealed that Flora from 1635 at the
National Gallery in London was originally planned as
Judith.
456 English by translator. “De man heeft niet te dencken
dat hy over sijn vrouwe gestelt is als een heerschen-
de Prince over sijn onderdanen; ofte gelijck een rau-
we schaep-wachter over het vee, maer gelijck de siele
over het lichaam, die onderlinge door een onverbreke-
lijcken bant van natuerlijcke vrientschap verbonden
zijn.” German quote after Loonen 1987, p. 34. 159
Rembrandt, Self-Portrait
c. 1657, panel, 49.2 /41 cm
Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
161
Part I: Plates 1– 8
Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn:
Bathseba, 1654
A Woman in Bed, c. 1645 – 49
Susanna, 1636
Diana and her Nymphs Bathing, with Actaeon

und Callisto, 1634
Lucretia, 1664
Lucretia, 1666
De Staalmeesters (The Syndics), 1662
Danaë, 1636 and 1643 – 49
163
Plate 1: Rembrandt, Bathseba, 1654
canvas, 142 / 142 cm
Paris, Louvre
164
Plate 2: Rembrandt, A Woman in Bed,
c. 1645 – 49, canvas, 81.1 / 67.8 cm
Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland
165
Plate 3: Rembrandt, Susanna,
1636, panel, 47.5 / 39 cm
The Hague, Mauritshuis
166
Plate 4: Rembrandt, Diana and her Nymphs
Bathing, with Actaeon and Callisto, 1634
canvas, 73.5 / 93.5 cm, Anholt, Museum
Wasserburg Anholt
167
Plate 5: Rembrandt, Lucretia, 1664,
canvas, 116 / 99 cm, Washington,
D. C., National Gallery of Art
168
Plate 6: Rembrandt, Lucretia, 1666, canvas,
110.17 / 92.28 cm
Minneapolis, Institute of Arts,
The William Hood Dunwoody Fund
169
Plate 7: Rembrandt, De Staalmeesters (The
Syndics), 1662, canvas, 191 / 279 cm
170
Plate 8: Rembrandt, Danaë,
1636 and 1643 – 49, canvas, 185 / 203 cm
St. Petersburg, Hermitage
171
Part II: Invisible
becomes Visible
Painting, not Mimesis
173
1 Mirror, Mirror
on the Wall …
Woman before the Mirror
by Frans van Mieris
A (painted) picture is like a mirror of nature: Sentences like this have been used
to characterize Dutch painting and its alleged primarily mimetic relation to nature
since the 17 th century. In the following chapter, the use of mirrors in Dutch painting
and their function in the interpretation of the relation between painting and reality will
be discussed exemplarily by explorinng one specific art work. While the example is a
somewhat ‘extreme’ case, it is also one that has scarcely been scholarly acknowledged
to its full extent. I am talking about a panel painting by Frans Mieris called Woman
before the Mirror, dated 1670 (plate 9). 457 A rich blue curtain draped to the side reveals a
view onto a dimly lit interior. We see a woman standing slightly diagonally in back view,
with lost profile, her left arm akimbo as she looks at herself in a large flat wall mirror.
Her gaze in the mirror is not directed at herself, but at the viewer. On the right edge
of the image there is a small red armchair and in the back — barely visible, even in the
original — a lute and a book rest on a small table. The wall to the right is covered with a
heavy tapestry, depicting a hardly discernable pattern with a horse and rider and a resting
stag. Van Mieris was one of the most respected genre painters of his time, best known
for his exquisitely detailed painting. The illusion
of materiality and his detailed color palette also
457 The painting is an oak panel of 43/31.5 cm. It is part of
the collection of Alte Pinakothek in Munich. I would mark the painting at hand. How he plays with
like to thank Dr. Dekiert for allowing me to view color shades of blue, red and green refracted in
the documentation. The painting was obviously ne-
ver examined for restoration. It is generally in good the woman’s clothing is much more apparent
condition, but has slight abrasions in the first layer
of painting and the varnish has darkened a bit; the in the original than in reproductions: The deep
painting was originally arched and was supplemen- blue of the curtain is refracted in the silvery satin
ted to make it rectangular. Otto Naumann, Frans van
Mieris (1635 – 1681) the Elder, Doornspijk 1981, vol. I, of her skirt, the red of the arm chair’s cushion
p. 78, 82; vol. 2, no. 76; Peter C. Sutton, Christopher
Brown (eds.), Masters of Seventeenth-Century Dutch
in the loosely painted blouse and the green of
Genre Painting, exh. cat. Gemäldegalerie Berlin, Royal her slippers in the yellow-green shimmer of the
Academy of Arts, London, Philadelphia Museum of
Art, Philadelphia, Berlin 1984, no. 76; Eddy de Jongh, feathers in her headdress. The image follows the
Ger Luijten (eds.), Mirror of Everyday Life. Genre- tradition of domestic scenes displaying women
prints in the Netherlands 1550 – 1700, exh. cat. Rijks-
museum Amsterdam 1997, p. 3 42; Stoichita 1998, looking at themselves in mirrors, such as the
p. 216 f.; Wayne Franits, Dutch Seventeenth-Century
Genre Painting, New Haven, London 2004, p. 127 f.; well-known painting by van Mieris’s teacher Gerrit
Quentin Buvelot (ed.), Frans van Mieris. 1635 – 1681, Dou from 1667 (fig. 80). The female back figure in
exh. cat. Mauritshuis The Hague, National Gallery
Washington, D. C. 2005/06, p. 3 4, 134, 157; Alte Pina- satin is a free paraphrase of Ter Borch’s invention
kothek, Holländische und deutsche Malerei des 17.
Jahrhunderts, col. cat., text by Marcus Dekiert, edited
by Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, Munich
2006, p. 126, ill.: p. 127. 175
Pl. 9 + Detail:
Frans van Mieris,
Woman before
the Mirror,
c. 1670, panel,
Munich,
Alte Pinakothek
(fig. 137, p. 287), which will be discussed in great detail later on. Van Mieris himself had
already used the motif of a woman looking into a mirror a few years earlier, but the woman
was depicted in profile and without her image reflected in a mirror mounted sideways. 458
Let us take a closer look at the woman and her reflection. Her nonchalant pose
with her hand on her left hip, the elbow pointing out of the picture and toward the
viewer, is quite unusual. In 17 th century Holland, this gesture of confidence was reserved
exclusively for men. Herman Roodenburg discusses the fundamental meaning of
welstand for the bourgeois elite in his book The Eloquence of the Body. He analyzes how
certain physical practices were acquired with the aim of molding (what seemed like)
a perfectly ‘natural,’ highly cultivated body in order to differentiate oneself from lower
social classes. 459 Etiquette manuals (particularly Castiglione’s), art theories (Hoogstraten,
Lairesse), theater and visual art created the ideals for the upper bourgeoisie’s self-
fashioning. Poses and gestures were distinguished according to gender. Thus many
Dutch portraits show men with arms akimbo — a sign of confidence — but no women.
Van Mieris also produced several depictions of men using this gesture, but not a single
other one of a woman. 460 The use of the gesture here is therefore an unmistakable
reference to insolence and an appropriation of male self-determination. The velvet beret
is a motif borrowed from Rembrandt’s circle. The feathers are not necessarily a symbol
of personified unchastity and lust, as claimed in the Munich catalog. In fact, van Mieris’s
oeuvre includes several instances of women wearing feathered berets in clearly non-
sexual scenes such as the painting of a letter-writing woman in a melancholic gesture
176
Fig. 80 + Detail:
Gerrit Dou, Lady at
Dressing Table, 1667,
panel, Rotterdam,
Museum Boijmans
van Beuningen
from the same time. 461 However, feathers were most commonly used in vanitas images.
The beret definitely contributes to the sense of masquerade, since headdresses of this
sort were usually not used for portraits.
The highlight of this painting is the divergence between the female figure and
her reflection in the mirror. Some sort of almost paradox ‘miracle’ changes her pose in
the looking glass. Instead of her hand on her hip, both arms are now folded around her
body (detail plate 9). It is astonishing that the striking difference between the woman and
her reflection has gone almost completely unnoticed in literature and that the painting
itself has never been discussed in greater detail. This phenomenon of divergence, which
forms the core of the fascination and suspense the image exudes, is neither mentioned
in the collection catalog from 2006, nor in the
catalog from 2005/06, nor in Franits’s text from
458 Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie; see exh. 2004. 462 It is not surprising that the painting’s
cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C . 2005 /06, cat. no.
31, p. 157 – 159, ill.: p. 158.
interpretations are accordingly banal: The
459 Herman Roodenburg, The Eloquence of the Body. woman is a whore trying to gain men’s desire
Perspectives on Gesture in the Dutch Republic, Zwol-
le 2004. for beauty 463, she “stands in a long tradition
460 See Portrait of a Man, 1659, Turin, Gal. Sabauda, Nau- of portrayals of vice and can be counted as a
mann 1981, fig. 26; Rauchender Soldat, ca. 1655 – 57,
Naumann 1981, fig. 13; Man in Oriental Costume, 1665, warning against a sinful lifestyle.” 464 In the only
The Hague, Naumann 1981, fig. 61; Soldier, 1667, for-
merly Dresden, destroyed, Naumann 1981, fig. 68. existing monograph on the artist, Nauman ack
461 Zurich, private collection, Naumann 1981, fig. 82. nowledges, yet attempts to deny the difference
462 Only Stoichita (1998, p. 216 f.) points out the ‘false re
flection’ in a few sentences in the context of discus- by reinterpreting it as factually possible:
sing the semiotic dimension of mirrors and their use
as signs and instruments of meta-painting.
463 Franits 2004, p. 127 f.
464 Dekiert, coll. cat. Munich 2006, p. 126. 177
Fig. 81 + Detail:
Jan Vermeer,
The Music Lesson,
c. 1662 – 64, canvas,
London, The Royal
Collection Her
Majesty Queen
Elizabeth II
It has been remarked privately to this writer that the ‘portrait’ in the mirror
cannot truthfully represent the pose of the standing woman. While it is
possible that van Mieris intentionally arranged the mirror image in a Mona
Lisa-like composition, he did not violate the laws of reflection in doing so.
By coincidence another Dutch artist, Emmy Andriesse, photographed a
similar subject in the late 1940s (fig. C 76, Amsterdam 1975). The photo-
graph shows that a reflected image can appear quite different from its
source, depending on the observer’s angle of view. 465
(Is it really necessary to clarify that van Mieris’s work is a painting and not a photo
graph and that the gesture of the hand on the hip could never be reflected the way it is re-
gardless of the angle?) In my opinion this grotesque misjudgment is symptomatic for the
still pervasive opinion on Dutch painting in the field of art history: Dutch genre painting
(in the style of van Mieris) is illustrative, descriptive, creates the illusion of reality, or simply
put, is ‘like a mirror.’ Thanks to Eddy De Jongh’s seminal iconological studies, many art histo-
rians (but far from all) at least admit that motifs can bear emblematic or symbolic meaning.466
Perhaps this is the right moment to explicitly emphasize that it is indeed a reflection in
the mirror and not a painted portrait of the woman. Van Mieris did everything to emphasize
this point, particularly with the reflection of the pale blue ribbon attached to the top of the
mirror (probably for this reason) and the bluish reflection of the curtain on the left.
In several images of women and mirrors, the mirror does not reflect the image of
the figure as exactly as the angle would require. Often the figure is turned directly to the
178
viewer, like in the painting by Dou mentioned earlier (fig. 80, p. 177). Only in very few cases
does the mirror reflect an explicitly diverging pose. One rare example is the mirror above
the virginal in Vermeer’s Music Lesson from 1662 – 64 (fig. 81). The artist not only inscribed
himself into the image by picturing the foot of his easel, which is not visible in the main
image, but also significantly altered the degree to which the woman’s head is turned.
We see the woman from behind, her head seemingly in line with her body’s axis as the
black trimming of her yellow dress emphasizes. In the reflection, however, she is turned
to the man standing next to the virginal. The
(painted) mirror thus does not reflect visible
465 Naumann 1981, vol. II, p. 92.
466 On the methodological debate between art histo reality. It rather reveals the invisible, the inner
rians, see below.
467 Gustav F. Hartlaub, Zauber des Spiegels. Geschichte affection this woman feels for the man next to
und Bedeutung des Spiegels in der Kunst, Munich the virginal. The mirror here is also a reflection
1951; Heinrich Schwarz, The Mirror in Art, in: The Art
Quarterly 15, 1952, p. 97 – 118; W. M. Zucker, Reflec- of her soul.
tions on Reflections, in: The Journal of Aesthetics
and Art Criticism, 1961 – 62, p. 239 – 250; J. Bialostocki,
Man and Mirror in Painting. Reality and Transience, Mirror semantics
in: Studies in Honour of Millard Meiss, New York
1977, p. 61 – 72; Jurgis Baltrusaitis, Le miroir, essai sur I would like to (very briefly) outline the
une légende scientifique, révélations, science fiction,
Paris, 1978; Theresa Georgen, Das magische Drei- symbolic meaning of mirrors from the Middle
eck. Über Blickkontakte in Spiegelbild-Darstellun- Ages to the early modern period as our starting
gen neuzeitlicher Malerei, in: Judith Conrad, Ursula
Konnertz (eds.), Weiblichkeit in der Moderne. An point for the interpretation of Woman before the
sätze feministischer Vernunftkritik, Tübingen 1986,
p. 2 44 – 269 (reprinted in Farideh Akashe-Böhme, see
Mirror. 467 Mirrors are symbols for different, at
below p. 67 – 90); Nico J. Brederoo et al., Oog in oog times even opposing meanings. They represent
met de spiegel, Amsterdam 1988, especially the essay
by Eric J. Sluijter, “Een volmaekte schildery is als een a pure reflection of the truth as much as decep-
Spiegel van de natuer”: spiegel en spiegelbeeld in de tive illusion, wisdom and knowledge as well as
Nederlandse schilderkunst van de zeventiende eeuw,
p. 146 – 163; Rolf Haubl, “Unter lauter Spiegelbildern vanity, self-recognition as well as self-misconcep-
…” Zur Kulturgeschichte des Spiegels, 2 vols., Frank-
furt a. M. 1991; Farideh Akashe-Böhme (ed.), Reflex- tion. Mirrors were used in science, particularly
ionen vor dem Spiegel (series: Gender Studies. Vom in optics, while also finding use in magical prac
Unterschied der Geschlechter), Frankfurt a. M. 1992;
Friederike Seidl, Zur Bedeutung des “Spiegels” in der tices. Sorcery, the demonic and the divine all
niederländischen Malerei und Graphik (15. bis Anfang
17. Jahrhundert), master thesis, Vienna 1997; Mark come together in the mirror. 468 The precarious
Pendergast, Mirror, Mirror. A History of the Human ambiguity of mirrors was pointed out time and
Love Affair with Reflection, New York 2004; Koen
Vermeir, Mirror, Mirror on the Wall. Aesthetics and again, for example by Raphael Mirami in 1582:
Metaphysics of 17 th Century Scientific Artistic Spect
acles, in: kritische berichte, “Spiegel und Spiegelun-
gen,” 2004 /2, p. 27 – 38. For further philosophy and For some, mirrors constitute a
critical theory on mirrors and reflection, see, a. o.:
Jacques Lacan, The Mirror Stage as Formative of the hieroglyph of truth in that they
Function of the I as Revealed in Psychoanalytic Ex- uncover everything that is pre-
perience (Seminar I, 1953 – 54), in: Écrits, English by
Bruce Fink, New York 2002, p. 75 – 81; Umberto Eco, sented to them […] Others, on the
Sugli specchi e altri saggi: Il segno, la rappresen-
tazione, l’illusione, l’immagine, Milan 1985; Michel contrary, hold mirrors for a symbol
Foucault, Des espace autres, in: Architecture, Mouve- of falsity because they so often
ment, Continuité 5 (1984), p. 46 – 49.
468 Especially see Baltrusaitis 1986, Vermeir 2004. show things other than they are. 469
469 English by Edward Peter Nolan (after Baltrusaitis
1986), Now Through a Glass Darkly. Specular Images
of Being and Knowing from Virgil to Chaucer, Ann
Arbor 1990, p. 291. 179
Fig. 82:
Hieronymus Bosch,
Superbia (detail
from the Table with
the seven Deadly
Sins), c. 1485, panel,
Madrid, Prado
Fig. 83:
Paulus Moreelse,
Young Lady with
a Mirror, 1627,
canvas,
Cambridge, Fitz-
william Museum
Nothing demonstrates the meaning of the mirror as an allegory of pure, untainted

truth as clearly as the use of the term speculum (mirror) for many medieval texts such
as Speculum maius by Vincent de Beauvais (d. 1264): the largest and most important
encyclopedia, divided into four specula (wisdom, history, nature, morality); speculum
sapientiae; speculum virginum; speculum humanae salvationis (one of the most significant
typological bible interpretations of the late Middle Ages) and many more. The term
speculum was used to verify the perfection of what was represented. The book is a written
representation of God’s truth without human intervention. It is in this sense that the term
speculum sine macula describes Maria as a pure image of God. The mirror metaphor
was not only used in spiritual contexts, it was also applied in secular and courtly writing.
Books function as mirrors for our mind, showing the ideal of virtuous (holy, courtly)
behavior. By mirroring the (imagined) other we are supposed to recognize our self and
follow the presented example. 470 This tradition continued well into the 17 th century, as
many Dutch books on moralizing or didactic subjects with spiegel in their title prove.
Prudentia (prudence) is the attribute given to mirrors. Reflectere, to reflect, is used both
for the mirroring effect and contemplation. Reflection, or self-knowledge, was already
considered the basis of wisdom in Antiquity. 471 Terms like speculation or to speculate,
meaning to think about God and the world, are derived from speculum. 472 This is telling
as it refers to the function of the mirror metaphor as a source of imagination.
The myth of Narcissus points out the deceitful (and at times deadly) effect of
the reflected image. In Peter Bruegel’s etching Elck (Everyman), Nemo looks at himself
in his convex hand mirror. The pessimistic caption “niemat en kent he selv” (No one
180
knows himself) highlights the impossibility of self-knowledge; the mirror becomes a
metaphor for self-misconception. In medieval allegorical portrayals of vice, Superbia
(Pride) usually holds a mirror in her hand. Like Augustine before him, Gregory the Great
particularly defined superbia as the worst of the seven deadly sins. Because humilitas
(humility) before God and subsequently before church and authority is considered the
highest of all virtues in Christianity, superbia — describing individualism, self-assertion
and selfishness — must be the worst of all sins. 473 The mirror in Superbia’s hand is thus
not merely an attribute of primping, but primarily symbolizes self-obsession and with
it paying more attention to one’s self than to God. Images by Hieronymus Bosch (fig. 82),
Memling, Bruegel and others show women with mirrors as images of pride and vanity.
The ephemerality of a reflected image additionally wakes associations to vanitas or tran
sience. Vanitas is the personification of people’s tendency to tie their hearts to trivial
mundane things instead of preparing for eternal salvation. Vanitas themes are reminders
of humans’ mortality, such as the figure of Lady World, a beautiful woman from the front
and a rotten, infested corpse from the back. This allegory gathers Superbia, Vanitas, Venus
and Luxuria in one figure. Next to globes, world maps and jewelry, mirrors are one of
Lady World’s most common attributes in Dutch painting and graphic art. 474 Unsurpris
ingly, this world of sinful temptation is imagined as female.
In the early modern period, a close, yet precarious relationship developed between
painting and mirror (image). Is painting and its attempt to emulate nature a mirror of
nature? For Leonardo da Vinci the mirror is a teacher for artists; for Alberti, Narcissus,
in love with his reflection, is the actual inventor of painting. 475 During the second half of
the 16th century, representations of the five senses became popular among the circles of
Frans Floris and Cornelis Cort and later of Hendrick Goltzius. Visus, or the sense of sight,
is portrayed as a woman holding a mirror. 476 Already in 1600 the meanings of Venus,
Visus and Vanitas were fused into the representation of a female figure holding a mirror.
This fusion was perpetuated by artists like
Paulus Moreelse and Jan van Bijlert, with Venus
470 On the meaning of the metaphor of the mirror in the
Middle Ages see the chapter Spiegel und Spiegelungen gradually taking the form of a contemporary
in: Horst Wenzel, Spiegelungen. Zur Kultur der Visua-
lität im Mittelalter, Berlin 2009.
seductress (fig. 83).
471 Laertius, Sokrates und Seneca advised their students
to observe themselves in the mirror. Baltrusaitis
1996, p. 9. The abundant and conflicting semantics
472 Wenzel 2009. of the mirror were fully present in cultural mem
473 Particularly see Haubl 1991, vol. 2, p. 523 – 651.
474 Eddy de Jongh, The Changing Face of Lady World, in: ory in 17 th century Holland. 477 A mirror, espe
de Jongh, Questions of Meaning. Theme and Motif in
Dutch Seventeenth-Century Painting, Leyden 2000, cially in the hands of a woman, was a popular
p. 60 – 82. metaphor in Dutch literature, where it was used
475 Schwarz 1952, p. 110.
476 Sluijter 2000, p. 86 – 159. to convey different meanings: sometimes an
477 Sluijter 1988. To elaborate on the meaning of mir
rors and reflections for still lifes and self-portraits in
Dutch painting would surpass the scope of this work.
For a discussion of these topics, see ibid. 181
emblem of beauty and eroticism, sometimes a sign of vanity, illusion and transience. 478
‘Theoreticians’ like Van Mander, Philips Angel 479 or Hoogstraten apostrophized the
proximity of painting and reflected image in several ways. Van Mander names the ‘positive’
and ‘negative’ connotations of the mirror metaphor. On one hand he uses it as the
highest praise for Jan van Eyck’s art:
T’sijn spieghels, spieghels zijnt, neen t’zijn geen Tafereelen

(They are mirrors, mirrors are they, not paintings) 480
On the other hand, he is aware of the mirror’s ambivalence between knowledge and
deception:
Den Spieghel houden wy veel voor de kennis onses self: doch wort hy van
outs ghehouden voor valsheyt, vertoonende slechts den schijn van t’waer
wesen, maar de waerheyt selfs niet.
(We often believe the mirror to be knowledge of our selves: yet it has been
known to be false for a long time; it only reflects what seems like true
nature and not the truth itself.) 481
He also warns that mirrors falsify because they reflect inverted images of objects before
them:
[…] doch wort hy [de spieghel] van outs gehouden voor valsheyt,
vertoonende slechts den schijn van t’waer wesen, maer de waerheyt
selfs niet: want al wat rechts is, toont hy op slincks, en wat slincks
is, rechts. 482
Identifying parallels between image and mirror does not necessarily mean that painting
is a pure mimesis of nature, since the mirror’s multiple layers of meaning are also implied.
Both painting and reflection share the fascination of illusion and apparent reality: schijn
sonder sijn (seeming without being). J. de Brune d. J. describes attraction to the power of
artistic illusion in his work published in 1665:
[…] want aan dingen, die niet en zijn, zich zo te vergapen, also ofze waren,
en daar zoo van geleit te worden dat wy ons zelve, sonder schade, diets
maken datze zijn; hoe kan dat tot de verlusting onzer gemoederen niet
dienstigh wezen? Zeker, het vervroolikt yemand buite maat, wanneer hy
door een valsche gelikenis der dingen wort bedrogen.
182
([…] to admire things that do not exist as if they indeed existed and to be
seduced to convince ourselves that they exist — without damaging us —
how should this not aid brightening our mood? It is surely exceedingly
delightful to be fooled by the false likeness of things.) 483
This is also how we can read Hoogstraaten’s famous dictum:
Want een volmaekte Schildery is als een spiegel van de Natuer, die de
dingen, die niet en zijn, doet schijnen te zijn, en op een geoorlofde,
vermakelijke en prijslijke wijze bedriegt.
(For a perfect painting is like a mirror of nature that makes things which
are not there appear to be there, and it deceives in an acceptably pleasant
and praiseworthy manner.) 484
The link between mirror image and painting was so special in 17 th century Holland be-
cause of the generally eminent meaning of vision and all visual phenomena. 485 Alpers
demonstrates in great detail how this applies to all of Dutch culture at the time (the
development of optics, the invention of the
telescope and microscope, cartography, etc). 486
478 De Jongh 1976, p. 192.
479 Philips Angel was the least innovative and theoreti-
For some, seeing and visual perception were not
cal of the three. He indeed preferred painting that only a source of knowledge, but also symbolized
reflects nature like a mirror, without any interference
by the artist-subject. Consequentially he preferred danger, deception, a gateway to seduction and
the Leydener Fijnschilders, most of all Gerrit Dou, desire, or distraction from religious devotion.
van Mieris’s teacher. See: Eric Jan Sluijter, In Praise
of the Art of Painting: On Paintings by Gerrit Dou and
a Treatise by Philips Angel of 1642, in: Sluijter 2000,
p. 199 – 263. Ambiguity
480 Karel van Mander, Het schilder-boeck, Haarlem 1604, In Dutch genre paintings from the time,
p. 2011, quoted here after Sluijter 2000, p. 338, note
169. English by translator. the multiple layers of meaning ascribed to
481 Quoted after Sluijter 1988, p. 150. English by trans
lator. mirrors are implicitly present. There are many
482 Karel van Mander, Wtlegghingh op den Metamorpho- versions, especially from the first half of the
sis Pub. Ovidii Nasonis, in: van Mander, Het schilder-
boeck, Haarlem 1604, p. 133v, quoted after Sluijter century, that include references to transience
2000, p. 310, note 75.
483 J. de Brune d. J., Alle volgeestige werken, Harlingen
such as skulls, monkeys or other symbols of
1665, p. 317. See Sluijter 2000, esp. p. 13; De Jongh vanitas. 487 In works from the latter half of the
2005, p. 47. English by translator.
484 Samuel van Hoogstraten, Inleyding tot de hooge century by artists such as Dou, Ter Borch or
schoole der schilderkonst, anders de zichtbaere wer- Vermeer, these allegorical references disappear.
elt, Rotterdam 1678, reprint 1969, p. 25. English by
translator. We also cannot find any distinctly
485 One example is the meaning and epistemological di-
mension of the trompe l’oeil in Dutch painting. moralizing symbols in van Mieris’s image. The
486 Svetlana Alpers, The Art of Describing. Dutch Art in woman’s shoes, the lute, the little dog and the
the Seventeenth Century, Chicago 1983.
487 For example an engraving by Jacob de Gheyn II from hunting scene rather bear a hint of eroticism. 488
ca. 1600, Jan Miense Molenaer 1633, ill.: Sluijter 1988,
p. 158, 159.
488 On the erotic connotation of shoes, see note 627. On
dogs, see below. 183
Fig. 84: Leonardo da Vinci,
Mona Lisa, 1503 – 05, panel,
77 /53 cm, Paris, Louvre
Pl. 9 — Detail: Frans van Mieris,

Woman before the Mirror,
c. 1670, panel, Munich,
Alte Pinakothek
Perhaps we could read the feathers on the beret as a subtle reference to vanitas. Because
there are no explicit allegorical symbols, all possible meanings of the reflection are
evoked in all their contradiction and without any clear direction. That this is not just a
genre painting of a vain lady in front of the mirror is made clear by the mirror’s odd
positioning. The flat mirror juts into the room considerably — an inconceivable thing
in any realistic domestic scene. The three-quarter profile of the female figure on the
projection plain becomes part of the mirror’s surface. The fact that her ‘real’ left elbow
covers her right elbow in the mirror further accentuates the tight linking of the female
figure and her reflection. Of course the left elbow is the cause for controversy, because
in ‘reality’ it points at the viewer in its bold and improperly masculine attitude. In the
reflection, however, this offence against proper social decorum is ‘corrected.’ Thanks to
the elbow’s formal inclusion into the figure’s whole silhouette, the gesture becomes a
bit subtler. These technical tricks as well as the big blue curtain framing the scene clearly
mark the mirror image as the focus of the painting.
In some works, in which the mirror does not reflect what is in front of it, the face
looking out of the mirror is a grimace or a skull; think of Lucas Furtnagel’s double por
trait of the Burgkmairs from 1529, where skulls stare out of the mirror in the wife’s hand;
or Bruegel’s Superbia, whose reflection in the mirror is distorted into an amphibious
grimace. Both reveal the true face of superbia, or pride. Van Mieris, however, reverses
the relationship between (ideal) image and distorted reflection. The face of our female
figure, who we only see in lost profile, is complete and immaculate in the mirror. It not
only alters the unflattering, partial view of her face, but also ‘corrects’ the pose of her
body that seemed so dowdy and rude according to the times’ standards of femininity.
184
The mirror image goes even further: Instead of merely ‘correcting’ her pose, the woman
is inscribed into a triangular composition as a bust, thus conforming to female ideals
from the high Renaissance. It is a structure found in female portraits by Raphael, or in
Leonardo’s Mona Lisa (fig. 84): a female bust, positioned slightly diagonally into the
pictorial space, both arms resting on a balustrade, her gaze directed out of the image
and at the viewer — a fully serene composition exuding harmony and poise. Thus we
can ascertain that the pose of the woman in the mirror cites the Renaissance ideal of
femininity.
What does this mean? Let us revisit the hard facts: We have a disparity between
the image of the woman and her (idealized) reflection in the mirror; we know about the
different meanings of mirror images and are aware that the artist simultaneously keeps
different readings open by foregoing any clear symbols. The effect of this aesthetic
staging is the evocation of manifold, partially opposing associations, feelings and
thoughts in the audience. The picture is like a painted commentary on the debate of
painting’s mimetic character. Van Mieris was one of the so-called fijnschilders (literally
fine painters), a group of artists famous for their special painting technique that made
surfaces completely smooth and showed no visible traces of brush strokes. Thus their
images did not seem like painting, but rather like mirrors of nature. Could painting
mimic nature like a mirror after all? The answer, of course, is no. Painting is not mimesis.
Painting can create the illusion of reality, but it always also reflects its artistic character.
Schijn sonder sijn. In general Dutch opinion of the time, a good image was painted so
realistically that it seemed like reality while also giving the impression of being art. It is
always a game of seeming and being. 489
Painting can make the invisible visible. Associations on the relationship between
the lady and her reflection likely diverged in different directions in van Mieris’s time, de
pending on gender, education and individual imagination.
If we assume that the reflection represents the inner self of the woman — similar
to Vermeer’s Music Lesson (fig. 81, p. 178) — and simultaneously keep in mind that the mir
ror represents both self-knowledge and self-misconception, or truth and deceit, we can
conclude the following possible interpretations: The woman sees a reflection of herself
and not herself. She perceives and misconceives herself. She sees her ideal self. Her bold,
defiant gesture concurs with this form of hubris. We, as second-order observers, see both
her and her reflection, which enables us to recognize the difference between the two.
Therefore the image grants us a certain form of insight, a recognition of the boundaries
of self-knowledge. It is the understanding that the image we form of ourselves is always
already an image and that this image is marked by certain codes and traditions. I believe
489 See Sluijter 2000 and Stoichita 1998, particularly

p. 209 – 223. 185
Fig. 85: Edouard Manet, Bar
aux Folies-Bergère, 1881 /82,
canvas, London, Courtauld
Institute Galleries
that this is a visualization of a concept of human being that anticipates modern subject
conceptions. Freud and Lacan later analyzed and conceptualized these ideas. This per
tains particularly to the phantasma of unity, coherence and ideal that Lacan addresses in
his metaphor of the mirror. 490 Due to progressive developments in society, the bourgeois
elite in Holland in the latter half of the 17 th century was able to gain new forms of subject
experience (Subjekterfahrung), which paid more attention to psychological matters. Even
if the negatively connoted late medieval motif of superbia/vanitas is still present (which is
why the figure is female), the painting’s meaning goes beyond moralization on the visual
level. Here, superbia versus humilitas is not the actual issue; the problem is not the mere
fact of self-reflection. It has become an intrapsychic problem, lying in the encounter of
the self with its own image in the mirror and all the (mis)conceptions that come with it.
On the level of visibility, a (modern) concept of the subject is created, prefiguring

future wordings such as Lacan’s saying “I is an Other.” One could also express this in
reversal: Lacan’s mirror metaphor and the eminent relevance of the gaze and vision for
the formation of the subject stand in a long tradition that includes an image tradition
and a culture that put visus, the sense of sight, above others. 491 An interesting point of
further investigation would be to ask if the relevance of the mirror and the mirror image
in the formation of a child’s ego in Lacan’s psychoanalytical theory, alongside the corres
ponding fundamental misconception of the subject that comes with it, was inspired by
old semantics of the mirror. What I mean is the inseparable unity between knowledge
and misconception, between truth and deceit. Because I find it enlightening for our self-
understanding to comprehend the origins of our images and discourses on one hand,
and their respective changes on the other, I would like to point out a dialog between
186
Socrates and Alcibiades in Plato’s Alcibiades. In it, Plato describes how the reflection in
the eye and thus in the soul of the other is the basic condition for self-knowledge. 492
Even though the idea of the importance of being mirrored in the other for self-recognition
is similar, the basic tenor is a different one. In Plato’s writing the belief in self-knowledge
and the discovery of one’s own soul is still intact. It is also interesting to compare the
meaning of the mirror in Woman before the Mirror with the mirror metaphor used in medie
val writing. Here mirrors are also used to reflect an other in whom the person is supposed
to reflect and recognize him/herself. Here, however, the reflection is the norm or model
not be questioned and not the internalized and conflicted (super)ego as in psychoanalytic
theory.
The discrepancy between the female figure and her reflection can also be
examined in relation to the audience’s perception. After all, her gaze is directed at them
and not directly at herself. This creates a triangular relation between female figure, her
reflection in the mirror and the viewer. The mirror-gaze of the female beauty (primarily
directed at a male viewer) can also be found in Dou’s painting (fig. 80, p. 177). The triad of
gazes can be traced back to a painting of Venus by Titian from 1555 that was varied multiple
times by Rubens and others. 493 Perhaps the reflection in van Mieris’s painting reflects
the viewer’s desire for, and fantasy of, an ideal
490 Lacan 2002, p. 75 – 81.

woman, while simultaneously pointing out
491 Lacan uses the mirror as a metaphor, but not exclu the discrepancy to reality. The juxtaposition of
sively. He indeed assumes that for a child between
6–18 months the experience of seeing itself in the reality and illusion, desire and wishful thinking,
mirror as a whole (contrary to the fragmented per- while simultaneously reflecting their imaginary
ception of the body, its ‘unfinished’ state and the fact
that we cannot see all of ourselves without a mirror) character, evokes Manet’s Bar aux Folies-Bergère
is fundamental for a first sense of independence and
the formation of the ego. Is this not an overrating of from 1881, where the male viewer has become
the sense of sight? Is not the development of motor a visible part of the representation (fig. 85). 494
skills, particularly walking, at least equally important
for a child’s detachment from its mother? Female viewers will probably have asso
492 “SOCRATES: And what are the objects in looking at
which we see ourselves? ALCIBIADES: Clearly, So- ciated the painting with other things, perhaps
crates, in looking at mirrors and the like. […] SOCRA- in the sense of a moralizing message from a
TES: Did you ever observe that the face of the person
looking into the eye of another is reflected as in a written speculum, suggesting they follow the
mirror; and in the visual organ which is over against
him, and which is called the pupil, there is a sort of
model of ideal reflected in the mirror. Corre
image of the person looking? […]Then the eye, looking lating the painting with the fairy tale of Snow
at another eye, and at that in the eye which is most
perfect, and which is the instrument of vision, will White evokes a different set of associations. The
there see itself […] Then if the eye is to see itself, it mirror in the story reflects the queen’s jealousy
must look at the eye, and at that part of the eye where
sight which is the virtue of the eye resides. […] And if and narcissistic slight by responding to her
the soul, my dear Alcibiades, is ever to know herself,
must she not look at the soul; and especially at that question “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is
part of the soul in which her virtue resides, and to any the fairest of them all?” with “My Queen, you
other which is like this?” Plato, Alcibiades I. English
by Benjamin Jowett; www.gutenberg.org/files/1676/ are the fairest here so true. But Snow White is a
1676-h/1676-h.htm, retrieved Sept. 25, 2013.
493 Georgen 1986.
494 Bradford R. Collins (ed.), 12 Views of Manet’s Bar,
Princeton 1996. 187
Fig. 86 + Detail: Frans van Mieris, The Cloth Shop, 1660, panel, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
thousand times more beautiful than you.” 495 Of course we could also solve the difference
between image and mirror with an alternative idea: it could be read as a confident woman’s
resistance against the pressure to conform to an ideal of femininity.
I do not think it is possible to find a singular, unambiguous interpretation of the
image; its central point is rather its semantic versatility/openness. The audience is con
fronted with a contradiction between (painted) reality and its counter-reflection, and
with the appellative structure created by direct eye contact to the reflected image. How
we react, how deep we delve into the issues implied and, subsequently, what conclusions
we draw, is not only subject to great variation today, but also was the case in van Mieris’s
time. The painting definitely stimulates subjective thoughts, fantasies and imaginations.
I believe that the production of subjectivity we can witness in this and related images is
the eminent significance of Dutch painting, particularly from the third quarter of the 17 th
century. However, scholars have yet to fully discover and examine it. 496
Some may not believe that van Mieris was capable of such intellectual depth and
complexity because they think he was only a superficial society painter. However, he was
one of the most renowned genre painters of his time. 497 I would like to counter this poten
tial objection with the fact that, apart from Rembrandt, no other artist staged himself
188
so often and with such irony. More remarkable than the sheer number of self-portraits is
the performative character, the masquerade, of van Mieris’s self-portraits. He presents
himself grinning, smoking, making faces, in disguise, in precarious erotic contexts. These
portraits almost always include some form of ironic twist. 498 Both Rembrandt’s and his
disguises seem like they followed Hoogstraten’s recommendation to painters studying
their reflection to turn themselves into actors and thus become performer and audience
at once. 499 We can detect a similar kind of staging in Woman before the Mirror, which
leads to the question whether there is an ‘original’ hidden somewhere behind the masks
in and in front of the mirror.
Another painting demonstrating the multi-layered character of van Mieris’s

work is A Cavalier in a Shop from 1660, in the KHM Vienna (fig. 86).500 Set in a luxurious
draper’s shop (which never existed in this form; it rather resembles the apartment of a
member of the bourgeois elite), an officer is choosing fabrics. With one hand he tests
the quality of a swatch of fabric while touching the chin of the salesgirl with the other. An
old man in the background is turned toward the couple; his pointing gesture could either
refer to the couple or to the painting above him, depicting a rare scene of Adam and Eve
commiserating Abel’s death. On the right side
of the painting several bundles of fabric are
495 On psychoanalytic interpretations of Snow White, see
Haubl 1991, vol. I, p. 36–44. Includes further literature.
stacked and draped on a rug-covered table. The
496 In the meantime, Eddy de Jongh (Questions of Un- stack is topped with a flag made of luxurious
derstanding, in: exh. cat. The Hague, Washington,
D. C. 2005/06, p. 4 4 – 61, here: p. 51 f.) has at least material; alongside fragments of Holland’s
recognized a certain ambiguity in Van Mieris’s work: and Leyden’s coat of arms we can make out
“Is it possible that van Mieris deliberately composed
his scenes, or some of them, so they could be read on the words COMPARAT(UR) CUI VULT (fig. 86,
more than one level? Did he anticipate that they would
be subject to different perceptions? […] This view has detail).501 Comparare is Latin for ‘to compare’
emerged only recently, and the suspicion seems justi and ‘to buy.’ Thus, we could either translate the
fied that certain postmodern ideas, together with
the aesthetics of floating meaning in contemporary words as “There are comparisons for him who
art (‘anything goes’), may have provided an added
stimulus to help crystallize it.” De Jongh substant wants (to see) them” or “Who wants can buy.”
iates his statement by referring to contemporary texts We can find comparisons on several levels: The
by Adriaan Poirters and Jan de Brune d. J., who, in
turn, offer several possible interpretations for the mo- officer assesses the surface of the fabric and the
tif of dog and skull.
497 De Jongh (op. cit.) rightly defends van Mieris against
girl — suggesting that he could buy both. A more
purely formalist interpretations. complex referential system can be found in the
498 Exh. cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C. 2005 /06, es-
pecially cat. no. 25, fig. 15; also see De Jongh, op. cit., constellation between the flirting couple and the
p. 56 f f. tragic scene in the painting. De Jongh interprets
499 “Zich selven geheel in een toneelspeeler (te) hervor-
men […] te gelijk vertooner en aenschouwer te zijn.” it as a reference to the fall from grace and the sub
Van Hoogstraten 1678, p. 109 f.
500 The painting was commissioned and enthusiastical- sequent arrival of passions, violence and death.
ly received by Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria, Franits, on the other hand, sees a connection
according to sources by Cornelis de Bie and Arnold
Houbraken. See: de Jongh exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976, between the painting and the old man who is
cat. no. 4 2, p. 173 – 175.
501 It makes most sense to read this fragment as a pas
sive form and interpret it accordingly. See De Jongh,
op. cit. 189
jealous of the young, successful man; jealousy was the cause of the fratricide.502 Despite
its generally jovial tone, the painting offers a complex referential system and evokes
varying associations and connections: comparatur cui vult.
The little dogs in the paintings from Munich and Vienna could be twins.503 And
yet they differ in their expression. While the dog in the shop fixes his gaze at the viewer,
the dog in the picture from Munich just stares into space. His eyes are open, but his
gaze is empty. This is the representation of animalistic vision, which, as opposed to
human vision, cannot identify anything in the mirror. Contrasting human and animalistic
vision was a popular comparison in the discourse on vision, art and recognition.504 The
following quote is an example taken from Constantin Huygens’s text Mijn leven verteld an
mijn kinderen:
De vorming van de ogen, de volle zuster der poezie, de schilderkunst, [kan

je] kortweg maar treffend betitelen als de kunst van het zien. Degenen die
hierin niet thuis zijn, beschouw ik waarlijk amper als mensen die compleet
mens zijn. Blinden noem ik ze, blinden die niet anders naar de lucht, de
zee of de aarde kijken dan hun vee dat ze met de kop omlaag laten grazen.
Zij kijken zonder ze te zien.505
(The ability of the eyes to create; the equal sister of poetry, painting, can
briefly yet accurately be described as the art of vision. Those who do
not have this knowledge I do not consider human, not fully human. I
call them blind, the blind who do not view the air, the sea or the earth
differently than the stock that they have graze with lowered heads. They
look without seeing.)506
In reference to our painting one could say

that a human, in the fullest sense of the word, is
502 Franits (2004, p. 125 f f.), in reference to Hecht; in: Fra-
someone who, unlike animals, can see, compare nits 1997, p. 221, note 8.
and recognize. 503 Dogs are a common sight in Dutch genre paintings;
they do not have a fixed meaning: sometimes they
symbolize loyalty; lap dogs often have an erotic conno-
tation. De Brune d. J. (1681) already points out their
It could be interesting to compare Mieris’s manifold metaphorical meanings. See: de Jongh exh.
representation of reflections and mirrors to cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C. 2005 /06, p. 50 f.
504 Hoogstraten used animals to mark awareness and re-
the experiences with mirrors that were offered cognition, for example in his perspective box (Natio-
in Athanasius Kircher’s museum around the nal Gallery, London) and corridor paintings. In these
depictions, dogs and cats look directly at the viewer.
same time.507 A Jesuit and polymath, Athanasius Celeste Brusati, Artifice and Illusion. The Art and
Writing of Samuel van Hoogstraten, The University of
Kircher presented a number of optical, technical Chicago Press 1995, p. 311, note 50.
and magnetic devices as well as rooms with 505 Quoted here after Thijs Weststeijn, De zichtbare We
reld. Samuel van Hoogstratens kunsttheorie en de
mirrors in his museum at the Collegio Romano legitimering van de schilderkonst in de zeventiende
eeuw, 2 vols., doctoral thesis, Amsterdam 2005, p. 60.
506 I would like to thank Gotthart Wunberg for his help
with this quote.
190 507 Vermeir 2004.
in Rome. He describes the effects of his ingenious stagings in Ars Magna Lucis et Umbrae,
published in Amsterdam in 1646. Visitors to the museum found themselves in all sorts
of metamorphoses: altered, distorted, fragmented, multiplied thousand-fold, floating
in the air, half human and half animal, or with a skull in place of the head. People were
supposed to get lost in this maze of mirrors and to lose all sense of the reality of things
and the space. Athanasius Kircher legitimized the derailed experience of the self by
claiming that recognizing the world’s illusionary character lead people to God. Aside from
the shared fascination with effects of mirrors, reflections and optical illusions popular
at the time, there are clear distinctions between the painter in bourgeois Holland and
the Jesuit in baroque Rome. In Kircher’s catoptric theater and the later courtly-baroque
mirror mazes, the audience experiences reflections and distortions of their selves. In
van Mieris’s work they can observe the figure’s self-misconception under the perspective
of a second-order observer. The Dutch image enables the development of subjective
imagination alongside its reflection.
191
2 The Picture within the Picture or
Conveying the world through media
Woman Holding a Balance by Vermeer
Painting is not mimesis. Mirrors, whether in images or texts, are not depictions
of visual reality. What are pictures within pictures?
Of course there is no simple answer to this question, far too complex are the
meanings and functions of pictures within pictures.508 In the Netherlands the practice of
integrating images (miniatures, graphic works, paintings) into other images traces back to
the 15th century. During the 17th century, we find this practice in a number of genre paintings
and domestic scenes. Since paintings often adorned Dutch interiors, they are also repre
sented in painted depictions of such interiors. Pictures in painted interiors, Stoichita
rightly notes, reflect the new site of painting: the walls of private, bourgeois homes.509
As varied as their interpretations may be, most scholars agree that there is most often,
but not always, a correlation between the contents of the main image and the integrated
image.510 Pictures within pictures comment the main image. The types of image we find
within images vary: they may be direct quotes of another artist’s work, paraphrases, varia-
tions, or original inventions by the artist.
508 André Chastel, Le Tableau dans le tableau, in: Stil und The connection between the images can be
Überlieferung in der Kunst des Abendlandes. Akten affirmative or contrary. References can be of
des 21. internationalen Kongresses für Kunstgeschich-
te in Bonn 1964, Berlin 1967, vol. 1, p. 15 – 29; also in: emblematic nature511 or more like exempla in a
André Chastel, Fables, Formes, Figures II, Paris 1978,
p. 75 – 98; Pierre Georgel, Anne-Marie Lecoq, La pein- rhetorical sense.512 Pictures within pictures are
ture dans la peinture, Dijon 1982; Hermann Ulrich almost exclusively from other genres: landscapes
Asemissen, Gunter Schweikhart, Malerei als Thema
der Malerei, Berlin 1994; Stoichita 1998, especially or history paintings, portraits, occasionally
p. 179 – 197; Gregor J. M. Weber, “Om te bevestige[n]
aen-te-raden, verbreeden ende vercieren.” Rhetori- still lifes, but almost never genre paintings or
sche Exempellehre und die Struktur des ‘Bildes im domestic scenes.
Bild’, in: Studien zur niederländischen Kunst. Fest-
schrift für Justus Müller Hofstede, Wallraf-Richartz-
Jahrbuch LV, 1994, p. 287 – 314; Gregor J. M. Weber,
Vermeer’s Use of the Picture-within-a Picture: A New
Vermeer’s Woman Holding a Balance is
Approach, in: Ivan Gaskell (ed.), Vermeer’s Studies, not a randomly chosen example, it is a border
New Haven, London 1998, p. 295 – 307; Dieter Beau-
jean, Bilder in Bildern. Studien zur niederländischen line case which most radically tests the limits
Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts, Weimar 2001 (doctoral of pictures within pictures (plate 10). It is a painter
thesis, Berlin 1998).
509 Stoichita 1998, especially p. 180 f. ly reflection of how paintings function as pro-
510 Beaujean (2001), for example, sees nothing more
than decorative art objects in pictures within pictures ducers of meaning and as a medium conveying
and states that “there are no layers of meaning to be the world.
deciphered.” (p. 212) English by translator. Thus this
doctoral thesis unsurprisingly provides no new in-
sight.
511 On emblematic readings, see Eddy de Jongh, espe-
cially: On Balance, in: Gaskell 1998, p. 351 – 365.
512 Weber 1994, 1998. 193
Pl. 10: Jan Vermeer, Woman Holding a Balance, c. 1664, canvas, Washington, D. C., National Gallery of Art
Fig. 89: Pieter de Hooch, Woman Weighing Gold, c. 1664, canvas, Berlin, Staatl. Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Commonly known as Woman Weighing Gold 513 in the past, this painting from
around 1664 is also referred to as Woman Weighing Pearls today.514 The painting shows
a fairly close-up view of a dimly lit interior where a woman standing at a table casts her
eyes down on a balance in equilibrium that she is holding in her right hand. On the table
we see a blue piece of cloth next to two jewelry boxes, gold and pearl necklaces and
coins. A window can be assumed to the left, where light seeps into the room through a
golden-orange curtain. Across from the woman a mirror hangs on the wall, but all we see
is its frame and a narrow strip of silvery reflection. On the wall behind her there is a large
painting of the Final Judgment. In our projected view, the female figure covers the middle
of the painting: the traditional position of Archangel Michael weighing souls.
The Final Judgment as the norm?
The Final Judgment, the picture within the picture, and its relation to the female
protagonist has lead to a very wide range of interpretations of the panting. Already Thoré-
Bürger, the enthusiastic rediscoverer of Vermeer’s artistic relevance, saw a correlation
between the female figure and the depiction of the Final Judgment. In his catalog from
1866 he wrote on La Peseuse des perles: “Ah! tu pèses des bijoux? Tu seras pesée et jugée
à ton tour!“ 515 In a commemorative publication for Wilhelm Pinder from 1938, Herbert
Rudolph further evolved the idea and developed the first explicitly iconologically oriented
194
interpretation of Woman Holding a Balance. He interprets the woman as a vanitas figure
who pays attention to worldly riches instead of preparing for Judgment Day. Accordingly,
he defines both the pearls and the mirror as symbols of vanitas. Rudolph’s moralizing
interpretation determined future dealings with the painting. In his monograph on
Vermeer from 1980, Albert Blankert, for example, sees a contrast between the woman
turned to worldly goods and the Final Judgment. Thanks to microscopic examinations of
the painting, however, Wheelock has been able to clarify beyond doubt that neither pearls
nor gold are being weighed in the balance, because the scales are indeed empty.516 It is
remarkable that it was necessary to conduct a scientific technical examination to establish
this fact instead of relying on plain sight. Even
513 The title Woman Weighing Gold goes back to a de- more remarkable is the fact that this female
scription of the painting in an auction catalog from figure was construed as a symbol of vanity.
1696, “A young woman weighing gold in a box by J.
van der Meer from Delft, painted in an extraordina- From that point on, interpretations of the image
rily skillful and vigorous way,” doc. 62, Blankert 1978
(1975) p. 161. changed, but their basic pattern structurally
514 Oil/canvas 42.5/38 cm, Washington, D. C., National remained the same: the employment of the
Gallery of Art, Widener Collection. The painting un-
derwent minor restoration in 1994 and is generally Final Judgment was still considered a marker of
well preserved. Albert Blankert, Johannes Vermeer
van Delft, Utrecht, Antwerpen 1975, English transla- religious and moral norm. Instead of regarding
tion: Oxford, New York 1978; Albert Blankert, Gilles the woman in contrast to the picture within the
Aillaud, John Michael Montias, Vermeer, Paris 1987;
Svetlana Alpers, Described or Narrated? A Problem picture, she was now seen as a corresponding
in Realistic Representation, in: New Literary History
VIII, 1976, p. 15 – 41, here: p. 25 f.; Ivan Gaskell, Ver-
figure. She no longer embodied vanity, but
meer, Judgement and Truth, in: Burlington Magazine, instead stood for true (Catholic) faith 517,
CXXVI, 1984, p. 557 – 561; Edward Snow, A Study of
Vermeer, Berkeley 1994, p. 156 – 166; Arthur K. Whee- Iustitia 518, or conscience519. In light of Judgment
lock (ed.), Johannes Vermeer, exh. cat. National Day a fixation on worldly goods seems vain and
Gallery of Art, Washington, D. C., Mauritshuis, The
Hague, Zwolle 1995, cat. no. 10, p. 140 – 145; Arthur K. futile, writes Norbert Schneider; considering
Wheelock (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth
Century, coll. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washing- the empty scales, he concedes, perhaps “an
ton, D. C. 1995, p. 371 – 377; Daniel Arasse, Vermeer’s inner decision in favor of forgoing all mundane
Ambition, Dresden 1996; Nanette Salomon, Vermeer
and the Balance of Destiny, in: Shifting Priorities, trumpery took place.” 520 Responsible and
2004, p. 13 – 18 (originally printed in: Essays in Nort-
hern European Art Presented to Egbert Haverkamp- modest, she need not fear Final Judgment, for
Begemann, Doornspijk 1983, p. 216 – 221); Eddy De she carefully weighs her actions: this is how
Jongh 1998; Weber 1994; Weber 1998; Stoichita 1998,
p. 181 – 190; Thierry Greub, Vermeer oder die Inszenie Wheelock describes it. Cunnar goes a step
rung der Imagination, Petersberg 2004 (doctoral thesis
Basel 2003), especially p. 106 – 115. For additional liter
further in his religious interpretation, drawing a
ature from before 1995, see Wheelock coll. cat. 1995. parallel to Ignatius of Loyola’s spiritual exercises,
515 William Thoré-Bürger, Van der Meer de Delft, in: Ga-
zette des Beaux-Arts 21, 1866, p. 555 – 556. which encourage believers to examine their
516 Exh. cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C. 1995, p. 140, conscience and weigh their sins as if they stood
142; coll. cat. Washington, D. C. 1995, p. 372.
517 Gaskell 1984; Blankert in: Aillaud, Blankert 1987. before their Judge at Final Judgment. They are
518 Alpers 1976.
519 De Jongh 1998. to choose a path of life that will lead to balanced
520 English by translator. Original German quote: “eine scales on Judgment Day.521 Nanette Salomon
innere Entscheidung zu Gunsten eines Verzichts
auf den weltlichen Tand stattgefunden,” in: Norbert also resorts to a strict Catholic reading. The
Schneider, Vermeer 1632 – 1675, Cologne 1996, p. 56.
521 Eugène R. Cunnar, The Viewer’s Share: Three Secta
rian Readings of Vermeer’s Woman with a Balance, in:
Exemplaria 2, 1990, p. 501– 536. 195
Fig. 87: Petrus Christus, S. Eligius, 1449, panel, New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art
Fig. 88: Quinten Massys, The Pawnbroker and his Wife, c. 1514, panel, Paris, Louvre
starting point of her interpretation is the assumption that the woman is pregnant. Accor
ding to Salomon, the woman is weighing her unborn child’s fate, determined by Christian
faith, the stars (constellation Libra) and free will.522 It is impossible to fully clarify whether
the woman is indeed expectant, but comparison with Vermeer’s other works and the
fashion of the time make it seem unlikely.523
As different as these iconological explanations may be, they all share a moralizing
interpretation and assume the Final Judgment as an absolute norm and unchallenged
authority. 524 The question of what the style of the picture within the picture is and how it
relates to the main image is never asked; they all ignore the aesthetic staging.
I believe the relation between the picture within the picture and the painting must
be the starting point for all interpretation. Before we take a closer look at this relationship,
we will examine two issues: the image tradition and the level of expectation or literacy of
the painting’s recipients and buyers/owners.
The balance
To Vermeer’s contemporaries, a domestic scene with a young woman holding an

empty balance in front of a painting of the Final Judgment must have seemed new and
unusual. While the elements on their own were not uncommon, their combination surely
was. Weighing gold was a familiar theme since the motif had a long-standing tradition
in the Netherlands. It traces back to the early 15th century, to a work by Petrus Christus
196
from the mid-15th century, probably a paraphrase of an invention by Jan van Eyck (fig. 87).525
The painting shows a young couple in the shop of Saint Eligius, patron of goldsmiths.
The origin of this motif carries no negative connotations; Eligius literally sanctifies the
handling and weighing of gold, pearls and gems. Likely inspired by the same source —
van Eyck — comes a painting of a Moneylender and his Wife by Quinten Massys from 1514;
it is a further step in secularizing the motif (fig. 88). The woman, watching her husband
work, is leafing through a prayer book; the opened page, Mary with child — also a picture
within the picture — serves as proof for the moneylender’s righteousness. In the course
of the 16th century, the motif of the goldsmith or moneylender/pawnbroker was passed
on, particularly by Marinus van Reymerswaele. In the late 16th and 17 th century, old men
are the ones who most commonly weigh gold. It is likely that these depictions as well as
respective emblems by Jan Harmensz. Krul in Pampiere wereld from 1644 and by Adriaen
Poiters in Het masker van de wereldt afgetrocken from 1649 indeed imply notions of avaritia
(avarice, greed) and vanitas. One example is The Gold Weigher by Salomon Konink from
1654, an old man in a domestic setting standing at a table with pieces of gold, masses
and their case spread on it, holding a scale up to the light shining in through a window.526
It is rare that women are portrayed handling balances and money; one exception is a half-
length by Gabriel Metsu depicting a woman sitting at a table with a balance. The work
dates from ca. 1660, but definitely came before Vermeer’s version.527 The Gold Weigher
by Pieter de Hooch (fig. 89, p. 194) is often rightly referenced in connection with Vermeer’s
painting. Both paintings were made around
the same time. Unlike before, scholars today
522 Salomon 2004. assume that de Hooch inspired Vermeer and
523 On the pros and cons on this theory, see Wheelock
in: coll. cat. 1995, p. 374 and notes 12, 13; also: Marieke not the other way around.528 Whatever the case,
de Winkel, The Interpretation of Dress in Vermeer’s
Paintings, in: Gaskell 1998, p. 327 – 339, here: p. 330 – there is no doubt that these two paintings
332. In the opinion of experts on costume history, were conceived in close proximity. Stoichita
this issue cannot be fully resolved, but the facts (con-
temporary fashion, almost nonexistent number of emphatically notes that the picture within the
portrayed pregnancies) rather point against the preg-
nancy hypothesis. picture turned de Hooch’s genre painting into
524 On anti-iconological voices, see Stoichita 1998, an, as he calls it, “interpretable picture” that
p. 181 – 190 and below.
525 There are written sources (Marcantonio Michiel saw encourages the viewer to (emblematic) inter-
the painting in the early 16th century in Milan) on a
now lost work by Jan van Eyck from around 1440, de-
pretation.529
picting a merchant settling accounts with his employ-
ees. Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting,
Cambridge 1966, p. 354. This work is of exceptional The fact that Vermeer’s painting shows
importance for the development of genre painting. a young woman handling a balance for gold is
526 De Jongh in: exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976, cat. no. 31,
p. 138 – 141, fig. 138. therefore unusual, but not entirely unfamiliar.
527 Private collection; ill.: exh. cat. The Hague, Washing-
ton, D. C. 1995, p. 4 2, fig. 17. New and astonishing, however, is the fact that
528 Thus Wheelock 1995; others like Stoichita (1998, nothing is weighed: no object, no money, no
p. 181) consider de Hooch’s painting “undoubtedly
inspired by Vermeer.” gold, no pearls 530. A woman with an empty
529 Stoichita 1998, p. 181 f f.
530 In Christian iconography the pearl symbolizes Maria’s
purity as well as salvation. There is no stringent con-
nection to vanitas. 197
balance in her hands automatically triggers associations to Iustitia, or Lady Justice. In
his Iconologia, translated into Dutch in 1644, Ripa labels the balance as an attribute of
justice and in one of the most popular emblem books of the time, Roemer Visscher’s
Sinnepoppen, the motif of the scale is described as stom en rechtveerdich (mute and
just). However, Iustitia also carries a sword. It is remarkable what a long and abundant
tradition the interpretation of Woman Holding a Balance as an allegorical figure of justice
has.531 In the Middle Ages the symbol of iustitia as a woman with balance and sword was
already common. A standing female figure holding a balance (but no sword) representing
aequitas appeared on Roman coins. Aequitas, the careful weighing of opposing argu
ments, can be considered a virtue belonging to the greater concept of justice.532 For our
context, the relation between Lady Justice and Archangel Michael, who is responsible for
weighing the souls at the Final Judgment, is particularly insightful. This notion can be
traced back to Ancient Egypt and the myth of the goddess Maat. This goddess of good,
harmonious world order, truth and justice weighed the hearts of the deceased. The heart,
and with it all evil deeds, was not allowed to weigh more than Maat’s feather, which lay
in the balance’s other bowl. The act of weighing souls is also mentioned in the Old Testa-
ment, in the Book of Job: “Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know
mine integrity.” 533 In Homer’s Iliad, Zeus weighs the deathless on a balance to determine
their fate. Late Antiquity and early Christianity appropriated the originally ancient Egyptian
idea of soul-weighing Maat and turned it into soul-weighing Archangel Michael.534 Is it
not astonishing that in Ancient Egypt, Judaism and Christianity the moral judging of a
person was symbolized with a scale which can only determine the physical weight of a
good? Symbols like these can only develop in cultures based on the trade of goods, where
a just act of trade is the epitome of a moral act. Notions of Iustitia and the Archangel
were sometimes fused, for instance on a reliquary of the cross from the Maas region
from 1170. The image adorning the reliquary shows the Final Judgment with Lady Justice
taking Archangel Michael’s place as a soul weigher.535 The soul-weighing Archangel be-
came an integral part of the Last Judgment from the high Middle Age onwards. Prominent
examples by Netherlandish painters from the 15th century are Rogier van der Weyden’s
and Hans Memling’s paintings of Judgment Day. A drop in depictions of the Final Judg
ment with a soul weigher becomes noticeable in the 16th century, which can be linked to
the Protestant concept of Christ as sole judge and savior.536 Generally, the radical rejection
of images in Protestant churches in Holland caused what was the most popular theme of
Christian art for centuries to slowly fade into irrelevance.
In conclusion we can ascertain that the motif of the balance as a representation
of moral judgment of a person’s life is an ancient element of our Vorstellungswelt, our
cultural memory. Vermeer is the first to juxtapose the profane motif of weighing material
goods with the celestial act of weighing souls.
198
The individual pictorial elements were familiar to Vermeer’s contemporaries and
most likely produced the respective associations; but they were immediately questioned:
a genre painting with a woman weighing her jewels — but on closer inspection that is not
what she is doing; elements of vanitas that are canceled out; what seems like Lady Justice
is not because she is missing her sword; the Final Judgment with its clearly defined mean-
ing, but only as a picture within the picture; the soul balance that is covered, maybe even
substituted by a profane female figure. A difficult case to solve, surely not just for us.
A Catholic work of art?
Scholars who assess the painting theologically, exclusively address the artist’s
(alleged) Catholic confession. Why has nobody asked about the recipients’ confessions?
After all, we are lucky enough to have a nearly complete provenance of the painting.537
We do not have any conclusive facts on Vermeer’s personal religious beliefs. The few
conclusions that can be drawn from documents are that he was baptized in a reformed
church and that he married Catholic Catharina
Bolnes. Montias, who amassed the most
531 On the following, see: Wolfgang Pleister, Wolfgang important original sources on Vermeer, assumes
Schild (eds.), Recht und Gerechtigkeit im Spiegel der
europäischen Kunst, Cologne 1988, especially the
that since he married a Catholic woman whose
essay by Wolfgang Pleister, Der Mythos des Rechts, mother was originally against the marriage,
p. 8 – 43.
532 Ill.: ibid., fig. 4 2 c. The term aequitas is minted on the Vermeer must have converted to Catholicism.538
coin. Paul Abels rightly doubts this in his in-depth
533 Ibid., p. 36. Similarly, in Daniel 5, 27, Daniel says to
Belshazzar, “Tekel: Thou art weighed in the balances, study Church and Religion in the Life of Vermeer.539
and art found wanting.”
534 In the Judeo-Christian apocryphal Testament of Abra- There are no documents to confirm Vermeer’s
ham from the second century, which tellingly origi alleged conversion; marrying a Catholic would
nated in Egypt, we find the first detailed description of
souls being weighed during Last Judgment. See ibid., have nonetheless been possible since neither
p. 40. Individually describing the plethora of sources
would go beyond the scope of this book. In late An- he nor his parents were official members of any
tiquity, Nemesis was the implacably just goddess re- reformed church. Even if Vermeer indeed con-
sponsible for equilibrium in human affairs. She was
also the judge of the souls of the dead. Her attribute verted to Catholicism in order to marry Catharina
is a balance. Some of these traits influenced the no-
tion of aequitas and the zodiac sign Libra. See ibid.,
Bolnes, we would still not know whether he was
p. 36. a convinced believer.
535 Ibid. p. 43, fig. 60. The reliquary of the cross in the
form of a tryptich is in a private collection in New
York. Iustitia is named as such and is accompanied by If Woman Holding a Balance contains
Veritas and Judicium.
536 Pleister 1988, p. 4 2. such a distinctly Catholic message, as many
537 On its provenance, see Wheelock in: coll. cat. Wash
ington, D. C. 1995 and exh. cat. The Hague, Washing- scholars assert, then it would be quite odd if
ton, D. C. 1995. non-Catholics had bought it. However, that is
538 John Michael Montias, Vermeer and his Milieu: A
Web of Social History, Princeton 1989. exactly what happened. The early owners of the
539 Paul H. A. M. Abels, Church and Religion in the Life of
Johannes Vermeer, in: Donald Haks, Marie Chistine
van der Sman (eds.), Dutch Society in the Age of Ver-
meer, Zwolle 1996, p. 68 – 77. 199
painting have been identified: they were Protestants, Remonstrants 540, Mennonites 541 —
not one of them was Catholic. The first confirmed source we have on the panting is an
auction catalog for the collection of Jacob Dissius from May 16, 1696, where it was sold
together with twenty other paintings by Vermeer. In the catalog, the work is described as
“Een Juffrouw die goud weegt in een kasje van J. van der Meer van Delft, extraordinaer
konstig en kragtig geschildert.”542 Jacob Dissius was a printer, his wife was Magdalena
van Ruijven. An inventory of their collection made after her death already lists twenty
paintings by Vermeer. Magdalena was the daughter of Pieter Claesz. van Ruijven, a
wealthy patrician and art collector. Montias assumes that he was Vermeer’s patron and
owned the greater part of his (very small) oeuvre. Van Ruijven was a Remonstrant, while
his wife Maria Simonsdr. de Knuijt, who bequeathed Vermeer the handsome sum of 500
guilders, was a member of a reformed church. The person who purchased the painting at
Dissius’s auction was Isaac Rooleeuw, a tradesman, artist and Mennonite. Contemporary
owners of this and other works by Vermeer all had different confessions, but none of
them was Catholic. This makes it very unlikely that Woman Holding a Balance conveyed
a stringently Catholic message. We know that the first owners were all members of a
small social elite. Whether van Ruijven truly collected Vermeer’s works or if the 21 paint
ings — about half the oeuvre — did not come together until Dissius’s collected them: the
painting was definitely always part of someone’s art collection, which in turn allows us
to conclude that the recipients had at least some knowledge about art and were literate
enough to be familiar with Vermeer’s ‘world.’
Aesthetic staging
In the following we shall take a closer look at the painting’s aesthetic structure
and examine how it relates to the style of the picture within the picture. The composition
is as simple as possible and remarkably rigorous. The painting’s vanishing point is practi
cally at the center of the image, which means that the vanishing point and the geometric
center basically coincide.543 This point is beneath the hand holding the balance, slightly
beneath the beam, between the scale pans. Vermeer fixed the central point for the con
struction of perspective with a nail; the puncture mark is still detectable.544 Not only
orthogonals meet at this point. The beam of light seeping into the room through the
curtain crosses the woman’s gaze here. The overall rigorous construction of the image
is determined by horizontals (table, balance beam, lower part of the picture frame, the
pinky of the right hand) and vertical lines (curtain, mirror frame and reflection, table leg,
picture frame). Vermeer inscribes the female figure into this system of horizontal, vertical
and diagonal lines. With her conic silhouette she almost seems like a stereometric figure:
200
her uniformed and broadened shape, further accentuated by the fashion she is wearing,
makes her appear static.545 Only the reflected light dancing on the gold and pearls on the
table creates some sense of vivid movement. The slightly lowered viewpoint produces an
effect of monumentality and distance. Vermeer’s slightly defused painting style furthers
the feeling of distance. Even though we seem so close to this woman, she is withdrawn
from us and seems distant. Together, the compositional lines, diagonal light beam and
direction of her gaze lead us to the center of the image, the (invisible) point between
the scales. The composition’s centralized structure generates a feeling of tranquility and
concentration, matching the female figure’s serene calmness. Balance both around and
on the scales has become form.
The sense of calmness described above is characteristic for Vermeer’s art. In our
painting, this principle is perfected with a mathematically sound composition and com
bined with a semantic culmination of the balance motif. There are several examples of
paintings concentrating on a female figure in a fairly close-up view of an interior; the
women are absorbed in their task, or are simply
present and focused: Woman in Blue Reading
540 The conflict within the reformed church between a Letter (plate 13, p. 202), Woman with a Pearl
Remonstrants and Counter-Remonstrants reached a
critical point before 1620, and at the Synod of Dord Necklace (fig. 90, p. 203), Woman with a Water Jug,
recht 1618 – 1619 the victory of the Counter-Remon-
strants, or orthodox Calvinists, was established. Re-
The Milkmaid (fig. 91, p. 203). There is one striking
monstrants proposed a more liberal form of worship, difference between Woman Holding a Balance
particularly in regard to the role of predestination and
free will. They generally advocated more tolerance in and these images: the walls behind the female
religious issues. figures are either completely empty (Woman
541 Mennonites are a Christian group developed from
Anabaptists; they are baptized as adults because they with a Pearl Necklace, The Milkmaid) or partially
believe faith should be chosen consciously; Menno
nites usually refuse all forms of public service. covered with a map. The luminescence and the
542 “A young woman weighing gold in a box by J. van der unbelievably rich detail of the wall’s surface or
Meer from Delft, painted in an extraordinarily skillful
and vigorous way,” doc. 62, Blankert 1978 (1975) p. 161; the map, respectively, intensify the impression
exh. cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C. 1995, p. 143:
“We know nothing about the case used to keep the of complete balance. The figures and the walls
painting, it could have been a sort of protective device are in full harmony, unlike the woman and the
to protect the fragile surface from light and dust.”
543 See the description in Greub 2003, p. 106 – 112. How painting behind her in Woman Holding a Balance.
ever, Greub does not address how the vanishing point
and the geometric middle coincide. He describes
Here Vermeer stages a contrast that could not
the painting as if it did not have any perspective con be more startling.
struction and thus compares it to a painting by Piet
Mondrian. Greub relies on an analysis by Michel Serres
(Peinture: Traduction et application: l’ambroisie et Vermeer included a total sum of eighteen
l’or. La Tour traduit Pascal. Turner traduit Carnot, in:
La Traduction. Hermès III, Paris 1974). Serres sees images in fifteen of his paintings. As far as mod-
the painting divided into four quadrants and therein
finds a reference to Descartes’s analytical geometry el images can be ‘reconstructed,’ almost all are
and the development of the coordinate system. quotes of works by other artists and not original
544 Wheelock in exh. cat. The Hague, Washington,
D. C. 1995, p. 140. On Vermeer’s construction of inventions. Most of them are landscapes; he
perspective with nails and string, see Jørgen Wadum,
Vermeer und die Perspektive, in: ibid., p. 67 – 79.
545 This probably explains the shape of her body, which
thus does not have to be ‘justified’ with pregnancy. 201
Pl. 10: Jan Vermeer, Woman Holding a Balance, c. 1664, canvas, Washington, D. C., National Gallery of Art
Pl. 13: Jan Vermeer, Woman in Blue Reading a Letter, c. 1662 – 64, canvas, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
incorporated a painting of the same Cupid three times; one portrait and, one still life
and five history paintings. Among the history paintings are the Finding of Moses from
the Old Testament (used in two paintings); the myth of Caritas Romana (fragmented
almost beyond recognition) and two themes from the New Testament: a version of
Jordaen’s Crucifixion in Allegory of Faith and, finally, Final Judgment in Woman Holding a
Balance. All model images used are works by Dutch artists from Vermeer’s time or the
1620s. There is one exception: Final Judgment. Here Vermeer recourses to an older style
from the late 16th century. The exact painting has yet to be identified, but is assumed
to be closely related to similar works by Jacob de Backer, Crispin van den Broek, Frans
Francken II (fig. 92, p. 204) and Maerten de Vos.546
Weber correctly pointed out that some elements, like the way Christ’s arms are
bent in a right angle, seem to stem from older sources, namely the famous altar by
Barent van Orley from 1525. Even if the explicit model cannot be identified, it is clear
that the work is painted in the style of late Mannerism. The dramatic and overwrought
pathos of the naked figures, their uncontrolled gestures and the hysteric atmosphere
of the somber-ominous painting could not be in more striking contrast to Vermeer’s
own work.547 If Vermeer had believed the Final Judgment to be a theological and moral
authority, then why would he quote an artwork so contrary to his own work? Considering
that this was the only instance he chose a work dating from before 1600, why did he not
202
Fig. 90: Jan Vermeer, Woman with a Perl Necklace, c. 1664, canvas, Berlin, Staatl. Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 9 1: Jan Vermeer, The Milkmaid, 1658 – 60, canvas, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
pick one of the famous Judgment Days by the likes of Roger van der Weyden, Petrus
Christus, or Hans Memling? The subdued monumentality and venerability of form
would have been more fitting for the religious content of the subject. A lot of elements
in Vermeer’s art grew out of the work of his predecessors from the 15th century, partic
ularly Jan van Eyck and Petrus Christus. And yet, he does not choose their work, but
rather that most foreign to his own. The polarity that is noticed by many scholars is
neither between vanitas and Final Judgment, nor between a vain woman and moral
authority, nor simply between a secular and celestial sphere. It is the contrast between
a harmonious, ordered (terrestrial) world — ‘Vermeer’s world’— and a picture in which
all laws of temperance, peace and harmony are suspended in favor of an affectively
moved and gesticulating mass. Even the most current scholarly findings that identify
an analogous relationship between the woman (temperantia, truth, justice) and the
Last Judgment miss the difference. There is no
harmony. The disparity is not only one of form,
546 Weber 1994, p. 314, note 72. Maerten de Vos is point
ed out in Beaujean 2001, p. 157. but also one of content: the careful, temperate
547 The contrast was already established by several anti- weighing of minimal differences in weight versus
iconologists, but without further investigating the
meaning. Thus Edward Snow (1994, p. 156 – 166) dis- the dichotomous yes-or-no. Archangel Michael,
misses any form of moralizing or emblematic read
ing (p. 160): “The woman’s gentle force counters, rendered invisible as by the woman, points to
perhaps overrules, the Christian schema depicted heaven or hell — tertium non datur.
in her background.” The same applies to Bryan Jay
Wolf, Vermeer and the Invention of Seeing, Chicago,
London 2001, p. 174 f. Greub (2004, p. 106 f f.) focuses
on the formal analysis of the painting’s structure as
a whole, but ignores the stylistic polarity of painting
and picture within the picture. 203
Fig. 92: Frans Francken II,
Last Judgement, 1606,
copper, formerly Brussels,
F. Franco Gallery
New views on Vermeer
Fortunately, since the late 1990s we have seen a growing trend of leaving behind
one-dimensional readings of Vermeer’s (and other Dutch artists’) works as moralizing or
didactic. The scholars mainly responsible for this change are Daniel Arasse, Victor Stoichita
and Jochen Becker.548 Even Eddy de Jongh began to openly consider the “ambiguity,” “multi-
valence” and “open semantics” of Vermeer’s oeuvre in his article On Balance from 1998.549
In regard to our painting, this means that a myriad of (partially contradictory)
associations is evoked — what to make of them is up to the audience. We, the viewers, are
called upon to judge, assess and evaluate as we see fit. In light of the stark contrast be
tween the image and the picture within the picture, however, it is not enough to assert a
multitude of possible meanings. There is more to it than a simple confrontation between
secular and religious spheres and with it the question what a righteous life is. The seman
tic dimension that lies in the discrepancy between the aesthetic structure of Vermeer’s
painting and the depicted Final Judgment must be taken seriously. My theory is that
Vermeer drafts a concept of life, ethics and values that explicitly distances itself from
Christian-Catholic doctrine. Even more so, he marks the Final Judgment as an outdated
image. Of course a claim as bold as this one must be supported by a thorough analysis
of the picture, comparison with other works by the artist, the religious beliefs of Vermeer
and his customers.550 And by contextualizing the work within the mentalities and dis
courses of the time.
204
The observations made in the description regarding the fundamental contradic
tion between the structure of the painting and that of the picture within the picture can
be evolved even further. Time, for instance, plays a crucial role in Vermeer’s oeuvre.551 In
his work, time seems frozen, there is only this one moment, now, the absolute present.
There is no before, no after, no narrative, no looking ahead. It is not the fleeting moment,
the moment of action, as we find it in works by Frans Hals. It is eternity captured in the
present; a presence experienced as eternity and thus as meaning. It is being now (Sein
im Jetzt). Therefore it is the polar opposite of any eschatological concept, which automat
ically encompasses a beginning and an end of time. Life is generally geared towards
the future, namely the Final Judgment. We have two time models: the Christian idea of
momento mori and Vermeer’s concept, which draws associations with Horace’s motto
carpe diem.552
Vermeer himself seems to have reflected the fact that perception (and with it,
interpretation) always depends on the respective position. What else could it mean that
the female figure, who is so close to the viewer, is slightly out of focus while the back wall
is not? The small nail on the wall is painted precisely, just like the tiny hole in the wall be
side it; the view is almost like a camera focused
on the left of the back wall. Thus Vermeer ad
548 Jochen Becker, Beholding the Beholder: The Recep-
tion of ‘Dutch’ Painting, in: Argumentation 7, 1993,
dresses the subject of perception per se.553 He
p. 67 – 87; Arasse 1996; Stoichita 1998. See works by does not focus on the main protagonist, but on
Gaskell from 1998, 2000. Wheelock (in: exh. cat.
The Hague, Washington, D. C . 1995, especially the the wall behind her instead, giving it meaning as
descriptions of Woman Holding a Balance, p. 154) a painted surface (without meaning).
at least pleads for a more open and ambiguous
meaning; also: Weber 1998, especially p. 303.
549 De Jongh (1998, p. 353) sees these new approaches
in connection with experiences of postmodern art The mirror is significantly placed where
and theory: “The hypothesis of Vermeer’s ambiguity, light falls into the room.554 A narrow beam of
or degree of incomprehensibility, may have been
suggested partly by late twentieth-century aesthet light reflected in the mirror is the most intensely
ic notions of floating meanings. Might there not be
connections with what we see in postmodern prose, illuminated part of the entire painting. Its
film, and art: discontinuity, shattering the illusion massive frame corresponds to that of the Final
of reality, resistance to causality, and the manifest
tendency to throw the reader or viewer off balance? Judgment. The female figure is framed doubly:
Might this partly color our view of Vermeer’s inten-
tions?” However he stays rigidly true to a fundamen-
in ‘reality’ her image should be reflected in the
tally iconological interpretation; on this, see below, mirror. Instead we have a triangular constella
Chapter 3.
550 See above. tion, consisting of the woman, the picture
551 See especially Irena Netta, Das Phänomen Zeit bei within the picture and the mirror. As has been
Jan Vermeer van Delft, Hildesheim, Zurich, New York
1996 (doctoral thesis, Basel). established, the mysterious connection between
552 On the idea of two models of temporality see: Chri-
stiane Hertel, Vermeer. Reception and Interpretation, the figure weighing and the Last Judgment
Cambridge 1996, p. 187 – 204 (the chapter Veritas filia evokes different semantics in the audience. The
temporis).
553 Sara Hornäk, Spinoza und Vermeer. Immanenz in mirror in the triangular constellation plays an
Philosophie und Malerei, Würzburg 2004, p. 216 – 218.
In her analysis of Vermeer’s Milkmaid, Hornäk draws
similar conclusions.
554 On the semantics of mirrors, see the previous chapter. 205
Fig. 93: Pieter Aertsen,
Still Life with Christ
in the House of
Martha and Mary, 1552,
panel, Vienna, Kunst
historisches Museum
eminent role. Because it does not reflect her image or anything else but light — the light
(of knowledge!)555 — it becomes a space of reflection, an empty space that the viewers must
fill as they wish. The mirror is a sign of reflection and knowledge.
Vermeer does everything to ensure we can recognize the Last Judgment as a

picture. His painting presents a domestic scene adorned with a religious artwork. The
theme of the Final Judgment, however, is more fitting as an altarpiece. In fact, it was not
a motif commonly found in Dutch homes. A foreign site. Quoting an altarpiece in a con
text it does not belong in — alienation. The opposition of profane and religious scenes is
already familiar from the works of Pieter Aertsen from the mid-16th century, for example
in Still Life with Christ in the House of Martha and Mary from 1552 (fig. 93).556 This is not
a random example, for the theme of Martha and Mary reflects the relation between the
spiritual sphere (Christ’s words) and the mundane sphere of kitchen, food, drink and
daily life.557 Velázquez later adapted the subject in his Christ in the House of Martha and
Mary (fig. 94). Similar to Vermeer’s Woman Holding a Balance, the religious component
becomes a picture within the picture; no longer another reality, it has become an image,
an artwork in the profane world.558
Vermeer not only apostrophizes the artistic character by resorting to a mannerist
model; he also emphasizes the frame of the painting instead of the picture of the Final
Judgment itself. Light (a central category in his work) falls on the empty wall, the woman
and — no, not on the picture — on the gold ledges of the picture frame. Vermeer meticu
lously differentiates various shapes and combinations of light and color. The curtain’s
yellow signalizes that the fabric itself is indeed yellow, but its ‘objective’ color cannot be
determined: its color only exists in this light and would change if either the light or its
angle changed. The yellow corresponds to the narrow strip of the woman’s yellow-orange
206
Fig. 94: Diego Velazquez,
Christ at the House of
Martha and Mary, c. 1618,
canvas, London,
National Gallery
undergarment as well as to the golden aureole in the Last Judgment. The oval shape of
said aureole, in turn, is repeated in the concentration of light at the top of the window.
The yellow surrounding Christ does not seem like light, nor like color produced by break-
ing light, it is merely the local color. In fact, the yellowish tint does not follow any color
ation or lighting practices common in late-16th-
555 On the meaning of light as knowledge in Vermeer’s century art, which the picture within the picture
work, see below.
556 Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Wider die Glättung
is supposed to represent. How the color is used
von Widersprüchen. Zu Pieter Aertsens ‘Christus bei here makes the image seem antiquated, even
Maria und Martha’, in: Peter K. Klein, Regine Prange
(eds.), Zeitenspiegelung. Zur Bedeutung von Traditio- somewhat medieval. However, there is no gold
nen in Kunst und Kunstwissenschaft. Festschrift für ground, which marked the divine sphere in truly
Konrad Hoffmann zum 60. Geburtstag, Berlin 1998,
p. 95 – 107. medieval paintings. The only gold we can find is
557 Here we have a reflection of conflicts between a rising
bourgeoisie, the unprecedented abundance of goods in the frame.
that were available to them, and the demands made
by the reformatory movement as well as between
Catholics and Protestants. The conflicts had many These observations are supported by
layers: commodities versus religious asceticism, vita
activa versus vita contemplativa, the relation between fairly recent findings, especially those following
religious and profane images. As tensions grew, the Stoichita and Arasse. A solely emblematic
scene became particularly explosive when Calvin crit
icized the deprecation of vita activa in Catholicism reading of Vermeer’s work is replaced by an
and defended the value of work. Calvin combined his
re-evaluation with a critique of life in monasteries.
emphasis of the self-reflexive quality of the
558 In one of his early works, Vermeer dealt with the medium. I am thinking about Bryan Jay Wolf’s
theme of Christ in the House of Martha and Mary
(c. 1655, National Gallery, Edinburgh). He overcomes Vermeer and the Invention of Seeing from 2001,
the traditional opposition between Martha and Mary. Ivan Gaskell’s Vermeer and the Limits of Inter
Martha, laying a basket of bread on the table, pays as
much attention to Christ as her sister. Christ, in turn, pretation from 1998 as well as Vermeer’s Wager.
also looks at Martha. In regard to the painting’s com-
position, all three form a harmonious group: another Speculations on Art History from 2000 and
instance of reconciliation instead of conflict. Christiane Hertel’s Vermeer. Reception and
559 Hertel mainly refers to Norman Bryson (Vison and
Painting. The Logic of the Gaze, London 1983). I would Interpretation from 1996.559 The named scholars
also like to mention two doctoral theses mentored by
Gottfried Boehm: Irene Netta on the phenomenon
of time in Vermeer’s work and Thierry Greub on Ver-
meer or the staging of imagination. 207
focus on other works by Vermeer, but their observations also prove relevant for our under-
standing of Woman Holding a Balance and support my reading of the work.
Gaskell criticizes a purely emblematic reading of Young Woman Standing at a Virginal
as exemplarily performed by Eddy De Jongh (fig. 95). Gaskell suggests an interpretation of
the painting as beauty of the woman and art united in a metaphor of love, but also goes
further. He refutes an emblematic meaning as proposed by De Jongh in recourse to an
emblem with Cupid found in Otto van Veen’s Amorum Emblemata from 1608. The emblem
shows a Cupid in profile (and not frontally) holding up a small plaque with laurels and
the number 1 while stepping on a plaque with many numbers. The message, verbalized
in a motto and epigram, “a lover ought to love
only one” refers to the woman playing the vir 560 Eddy De Jongh, Zinne- en minnebeelden in de schil-
ginal, according to de Jongh.560 Gaskell rightly derkunst van de zeventiende eeuw, Amsterdam 1967,
p. 49 f. De Jongh reacted to critics in his essay On
opposes this opinion by pointing out that the Balance from 1998, in which he further differenti-
ates his theory, yet ultimately adheres to his opinion
plaque in Vermeer’s painting is in fact empty, a that Vermeer used van Veen’s emblem. He concedes
blank surface. We seek an explanation in the “The crucial question: how did the painter intend the
inserted moral to function?” (p. 354). De Jongh can
picture within the picture, but only draw a blank. simply not fathom that the painting may not have a
The Cupid is thus a reminder to consciously moral intention at all.
561 Gaskell 1998, p. 230: “I suggest that the structure and
see representation as representation. Gaskell con- fiction of this painting are such that the attention of
the viewer is drawn not to emblematic allusion as a
tinues that Vermeer’s work was not about a principal means of establishing pictorial meaning,
clear-cut message, but rather about “conditions but rather to the condition under which such an al-
lusion is created, and hence to the conditions of the
of the apprehension of pictorial fictions.” 561 If apprehension of pictorial fictions.” (Ivan Gaskell, Ver
meer’s Wager. Speculations on Art History, Theory
and Art Museums, London 2000, p. 83 f.).
562 Wolf considers Vermeer the first modern painter. He
208 contextualizes him within the visual culture of 17 th cen-
Fig. 95: Jan Vermeer, A Lady Standing at the Virginal,
c. 1672 /73, canvas, London, National Gallery
Fig. 96: Jan Vermeer, The Girl with the Wineglass,

c. 1659 /60, canvas, Braunschweig,
Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum
Fig. 97: Jan Vermeer, The Art of Painting, c. 1666 /68,

canvas, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
we translate Gaskell’s methodological approach to our painting — a painting that not only
deals with profane subjects like love, beauty and art, but with the relation between this
profane world and the sacral one — we arrive at radical conclusions. The Final Judgment
should not primarily be read according to its iconography or manifest content, but rather
in regard to the effects of its representation.
A related way of thinking can also be found in Jay Wolf’s Vermeer and the Invention
of Seeing.562 Wolf is not an art historian, but a professor for American Studies, which is
likely the reason for his unprejudiced view and open-minded approach. In the introduction
to his analysis of The Girl with the Wine Glass563 (fig. 96) he writes the following, continuing
Edward Snow’s thoughts564:
tury Holland: “Seeing becomes, in the early modern
period, a totalizing process […].” He asserts that aes Vermeer takes Dutch domestic art
thetics obtained a new meaning in modern culture,
p. 168. “Vermeer’s paintings align themselves with and problematizes it. He cleanses
the autonomy of the bourgeois subjects they record,
and in the process they claim for themselves forms
it of its allegorizing tendencies, re-
of independence, modes of interiority, that rebut moves its latent didacticism, and
the intrusions of either the viewer or the market.”
563 For literature on this painting, see Wolf and exh. cat. substitutes a vision that is quietistic,
The Hague, Washington, D. C . 1995, cat. no. 6, p. self-reflexive, and often voyeuristic.
114 – 119. The work is modeled after de Hooch’s Wo
man Drinking with Soldiers from 1658 (Louvre, Paris). Vermeer is possessive of his subjects,
Wheelock (op. cit.) believes the painting’s central
message is a moralizing one: men lack restraint in self-effacing in his tone, and decon-
everyday life and tobacco and alcohol undermine structive of the very traditions that
moral behavior. He bases his arguments on Rüdiger
Klessmann’s finding that the colored window repre- make his art possible.565
sents an allegory of temperantia (restraint) holding
reins.
564 Snow 1994.
565 Wolf 2001, p. 112. 209
Wolf argues that The Girl with the Wine Glass promises to tell a story of court-
ship and seduction, but fails to do so. The girl, whose function as a model is revealed,
looks out of the picture at the viewer, thus transgressing the story within the painting
and giving the scene a self-reflective tone. He sees the interruption as an opportunity to
reflect representation. What if, he asks, representation per se becomes more important
than moral content? According to Wolf, this is art that no longer stems from a realm of
agency, desire, or sexuality, but is rather scopophilic, self-reflexive and thus postnatural.566
In regard to our context the function of the picture within the picture is particularly inter
esting. On the wall in the back there is a large, upright rectangular, three-quarter-length
portrait of a man. It is the only portrait in Vermeer’s pictures within pictures. The por
trayed figure is wearing black clothing with a white lace collar and cuffs, a style popular
in the 1630s. The man’s elegance is further emphasized by the glove he casually holds
in his left hand. His upright, almost fully frontal pose, the outdated fashion, his admoni
tory gaze from the picture and finally the somber hues of the portrait give the figure a
significant amount of seriousness, which contrasts the relaxed atmosphere of the do
mestic scene. The portrayed man has been assumed to be an absent husband 567 or one
of the family’s ancestors568. Bryan Wolf comments:
The figure within the painting thus introduces two functions of seeing: its
work of surveillance and its work of disguise, both cast in the moralizing
language of ‘thou shall’ and ‘thou shall not.’ Yet what is most interesting
about this old-fashioned, morally righteous ancestor is not how he sees
but the context of his vision: he sees from within a painting.569
He continues:
His ‘obsolence’ binds him to that which is also obsolete in Vermeer’s

canvas: the natural world, the place of agency and morality that Vermeer
casts off — relinquishes — in the moment of interruption that marks the
true starting point of the canvas.570
In The Girl with the Wine Glass a personalized super-ego has a function similar to
that of the Final Judgment in Woman Holding a Balance. Both moral instances, however, are
merely pictures within pictures; they are just paintings on the wall.
When it comes to the possibilities of artistic reflection in Vermeer’s oeuvre, we

immediately think of his explicit commentary on the meaning of painting: De Schilderconst
(The Art of Painting) from 1666 – 68 (fig. 97, p. 209). I would diverge too far if I elaborated
210
on this capital work and its respective literature in great detail. Therefore I will limit my
comments to aspects that can be seen in analogy to Woman Holding a Balance.
Ever since Karl Gunnar Hultén’s essay from 1949, most scholars seem to at
least agree that the portrayed woman is not the goddess of victory, Fama (Fame), but
rather Clio, the muse of history, as described in Ripa’s Iconologia from 1593, which was
translated into Dutch in 1644: a woman wearing a crown of laurels, holding a book
(Thukydides) and a trumpet.571 However, Vermeer does not present an allegory. The
drawn-back rich tapestry rather opens into a bourgeois domestic setting; we see an
unusually dressed painter572 sitting in front of a canvas and his model — a girl — dressed
up as Clio. A glimpse of her regular clothes is visible beneath the antiquated blue cape.
We do not see Clio, the muse of history, but a girl who is modeling her. It requires the
art of Vermeer to turn this girl into a goddess. The (painted) painter, who has a different
view than we do, is not painting the image we see. While we see the entirety of Vermeer’s
concept of painting, he is indeed only painting Clio the allegory. The sketch on his canvas
is only a bust-length portrait of Clio. A full portrait would not fit, and by painting nothing
more than the bust, he really only depicts the ‘costumed’ part of his model, thus render
ing invisible the part that reveals her as a model. Only the laurels are completed so far.
Vermeer would have never begun a painting from the top with a laurel crown. We cannot
even see the muse on the canvas, just her fame. I agree with Christiane Hertel and
Bryan Wolf who argue, contrary to mainstream scholarly opinion, that Vermeer does not
identify himself with the artist in the painting, but rather expresses ironic criticism against
imitating and allegorizing art. The idea that
mimetically painting a (costumed) model could
566 Ibid., p. 117, p. 119.
567 Pierre Desargues, Vermeer, Biographical and Critical adequately represent a theoretical concept (Clio
Study, Geneva 1966, p. 128. and everything implied by the muse of history
568 Wheelock in exh. cat. The Hague, Washington,
D. C. 1995, p. 116. and thus most likely history painting as well) is
569 Wolf 2001, p. 122.
570 Ibid., p. 123. ironically twisted. By marking the allegory, or
571 Karl Gunnar Hultén, Zu Vermeers Atelierbild, in: rather personification, as masquerade, Vermeer
Konsthistorisk Tidskrift 18, 1949, p. 90 – 98.
572 Marieke de Winkel (1998, p. 333 f.) was able to dis- makes the problematic dialectic of the concept
prove the common theory that the costume is an old,
unfashionable costume from Burgundy. The mark-
visible. On one hand what does it mean when
edly slashed doublet and the wide boothose over red an abstract idea is embodied, in this particular
stockings were indeed quite an unusual choice of
clothing in the 1660s and were only worn on certain case by a female figure? 573 On the other hand
special occasions. Bryan Wolf is mistaken when he lies something that Walter Benjamin worked on
describes the costume as not only out of fashion, but
grotesque — particularly the slipped boothose (Wolf in great detail: the disembodiment (Entleibung),
2001, p. 194).
573 On the problematic relationship between femininity the devaluation (Entwertung) of the world of
(female body) and allegory, see Wenk 1994; Schade, objects and the fact that things are no longer
Wagner, Weigel 1994.
574 Walter Benjamin, The Origin of German Tragic Dra- signifiers of their own meaning.574 The young
ma, translated by John Osborne, London, New York
1998 (1963). Also see Sigrid Weigel, Von der “anderen
Rede” zur Rede des Anderen, in: Schade et al. 1994,
p. 159 – 169. 211
woman’s presence in Vermeer’s painting, however, insists on the resistance of materiality
(Widerständigkeit des Materiellen). Vermeer uncovers the difference between signifier
(the female model) and signified (history, history painting). Personified Clio thus cancels
herself out, or as we say today: she is deconstructed.575
Herein lies further proof of Vermeer’s artistic reflection declaring the instruments
and effects of visual staging as such. We have already established this in regard to the
representation of the picture within the picture in Woman Holding a Balance. How allegory
is dealt with is also similar. In Woman Holding a Balance, Vermeer disrupts a strictly
allegorical reading with other means: he unsettles the dogma of allegory by disobeying
the clarity of set codes. By evoking several, even contradictory meanings, he makes it
impossible to identify a singular one. The subject takes the place of interpretation
authority and unequivocal allegorical relations.576 The generated sense of uncertainty is
twofold. Is it really an allegorical image, or could it be a genre painting after all? The fact
that nothing is weighed, that the scales are empty, the de-individualized features and
finally that it is a female figure all contribute to the idea of an allegory. If it were a male
figure, it would more likely be read as an actual person, an actual moneylender and
not as an abstract idea.577
The allegorical elements, in turn, are countered by the domestic, bourgeois and
realistically staged interior. Similar to The Art of Painting, Vermeer overcomes these polar
positions as he turns against both abstract allegory and the idea of genre painting as
the depiction of ‘reality’ or honestly mundane life. He rather demonstrates that there is
a new way to convey fundamentally relevant meaning. It is a form that people already
began to describe as modern at the time.578 Already van Mander used the term when
describing Bloemaert’s merry companies. Gerard Ter Borch’s father wrote a letter to his
son on July 3, 1635: “If you want to paint, make something in the modern style of figures
of groups (ordonantsij van modarn).” The term applied to early genre painting and was a
counterpoint to ‘antiek,’ which referred to everything related to history painting, religious,
mythological or allegorical themes. Gerard de Lairesse retroactively devised a theory for
the opposites of antiek en modern.579 As a proponent of classicism, Laraisse favored the
antique mode, which he claims is legitimized because it draws from classic antiquity,
the Renaissance and the bible and is thus of permanent and enduring value. Contrary,
Laraisse argues, the modern style depends on fads and only deals with mundane, quo
tidian subjects. Modern painting can only depict current states and thus has no lasting
value. Vermeer, on the other hand, diametrically juxtaposes the two modes while mark-
ing the antique style as outdated and obsolete. He thus elevates the relevance of
profane (genre) painting to the level of history painting.580
212
My proposition that Vermeer puts representation up for debate in Woman Holding
a Balance is thus supported by comparisons with other works by him. Questioning the
effect of the picture within a picture in this work is particularly charged because of
its theological subject. The sacral painting in the painting is not an unquestioned author
ity or commentary on the profane scene (neither in an affirmative nor an admonitory
sense). Medieval thinking in analogies is presented, but no longer works.581 All icono
logical interpretations, as myriad as they may be, still adhere to these analogies: you will
be judged as you judge others, as in heaven so on earth, and so forth … The paradigm,
the moral pattern we use to evaluate the scene is a picture on the wall that is explicitly
marked as an outdated image. The picture within the picture does not function as ‘truth,’
nor as a frame for interpretation. The frame in the frame is rather revealed as the quote
that it is. As I have pointed out, the frame of the
painting, which also frames the figure, is what
575 Christiane Hertel (1996, p. 205 – 229, here: p. 229) ar-
rives at similar conclusions in her analysis (following is highlighted and accentuated by the lighting
Walter Benjamin) of Vermeer’s controversial late work scheme.582
Allegory of Faith: “Viewing Vermeer’s Allegory of Faith
is painful because the event witnessed is the devalua- The picture within the picture produces
tion of allegorical authority as the threshold between
the pastness of religion and the future of idealized se- potential meaning that we are called upon to
cular woman. […] In each [The Art of Painting, Allegory semanticize. The image of the Last Judgment
of Faith, Woman Holding a Balance] the negativity of
allegory is represented as an actual withdrawal within ‘forces’ us to interpret the entire painting in
the painting. Clio, Christ and Divine Justice withdraw
themselves in these works, leaving behind a vacuum
its frame. It demonstrates what we all do all
of authority that continues to challenge their behol- the time: interpret the world through images
ders.”
576 Weigel 1994, p. 166. (concepts). Our perception is always framed.
577 See note 573. Vermeer shows us the frame that we see
578 On the following see: Albert Blankert, Vermeer’s Mo-
dern Themes and Their Traditions, in: exh. cat. The and think in. That sounds astonishingly modern.
Hague, Washington, D. C. 1995, p. 31 – 45; Lisa Vergara,
Antiek and Modern in Vermeer’s Lady Writing a Letter Some will say: unthinkable in Vermeer’s time.
with her Maid, in: Gaskell 1998, p. 235 – 255, especially But did not Descartes make the same demand
p. 2 45 f f.
579 A seminal text still relevant for the principle discus- for philosophy, based on, among others, Kepler,
sion is Hans Robert Jauß, Schlegels und Schillers Re-
plik auf die “Querelle des Anciens et des Modernes,” who had begun to examine the instrument of
in: Hans Robert Jauß, Literaturgeschichte als Provo- sight itself, the eye, in his optics? Descartes’s
kation, Frankfurt a. M. 1970, p. 67 – 106. I would like to
thank Gotthart Wunberg for this recommendation. radical doubt of all perception, of all common
580 Analog to Vermeer, Velazquez presented a profane
subject with the poise and depth of a history painting
ways of thought led him to analyze the methods
in his Hilanderas from 1657 (Prado, Madrid). Velaz- of thinking itself. Daily experience was to be
quez not only juxtaposes a mundane scene with a
picture within the picture depicting a mythological overcome in favor of critical, self-reflective
scene, but also creates four levels of reality: the thought. Descartes de-naturalized knowledge.
spinstresses in the foreground, the ladies of the court
in the background watching Athena and Arachne as In analogy to Descartes, one could say that
a play and a tapestry on the back wall depicting the
Rape of Europe — the tapestry Arachne wove in con- Vermeer explores the frame and instruments of
test with the goddess, who later turned her into a spi- thought on the visual level. The scales are empty.
der as punishment.
581 Michel Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeo- The tools of judgment are being examined.
logy of the Human Sciences, New York 1970 (1966),
especially the chapters 2 and 3.
582 On the meaning of frames as symbols of meta-paint
ing, see Stoichita 1998. 213
Vermeer juxtaposes two worlds in two modes, while abrogating all traditional anal-
ogies. Thus, he illustrates the paradigm of modernity, the idea of individual autonomy
and judgment in opposition to a theological world order. Individual judgment is not only
the subject of representation in Vermeer’s painting. The aesthetic staging in fact produces
individual judgment, evaluation, interpretation. The painting refuses a singular (moral)
message — the mirror on the wall opposite the woman reflects nothing, it only reflects
light, a metaphor for knowledge and self-knowledge.
Contemporary discourses — Spinoza
In the 1660s, the time our painting was created, Cartesian influence culminated
in the Netherlands.583 The new philosophy was no longer only discussed in academic
circles at universities, but also by a broader public. Cartesianism was of eminent
value as a referential frame for the natural sciences as well as theological and political
debate. The new concept of Cartesian thinking became a top-notch cultural and social
phenomenon. The plea against antiquated Aristotelian concepts and for the freedom
of rationality and an unprejudiced analysis of nature was substantially furthered by the
technological development of the microscope. Microscopic experiments conducted
since the beginning of the century by Cornelis Drebbel were continued in the latter half
of the century by Jan Swammerdam and Anthonie van Leeuwenhoek. Leeuwenhoek, the
first to discover and examine male sperm under the microscope, lived in Delft.584 The
point here is not to prove any definite influences on Vermeer, but rather to illustrate the
climate that allowed for rational philosophy, mathematics and cartography as well as
empirical sciences, particularly optics, and the experimentation they made possible. This
‘climate’ was able to develop thanks to the progressive nature of bourgeois society at the
time. Despite the high level of tolerance, surely unique in Europe at the time, the process
was also met with resistance and fierce struggle. In the sixties, some radical thinkers
applied Descartes’s principles and methods to theology, or more specifically the bible,
an obvious step, which Descartes himself had meticulously avoided. Van Velthuysen, Van
den Enden, Balling, Meijer, Koerbagh and others called for critical studies of the bible,
dismissed ‘implausible’ passages and advocated a separation of church and state, or
rather, a submission of church to state.585 Koerbagh rejected all notions of supernatural
phenomena, miracles and virtually all ‘facts of belief’ in his text Een bloemhof van
allerley lieflijkheid sonder verdriet geplant (A Flower Bed Containing All Sorts of Delights)
from 1668. He demanded that the Revelation and all its contents should be examined
rationally and that the bible should be read and understood like all other historical
books.586 Koerbagh was arrested, convicted of blasphemy and sentenced to ten years
214
incarceration and ten years of exile. The men
named all belonged to a circle 587, the circle of
583 Wiep van Bunge, Philosophy, in: Frijhoff, Spies Spinoza.588 These ‘naturalists,’ a contemporary
2004, p. 281 – 346. Descartes (1596 – 1650) lived in the source laments, were ridiculing religion, yes
Netherlands, mostly in Amsterdam, from 1630 until
shortly before his death. He was not the first to ques even the Holy Script and the Spirit of the Holy
tion Aristotelian philosophy; his critique was based
on work by Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo Galilei, Ra-
Script. They doubted whether God existed at
mus, Gassendi and Bacon, a. o. all, or at least a God who paid attention to
584 After Vermeer’s death, Leeuwenhoek was designated
the executioner of his estate. life on earth.589 Spinoza was not the isolated
585 Lambertus van Velthuysen, medical doctor, eminent
loner scholars assumed he was for so long.
head of the WIC (West India Company) from 1665,
and member of the city council of Utrecht, was an His life span (1632 –1677) is almost the same
avid proponent of a division of church and state.
This opinion was dominantly influenced by Hobbes, as Vermeer’s (1632 –1675). He was born in
whose political ideas he brought closer to his Dutch Amsterdam as the son of a Jewish-Portuguese
peers. See ibid., p. 320 f f.
586 Ibid., p. 340: Quote by Koerbagh (p. 664): “Who the family, but was expelled from the Jewish
father of this Savior really was is not known, and for
that reason some ignorant people said he was god, community in 1656. His first writing, Principia
eternal god, and a son of eternal god, and that he was philosophiae Cartesianae, was published in 1663
born in time of a virgin without the help of a man:
but those propositions are also outside Scripture, and by Jan Rieuwertsz. in Amsterdam, and his most
contrary to the truth.”
587 All except Velthuysen. important text, Ethics, was finished by 1675,
588 Baruch de Spinoza. Complete Works, ed. Michael but not published until after his death in 1677.
Morgan, translated by Samuel Shirley, Indianapolis
2002; Gilles Deleuze, Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza already revised Descartes’s philosophy
Spinoza, translated by Martin Joughin, New York
1990 (1968); Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari, What is
in the early 1660s in his treatise Korte Verhandeling
Philosophy?, translated by Hugh Tomlinson and Gra- over God, de Mensch en deszelvs Welstand. In it,
ham Burchell, London, New York 1994 (1991); Susan
James, Passion and Action. The Emotions in Seven- he had already developed the basic ideas of his
teenth-Century Philosophy, Oxford 2003 (1997); Ethics.590 Spinoza does not distinguish three
Hornäk 2004.
589 Thus van den Wijngaerdt in his text Oogh-water voor substances like Descartes: God, thought (res
de Vlaemsch doops-gesinde gemeynte tot Amsterdam,
Amsterdam 1663, p. 19, see van Bunge 2004, p. 334; cogitans, the mind) and matter (res extensa,
see below, Chapter 5. the physical body). Spinoza considers them all
590 The Ethics appeared under the title Ethica ordine geo
metrico demonstrata and was divided into five books: attributes of a single substance: God. According
part I: Concerning God, part II: On the Nature and
Origin of the Mind, part III: On the Origin and Na- to him, God is neither the creator nor cause for
ture of Emotions, part IV: Of Human Bondage, or the the substances that our world is made of. God
Strength of the Emotions, and part V: Of the Power of
the Understanding, or of Human Freedom.The work is rather the substance that is unique, indivisible
has a ‘geometrical structure,’ meaning that Spinoza
aimed to develop his arguments according to logical
and infinite. God is the cause for himself and
criteria by using definitions, axioms, propositions and the immanent cause for everything.591 Thus
proof; www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3800, retrieved
Oct. 11, 2013. Spinoza overcomes Descartes’s dualism. Mind
591 In Spinoza’s strictly causal thought, knowledge is (soul) and body are merely two aspects of a
only possible once we recognize the cause of a thing.
The causal chain ends in the notion of a (divine) sub- single substance.592 God needs neither words,
stance whose cause is in itself. Ethics I, Proposition
3: “By substance, I mean that which is in itself, and nor miracles, nor anything else to reveal himself.
is conceived through itself: in other words, that of God reveals himself solely through the order of
which a conception can be formed independently of
any other conception.” nature. Self-knowledge thus is not substantiated
592 That “substance thinking and substance extended
are one and the same substance, comprehended now
through one attribute, now through the other.” Spino-
za, Ethics II, note to Proposition 7. 215
in a forbearance of earthly things, but rather in embracing them, because God can only
be recognized in concrete forms of expression.
Spinoza and his peers dismissed the notion of God as a transcendent or anthro
pomorphic creator.593 With this dismissal, the idea of a Final Judgment is also rejected.
In his Ethics, Spinoza demonstrates the connection between (divine) immanence

and humankind. The force of (godly) substance in humans, conatus, is the base of his
theory of affect. Conatus is the striving to persevere. Recognizing and affirming one’s
own capacity to act is what ultimately leads to happiness, according to Spinoza. The
ethics of humankind are linked to happiness and are rooted in each person, since she
or he is part of immanence. External values and moral concepts (e. g. Final Judgment)
are superfluous. Spinoza dismisses the notion
of a moral system based on reward and punish
ment.594 It is about recognizing the full extent
593 Meijer wrote an (anonymous) pamphlet in 1666,
of one’s own responsibility without falling back which was published in Dutch a year later: De Philoso
phie d’Uytleghster der H. Schrifture: Een wonderspreu
on external moral authorities and about fore kigh Tractaet. In it, he explicitly calls for a Cartesian
going personal advantages. Declaring morals critique of the bible including doubting everything
and allowing only what withstands all questioning.
as immanent is equal to declaring them auton Van Bunge 2004, p. 338.
594 See esp., Spinoza, Ethics V, Proposition 41 and note.
omous. Determining one’s self as a rational 595 Hornäk, p. 113, 114.
being, existing as a cause in itself — this is what 596 Spinoza, Ethics III, Proposition 18, note 2.
597 Spinoza, Ethics V, Proposition 42. “Blessedness is
Spinoza bases his new form of ethics on. They not the reward of virtue, but virtue itself; neither do
are ethics that fundamentally differ from a moral we rejoice therein, because we control our lusts, but,
contrariwise, because we rejoice therein, we are able
system based on fulfilling duties.595 Therefore, to control our lusts. Proof–Blessedness consists in
love towards God […] which love springs from the
he not only considers fear, but also hope as third kind of knowledge; […] therefore this love […]
damaging and undesirable emotions.596 Positive must be referred to the mind, in so far as the latter is
active; therefore […] it is virtue itself. Again, in propor-
affects are those that are in sync with reason tion as the mind rejoices more in this divine love or
blessedness, so does it the more understand […] that
and allow humans to be active agents.597 People is […] , so much the more power has it over the emo-
experience blessedness in the knowledge of tions, and […] so much the less is it subject to those
emotions which are evil; therefore, in proportion as
eternity — an eternity that is not conceived as a the mind rejoices in this divine love or blessedness,
so has it the power of controlling lusts. And, since
transcendent hereafter, but is rather immanent human power in controlling the emotions consists
to life itself; it is the realization of eternity within solely in the understanding, it follows that no one re-
joices in blessedness, because he has controlled his
the present time.598 lusts, but, contrariwise, his power of controlling his
lusts arises from this blessedness itself.”
598 Hornäk, p. 134 f. She also quotes Yirmiyahu Yovel (Spi-
noza and Other Heretics. The Merrano of Reason,
Princeton, Oxford 1989, p. 170.): “It is therefore not
in immortality that metaphysical salvation consists,
but in the realization of eternity within time. The third
kind of knowledge helps me overcome my finitude,
not my mortality. I am saved as long as I live.”
599 I generally agree with Sara Hornäk, who investigated
this relationship on the basis of repeatedly voiced
comments of a possible connection between the two
216 (see Hornäk p. 192 f f. for the respective literature).
The Final Judgment as an outdated image
I see an analogous thought pattern in Vermeer’s painting and Spinoza’s philoso

599
phy. In the same country, at exactly the same time (the 1660s), coming from the same
social background and influenced by the same discourses, the painter Vermeer visualized
a view of the world that the philosopher put into words. If it was possible to verbally
formulate that Final Judgment was nothing more than an anthropomorphic concept,
an image, then why should it not be possible to express the same thing in a painting?
We will never be able to find out whether Vermeer consciously had this in mind. It looks
like he did. Perhaps pictures like this one helped develop new and different views and
experiences of the world, the self and being in the world. What Spinoza describes as the
immanence of the divine in attributes Vermeer visualizes as the unfathomable beauty of
things.600 The scales are empty. Only light lies
on them. In her analysis of The Milkmaid, Sara
Hornäk fittingly describes Vermeer’s use of light
The only detailed work on this issue before Hornäk
(Hubertus Schlenke, Vermeer mit Spinoza gesehen, and what it means in his work:
Berlin 1998) is not very conducive. The only point by
Hornäk that I find to adherent to a (bourgeois) notion
of artistic autonomy is when Hornäk identifies imma- Beyond its natural and illustrative
nence with the autonomy of the image, p. 189 (English
by translator): “We are on the plane of immanence function, the light is purposely not
when authorities beyond the artwork stop ascribing
meaning and the image becomes a reality of its own.
used to indicate an authority
It is a reality that creates its own meaning without re- beyond the image. It rather
ference to anything else. Self-referentiality takes place
on many levels of Vermeer’s paintings and replaces radiates from within things. It
the moment of representation.” I, on the other hand, illuminates objects and figures
assume that Vermeer represents immanence. Hornäk
first places emphasis on Spinoza’s concept of im- from within, symbolizing a
manence and then concentrates on the analysis of
Vermeer’s Milkmaid. Woman Holding a Balance is power that needs things in order
only briefly touched upon in reference to equilibrium. to present itself in their form.
600 In De Schilderconst (The Art of Painting) Vermeer pre-
sented his understanding of painting (fig. 97). The […] Thus immanence finds its
drawn back curtain reveals the truth about painting.
The motif of the curtain is semantically charged; perfect medium in light.
on one hand it refers to the metaphor of the veil, Vermeer’s visual world, which
which already illustrated the unveiling of truth in an-
cient Egypt and later in Jewish religion (curtains in differs from our perceptible
Salomon’s temple, the Torah Ark curtain) and Chri-
stian tradition. Revelatio means revelation, unveiling.
world and its ‘natural’ incidence
At the same time the curtain motif can be associated of light, constitutes its own
with the legend of Zeuxis and Parrhasius. In The Art of
Painting, both sides of the unbelievably lavish curtain reality: a world that no longer
are visible. In fact, the tapestry is the most resplen- depends on the polarity of
dent part of the interior. It thus not only serves as a
reference to something else; it is per se part of the rev inner and outer world or natural
elation it reveals. This is visualized immanence. See
below, notes 634 – 638. Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, and supernatural.601
Arcana Cordis. Zur Konstruktion des Intimen in der
Malerei von Vermeer, in: Gisela Engel, Brita Rang,
Klaus Reichert, Heide Wunder (eds.), Das Geheimnis
am Beginn der europäischen Moderne. Zeitsprün-
ge, Forschungen zur Frühen Neuzeit, vol. 6, 2002,
p. 234 – 256, here: p. 252 – 254.
601 Hornäk 2004, p. 211. English by translator. 217
The image of light as immanence can also be found in Spinoza’s work:
Even as light displays both itself and darkness, so is truth a standard both
of itself and of falsity.602
On the visual plane, Vermeer’s female figure embodies the ideal of inner calm and balance.
This inner tranquility is also present in Spinoza’s concept of affect. He argues that the
aim is not to suppress affects, but rather to encourage positive affects and retain inner
equilibrium. This is called self-approval.
Self-approval is pleasure arising from a man’s contemplation of himself

and his own power of action.603
The specific representation of time in Vermeer’s oeuvre, the frozen moment, the
experience of eternity in the present also finds its analogy in Spinoza’s work. Spinoza
attempts to fathom eternity in temporality, the infinite in the finite. Vermeer and Spinoza
share an understanding of eternity that is in stark contrast to the Christian teleological
notion of eternity and the end of times.
Spinoza the philosopher and Vermeer the painter each devised a view of the
world: the idea of (divine) immanence in the world is tied to recognition and self-re-
cognition, to a certain state of affect (inner balance) and new, self-determined ethics,
dismissing a moral system of reward and punishment and the notion of a hereafter
and Final Judgment.
218
3 Farewell to Lessing’s Laocoon:
Leaving behind a methodological dispute
Gabriel Metsu’s
A Woman Reading a Letter
As I have demonstrated in previous chapters, painting is not a ‘mirror,’ not a

mimetic depiction of the world. Some paintings from 17 th century Holland reflect this
fact and mark their own semiotic character, for example as a commentary picture within
the picture. These images render visible how painting produces meaning — just like
language. In the following I will examine the relation between image and language using
the example of Gabriel Metsu’s A Woman Reading a Letter (plate 11).
(Love) Letters
Between the thirties and seventies of the 17 th century, love letters became one
of the most popular themes in Dutch painting.604 Almost all of them portray women
in domestic settings as they read, receive and, in some cases, write letters. Dirck Hals,
Willem Duyster, Pieter Codde, Gerard Ter
602 Spinoza, Ethics, II, Proposition 43, note. Borch, Pieter de Hooch, Frans van Mieris, Jan
603 Spinoza, Ethics, III, Definition 25. Hornäk (2004, p. Steen — there is hardly a Dutch genre painter
222) rightly describes the milkmaid’s affect as this
form of self-approval and contrasts it with humility, a who did not deal with this theme intensively.
state Spinoza views critically.
604 Eddy de Jongh in exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976, p. 121, Vermeer’s small oeuvre alone includes six letter
270 – 271; Alpers 1985, p. 321 – 342; Ann Jensen Adams, scenes, Ter Borch even painted sixteen (plates 12,
‘Der sprechende Brief.’ Kunst des Lesens, Kunst des
Schreibens. Schriftkunde und schoonschrijft in den 13, figs. 100, 101, 102, 126, 140, 141, p. 220 – 223).
Niederlanden im 17. Jahrhundert, in: Sabine Schulze
(ed.), Leselust. Niederländische Malerei von Rem- How the letter motif could reach such an
brandt bis Vermeer, exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M. (Schirn extraordinary peak in image production only
Kunsthalle) 1993, p. 69 – 92; Stoichita 1998, p. 166 – 173;
Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Liebesbriefe. Plädoyer becomes clear in the context of the eminent im
für ein neues Text-Bild-Verständnis der holländischen
Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts, in: Kunsthistoriker. Mit-
portance of written and printed text as a cultural
teilungen des österreichischen Kunsthistorikerver- practice in 17 th century Holland.
bandes, 10. Tagungsband, Vienna, 2000, p. 126 – 133;
Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, Der unsichtbare Text. Currently books and letters are of cen-
Liebesbriefe in der holländischen Malerei des 17. Jahr- tral concern to scholars. The reawakened atten
hunderts, in: Horst Wenzel, Wilfried Seipel, Gotthart
Wunberg (eds.), Audiovisualität vor und nach Guten- tion paid to the Gutenberg galaxy was likely
berg, Vienna 2001, p. 159 – 174; Peter C. Sutton, Lisa
Vergara, Ann Jensen Adams with the assistance of caused by the most recent media shift, which
Jennifer Kilian and Marjorie E. Wieseman (eds.), Love many believe signals the end of all printed
Letters. Dutch Genre Paintings in the Age of Vermeer,
exh. cat. Bruce Museum of Arts and Science, Green- media.605 Not only the end of the book, but
wich, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, London 2003.
605 The term was coined by Marshall McLuhan. The Gu-
tenberg Galaxy, London 1962; also see: Norbert Bolz,
Das Ende der Gutenberg-Galaxis, Munich 1995. 219
also the end of letter writing has been proclaimed profusely. However, lamentations
on the demise of letters date as far back as the 19th century and thus well before the
electronic age. Theodor Adorno already mourned the looming obsolescence of the letter
in 1962 and asserted that it was no longer possible to write letters.606 The question if
and how electronic communication contributes to the demise of letter writing cannot
be duly discussed here.607 Of course it is beyond doubt that the structure of private
written communication has changed forever. These changes can be seen in analogy
to the massive expansion of written correspondence during the 17 th century and its
profound effect on the formation of identities and the structure of relationships between
individuals.608 In fact, epistolary culture saw its first peak in the 17 th century, and not,
as many, mostly German, scholars claim, in the 18th century. Holland is practically
ignored in epistolary theory.609 Even Thomas Beebee, the first to present an explicitly
pan-European outline in his study Epistolary Fiction in Europe 1500 – 1850, covers Britain,
France, Germany, Italy and Spain, but fails to mention the Netherlands.610 The reasons
may be manifold; next to the great national languages German, French and English,
Dutch is often confined to the second row as it is rarely translated into other languages.
Perhaps the Dutch language is subsumed under German — a fundamental mistake
considering the highly different social, political and cultural situation of the two countries
in the 17 th century. Perhaps Dutch (epistolary) literature was not relevant enough. We
should, however, keep two aspects in mind when facing the issue from the perspective
220
Pl. 11: Gabriel Metsu, Woman Reading
a Letter, c. 1664 – 67, panel, Dublin,
National Gallery of Ireland
Pl. 12: Jan Vermeer, Woman Reading

a Letter at an Open Window, c. 1657,
canvas, Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte
Meister
Pl. 13: Jan Vermeer, Woman in Blue

Reading a Letter, c. 1662 – 64, canvas,
of cultural studies (Kulturwissenschaften): Firstly,
606 In the epilog to the 1983 German edition of Walter

we have an incomparable abundance and quality
Benjamin’s German Men and Women (Deutsche Men of visualized letters in Dutch painting, which so
schen. Eine Folge von Briefen), he writes: “It [the medi-
um letter] is outdated […]. Those still in command of far has only played an illustrative role in the grad-
it possess an archaic skill; actually, it has become un- ually differentiating field of epistolary studies.
feasible to write letters.” English by translator. German
quote after Christa Hämmerle, Edith Saurer, Frauen- Beebee pronouncedly asserts letters as a genre
briefe — Männerbriefe? Überlegungen zu einer Brief-
geschichte jenseits von Geschlechterdichotomien, in its own right, constituting a specific discur-
in: Christa Hämmerle (ed.), Briefkulturen und ihr Ge- sive phenomenon. In reference to Foucault and
schlecht. Zur Geschichte der privaten Korrespondenz
vom 16. Jahrhundert bis heute, Wien 2003 (L’Homme, Kulturwissenschaften, he develops a broad
Schriften 7), p. 8. The authors rightly note that Adorno
laments the demise of an emotional culture specific to approach to the meaning of letters, yet still fails
the bourgeois elite. to acknowledge the importance of images within
607 On diverging evaluations, see Hämmerle, Saurer
2003, p. 7 – 32, here: p. 8, with further literature. this cultural field.
608 Klaus Beyrer, Hans-Christian Täubrich (eds.), Der
Brief. Eine Kulturgeschichte der schriftlichen Kommu-
nikation, Heidelberg 1996; Rebecca Earle (ed.), Epi- Secondly, we must consider the fact that
stolary Selves. Letters and Letterwriters 1600 – 1945,
Aldershot, Brookfield 1999; Hämmerle 2003. Holland was Europe’s most literate country in
609 A representative example for this is Regina Nörte- the 17 th century, which automatically makes
mann, Brieftheoretische Konzepte im 18. Jahrhundert
und ihre Genese, in: Angelika Ebrecht, Regina Nörte- letters immensely important. The high rate of
mann, Herta Schwarz with the assistance of Gudrun
Kohn-Waechter and Ute Pott (eds.), Brieftheorien des literacy was based on the country’s expanding
18. Jahrhunderts. Texte, Kommentare, Essays, Stutt- and increasingly international economy, making
gart 1990, p. 211 – 224. The ‘discovery of the German
letter’ is assumed in the 18th century, predecessors it an economic factor itself. In the 17 th century,
from the 17th century are only identified in France and
Britain (p. 213).
610 Thomas O. Beebee, Epistolary Fiction in Europe
1500 – 1850, Cambridge University Press 1999. 221
Fig. 100 (detail): Dirck Hals, Woman Tearing a Letter, 1631, panel, Mainz, Mittelrheinisches Landesmuseum
Fig. 101: Dirck Hals, Seated Woman with a Letter, 1633, panel, Philadelphia, Museum of Art
Fig. 102: Vermeer, The Love Letter, c. 1669 – 72, canvas, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
more books were printed in the Netherlands than in all other European countries taken
together.611 Dutch printers and publishers not only printed for domestic use, but were
also world leaders in publishing various spoken and dead languages for international
audiences. The book was more than an economic factor; it played an eminent role in the
young Dutch republic’s search for identity. Finally, literacy was advanced by Calvinists
who, however, promoted reading more than writing. To get a feeling for the degree of
literacy, we will take a look at the time’s ‘bestselling author,’ the moralist Jacob Cats:
by 1655, more than 300 000 copies of his books had been printed. Divided among 1.9 million
citizens that means that at least half of all households (assuming 3 – 4 people per
household) had a copy of one of his works.612 Adriaen van Ostade painted farmers and
other members of lower social strata engulfed in letters and thus literate.613
Letters were of central importance to the economy and politics, to scholarly,
theological and private communication. We must keep in mind that approximately ten
percent of men were not with their families, but at sea or in one of the colonies.614
Exchanges on ideas between scholars and scientists predominantly took place in letters;
many were published. The representative portrait of Constantijn Huygens by Thomas de
Keyser from 1627 shows the famous secretary of stateholder Prince William of Orange at
his desk, on which we see an entire array of writing utensils, and in the process of hand-
ing a letter to a messenger (fig. 98, p. 224). Huygens is said to have written over 78 000
letters (sic!), on subjects ranging from politics and the organization of the general state
to letters to scholars, friends and family members.615 One of the greatest Dutch poets,
Pieter Cornelisz. Hooft (1581 – 1647), corresponded almost daily with nearly all Dutch
222
Fig. 126: Gerard Ter Borch, Woman Sealing a Letter with a Maidservant, 1658/59, canvas, New York, priv. coll.
Fig. 140: Pieter Codde, A Woman Seated at a Virginal with a Letter, panel, early 1630s, Boston, priv. coll.
Fig. 141: Willem Duyster, Woman with a Letter and a Man, early 1630s, panel, Copenhagen, Statens
Museum for Kunst
scholars of the time and a large circle of friends on matters of literature, history, politics,
science or the heart.
Around 1630, the same time love letters became a popular painterly motif, the
market for briefschryver, manuals on letter writing, exploded.616 These manuals not only
included templates for various occasions in the fields of law, politics, economy, daily life
and private correspondence, they also helped society become literate and, even more
importantly, shaped a specific civilized norm in communication. Next to Dutch versions
such as Heyman Jacobi’s Ghemeene Sendtbrieven from 1597 and Daniel Mostaert’s Neder
duytsche Secretaris of Zendbriefschrijver from 1635, there were numerous Dutch trans
lations of French and English epistolary manuals. Until 1800, 19 different briefschryver in
79 editions were published in Holland. The most popular was Jean Puget de la Serre’s
Le Sécretaire à la mode from 1630. The Dutch translation was reprinted 19 times in
Amsterdam until 1664 under the title Fatsoenlicke Zend-brief-schryver. It is particularly
relevant in our context, because it includes the greatest number of model love letters.
The sources for these letters were manifold;
most of them drew from fiction and rhetoric
611 Jochen Becker, Die Buchdruckkunst — eine niederlän- literature: from letters between Abélard and
dische Erfindung? Notizen zu einem monumentalen
Mythos, in: exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M. 1993, p. 106 – 125; Héloïse to Pertrarch, Bembo and Erasmus, all
exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, especially p. 26 ff.
612 M. A. Schenkeveld-van der Dussen, Niederländische the way back to antique authors like Cicero and
Literatur im Goldenen Zeitalter, in: exh. cat. Frankfurt Ovid. Especially the latter’s Heroides, a fictional
a. M. 1993, p. 55 – 68, here: p. 61 f.
613 Exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 23, figs. 14, 15. collection of letters by heroines of Antiquity,
614 Exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 27.
615 Ibid., p. 14 ff.
616 De Jongh in: exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976, p. 37 ff.; exh. cat.
Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 34 f. 223
Fig. 98: Thomas de Keyser, Portrait of
Constantijn Huygens and a Messenger,
1627, panel, London, National Gallery
was featured in Serre’s manual.617 This and similar epistolary manuals offered entire love
letters for various situations and added the matching answers as well.618
Puget de la Serre sketched out the different directions a relationship could take, from
the shy beginnings to various endings. It is remarkable how female respondents could
choose from several roles and possible reactions, somewhere between dignified reser-
vation and outraged rejection or between gradually giving in and passionately reciproca
tion. Everyone was included: virgins as well as
widows and even married women. Briefschryver
617 Exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 34 – 37.
were the direct source for the genre of episto- 618 For examples translated to English, see ibid.
619 Still fundamental: Bernard Bray, L’art de la lettre amou-
lary novel that emerged in the 1660s.619 Fic reuse. Des manuals aux romans (1550 – 1700), The
tional literature thus became a template for Hague, Paris 1967.
620 The letters appear to be by the Portuguese Sor Mari-
potential letters in epistolary manuals, which ana Alcoforado from Beja/Alentejo; they are love let-
ters which she supposedly wrote to the French officer
then once again were turned into fiction — now Marquis Noel Bouton de Chamilly. On the issue of
in the form of novels. The earliest epistolary authorship, see: Frédéric Deloffre, Guilleragues et les
Lettres portugaises, in: Littératures classiques 15, 1991,
novels were written in Britain and France: Les p. 259 – 270; Martin Neumann, Die Aporie(n) leiden-
schaftlicher Liebe. Überlegungen zu den Lettres portu
Lettres Portugaises (Letters of a Portuguese gaises, in: Dickhaut 2006, p. 85 – 98.
Nun) from 1669, whose author was recently 621 M. A. Schenkeveld van der Dussen, “Schrijven voor
vrienden; lezen over de schouder,” in: W. van der Berg,
confirmed to be the alleged translator Gabriel- J. Storten (eds.), Het woord aan de lezer. Zeven lite
Joseph de Guilleragues 620, and Aphra Behn’s ratuurhistorische verkenningen, Groningen 1987, p.
110 – 126; exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 37 f.
Love-Letters between a Noble-Man and his Sister 622 Even though we know of no Dutch epistolary novels,
the cultural elite was presumably familiar with the Lettres
from 1684. Even earlier than the epistolary Portugaises and Aphra Behn’s novel.
novel we can identify a genre of epistolary 623 On the invisible reaction and the psyche of readers,
see last chapter.
poems in Holland, known as the dichtbrief; 624 For literature pertaining to this issue, see note 508.
625 National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. oil/wood, 52.5/40.2
cm. Franklin W. Robinson, Gabriel Metsu, A Study of
His Place in Dutch Genre Painting of the Golden Age,
224 New York 1974, p. 59 – 61; de Jongh in: exh. cat. Ams-
they are letters addressed to a friend written in verse and conceived with the public and
possible publication in mind: published intimacy, as it were.621 Their unaffected and
straightforward style clearly sets epistolary poems apart from the rest of Dutch literature,
which was predominantly based on classic literature. What fascinated audiences about
both epistolary novels and dichtbriefe was their apparent authenticity. This is likely why
epistolary painting is so closely linked to realism.
Metsu’s A Woman Reading a Letter
I see an analogy between Dutch images of women with letters and dichtbriefe
and epistolary novels.622 There is one fundamental difference, however: the paintings are
silent. Letters, epistolary poems and novels — we can read what was written in them, we
know the content, the story. The images are about letters, about written messages, but
there is no language. The letters are only visible as white sheets of paper, we cannot make
out any writing. The (painted) letter is invisible text. This invisible text is what allows
us recipients to develop our own fantasies about the letter’s possible contents and the
reactions of the woman reading it. We ‘write’ our own (epistolary) story.
Yet there was one way to hint at the invisible words of the letter and the equally
invisible reaction of its reader623, namely the picture within the picture.624 In Gabriel Metsu’s
Woman Reading a Letter (ca. 1664 – 67), we
see a bourgeois interior, with a young woman
terdam 1976, cat. no. 39, p. 165; Alpers 1985, p. 330 f.; sitting beneath a mirror as she reads a letter
Asemissen, Schweikhart 1994, p. 138; Stoichita 1998,
p. 166 – 173; Marjorie E. Wieseman, Caspar Netscher (plate 11).625 She devotes her full attention to the
and Late Seventeenth-Century Dutch Painting, Doorn- letter, which she holds up to the light, while
spijk 2002, p. 58, 60; exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003,
cat. no. 19, p. 132 f. Based on the influence of the Delft completely ignoring the needlework — the
school and Vermeer in particular, Robinson rightly
concludes a later date, ca. 1664 – 67. Metsu, born 1629 epitome of female diligence and virtue — that
in Leyden, lived in Amsterdam from 1657 until his rests on her lap.626 The thimble that has rolled
death in 1667. There is a pendent painting with a male
letter writer (also in Dublin). See Chapter 4. away pointedly marks how her concentration
626 Franits 1993; Rozsika Parker, The Subversive Stitch.
Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine, London
has shifted elsewhere. The single slipper at her
1996 (1984). feet is erotically connoted.627 Shoes slipped off
627 On the erotic symbolism of shoes in Dutch images,
see Aigremont, Fuß- und Schuhsymbolik und Erotik, are often ascribed to women in Dutch domestic
Leipzig 1909; Handwörterbuch des deutschen Aber- scenes628, and there are numerous Dutch idioms,
glaubens, vol. 7, 1987, cols. 1292 – 1354: Schuh (Jung
bauer); de Jongh in: exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976, p. myths, fairy tales and wedding rituals where
259 – 261; Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat 2000 (Kunst
der Imagination / Imagination der Kunst), p. 148. shoes or slippers are used as allusions to female
628 Franits (1993, p. 77 – 79) interprets the removed shoes genitalia.629 “Men moet zijn voeten niet in eens
as a symbol for the virtue of the woman who stays
in the house with recourse to Plutarch’s Conjugalia anders schoenen steken” (Don’t stick your
praecepta. As always, acknowledging the respective
context is paramount.
629 A remainder of this symbolism continues in Grimm’s
Cinderella. 225
Pl. 11: Gabriel Metsu, Woman Reading a Letter, c. 1664 – 67, panel, Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland
Fig. 99: Jan Harmensz. Krul, Amor Presents a Letter to a Woman, emblem from Pampiere wereld,
Amsterdam 1644, Amsterdam, Universiteitsbibliotheek
feet in another person’s shoes), for example, is a proverb about adultery.630 Next to the
reading woman we see a maid pulling back a curtain from a painting, revealing a ship
at stormy sea. She holds a sealed letter in her hand; it is no coincidence that this letter
almost marks the center of the painting.631 The artist chose said letter for his signature:
Metsu, tot Amsterdam Poort (Metsu, at the Amsterdam port), thus, as Stoichita writes,
declaring himself the sender and originator of
“the whole communication dramaturgy.” 632 His
630 De Jongh 1976, p. 259.
eye-catching, semantically charged signature, 631 It is very unlikely that this is the envelope the letter was
integrated into the image, is the only occurrence sent in, because letters at the time were usually only
folded and sealed and very rarely put into envelopes.
of ‘real’ words in the painting.633 The pail the 632 Stoichita 1998, p. 173.
633 On the semantics of artists’ signatures in Dutch
maid holds propped on her hip is marked with painting, see: Karin Gludovatz, Die Signaturen Jan
large arrow-like decorations — an undoubtedly van Eycks. Autorschaftsnachweis als bildtheoretische
Stellungnahme, master thesis, Institute of Art History
unique embellishment for this sort of vessel. at the University of Vienna, Vienna 1999; Karin Glu-
dovatz, Der Name am Rahmen, der Künstler im Bild.
We can read the arrows as symbols for Cupid’s Künstlerselbstverständnis und Produktionskommen-
love arrows. In emblems, Cupid was often used tar in den Signaturen Jan van Eycks, in: Wiener Jahr-
buch für Kunstgeschichte LIV, 2005, p. 59 – 72; Karin
as a messenger for love letters (fig. 99). It is Gludovatz, Fährten legen, Spuren lesen. Die Künstler-
distinctive for the age of letters that Cupid now signatur als poietische Referenz, Munich 2009.
634 Jan Assmann, Das verschleierte Bild zu Sais — griechi-
aims at the heart of lovers with letters instead sche Neugier und ägyptische Andacht, in: Aleida und
Jan Assmann (eds.), Schleier und Schwelle, vol. 3: Ge-
of arrows. heimnis und Neugierde, Munich 1999, p. 45 – 66.
The maid therefore is the carrier of 635 Moshe Barasch, The Veil: Representations of the Sec
ret in the Visual Arts, in: The Language of Art. Studies
the love message in multiple ways; she is also in Interpretation. New York, London 1997, p. 266 – 287.
636 This theme continues into the early modern period,
for example in Hugo van der Goes’s depiction of the
birth of Christ, which shows two prophets drawing back
226 a curtain to reveal the miracle of birth and with it —
the one who pulls back the curtain before the nautical painting. The motif of the drawn
back curtain is also symbolically laden. The curtain (or veil) is the ultimate symbol of
revelation. Already in Antiquity, in Plutarch’s writing, the Parting of the Veil at Sais became
the epitome of the dialectics of truth and concealment.634 The Egyptian inscription at
the shrine of Neith-Isis-Minerva says: “I am all that hath been, and is, and shall be;
and my veil no mortal has hitherto raised.” The veil / curtain became the metaphor
for secrets, in Greco-Roman Antiquity as much as in Judaism and Christianity.635 The
curtain conceals and reveals what is holy. Solomon’s Temple, the curtains of the Torah
shrine and the curtains in medieval depictions of the Apocalypse all come to mind.636
At the same time our painting refers to actual curtains like they were used in Holland
to protect paintings.637 Moreover, the trompe-l’oeil effect of the curtain is reminiscent
of the painting contest between Zeuxis and Parrhasius — a clear and irrefutable signal
that we have a picture, an artificial scene before us.638 The maid in back view is not
only a doubling of the reading female figure, but also of the viewer’s position. She is
like a guideline for the viewer to read the painting like the woman is reading the letter.
A complex web of reciprocal references marks the painting: two female figures, one in
frontal, the other in back view; the opened letter/the unopened letter; the viewing of a
text/ the viewing of an image; the sense of sight as rational recognition/the animalistic
sense of sight represented by the dog.639 The pairing of mirror and painting is another
instance of semantically laden juxtaposition.640 The mirror only reflects a fraction of the
window’s mullion. It does not even reflect the reading woman’s back, and even less the
text of the letter in her hands. It is the painting on the wall that reveals the meaning of the
letter to us.
typologically speaking — the fulfillment of their pro- What is being covered, hidden from
phecies. Raphael’s Sixtine Madonna also includes a our eyes, yet also (at least partially) revealed?
curtain drawn back to reveal the divine sight.
637 Kemp 1986. The painting in gray tones shows two unrigged
638 Pliny the Elder described (in Naturalis Historia, book
35/65) the late classic painter Parrhasius’s painting sailing ships at stormy sea. Ships at sea were
contest with Zeuxis. While Zeuxis’s painting of grapes a popular motif in Holland’s love discourse;
attracted birds that pecked at his canvas in vain,
Parrhasius managed to fool his competitor. Zeuxis mostly the ship and the sailor represented
did not realize that the curtain seemingly covering
Parrhasius’s work was in fact painted until he tried to
the lovers, while the sea was love.641 Eddy de
draw it back. This anecdote has served as a metaphor Jongh has compiled this imagery from poetry
for art as a deceptive mimicry of nature for centuries.
On the meaning of curtains in Vermeer’s oeuvre, see and emblematics, I will quote a few in the
note 600. following.642 Cornelis Pietersz. Biëns compares
639 On the difference between human (aware) sight and
animalistic sight, see Part II, Chapter 1. suitors with ships sailing the abyssal sea:
640 On the meaning of mirrors, see ibid.
641 The exceptional importance of the sea for Dutch soci-
ety is reflected in the manifold use of sea, ships and
sailors for different contexts. See Lawrence Otto Goed-
de, Tempest and Shipwreck in Dutch and Flemish Art.
Convention, Rhetoric, and Interpretation, University
Park, London 1989.
642 De Jongh in: exh. cat. Amsterdam 1967, p. 50 – 55; de
Jongh in: exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976, p. 270. 227
Fig. 100: Dirck Hals,
Woman Tearing a Letter,
1631, panel, Mainz,
Mittelrheinisches
Landesmuseum
Fig. 101: Dirck Hals,

Seated Woman with
a Letter, 1633, panel,
Philadelphia, Museum
of Art
Fig. 102: Vermeer, The

Love Letter, c. 1669 – 72,
canvas, Amsterdam,
Rijksmuseum
Even als de Scheepjes varen / In het grondeloose Meer […] Zijn de Vryers te
ghelijcken.643
Otto van Veen, in turn, equates unrequited love with a ship that does not arrive, while
fulfilled love is a ship sailing in full wind. Jacob Westerbaen describes suitors as ships:
Vryers gelijck de Schippers, die de baeren / Van ’t ongestuyme diep des

hollen Meyrs bevaeren’, en is het ’vryen een Zee, waer in men storm, en
wind, / En stille kalmt, so wel als in de golven, vindt’.
The accompanying text to an emblem in the Minne-beelden by Jan Harmensz. Krul from
1634 states:
Wel te recht mach de Liefde by de Zee vergeleecken werden

aenghesien haer veranderinge
die d’eene uyr hoop
d’ander uyr vreese doet veroorsaecken: even gaet het met een Minnaer
als het een Schipper doet
de welcke sich op zee beghevende
d’eene dagh goedt we’er
d’ander dagh storm en bulderende wint gewaer wort.644
228
An emblem from Krul’s Pampiere Wereld, depicting a Cupid delivering a love letter
to a lady (fig. 99, p. 226) also resorts to a picture within the picture, a nautical scene with a
man at shore, to emphasize the amorous character of the scene.
In this context it becomes clear why so many paintings of women reading letters
include pictures within pictures of seascapes and nautical scenes (figs. 100 and 101): they
are what marks the (silent) letters as love letters. In early versions by Dirck Hals from the
1630s, the mood in the seascape corresponds with the women’s emotional state. While a
stormy sea in the painting on the wall in Woman Tearing a Letter emphasizes the dramatic
and grim atmosphere, Hals’s painting from 1633 suggests the opposite. Here a plump,
contently smiling woman sits before a harmonious seascape showing a calm sea during
lovely weather. Vermeer also incorporated nautical scenes into his paintings of women
reading letters (fig. 102).645
Metsu did not include a random seascape in his painting, but rather a stormy sea.
It is reminiscent of an epigram by Jan Harmensz. Krul printed in his popular emblem
collection Minne-belden from 1640. It shows a sailing ship with a Cupid at the billowed
sails and a man at the forecastle, while a woman
643 Handt-boecken der christelijcke gedichten, Hoorn 1635, waits at distant shore (fig. 103, p. 230). The motto
p. 188 – 189, Quoted here after de Jongh 1976, p. 270.
644 Jan Harmensz. Krul, Minne-beelden: Toe-ghepast de of the picture is “Al zijt ghy vert, noyt uyt het
lievende Ionckheyt, Amsterdam 1640. Quoted here af- Hert” (Even though you are far away, you are
ter exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976, p. 121.
645 On this, see Part II, Chapter 5, on Dirck Hals. Also see never out of my heart), followed by the epigram:
Metsu’s Woman Writing a Letter from ca. 1665, which
shows a large seascape with a ship behind the figure.
(private collection, ill.: exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003,
cat. no. 20, p. 135). 229
Fig. 103: Jan Harmensz. Krul, emblem from Minne-beelden, Amsterdam 1640
Fig. 104: Heerman Witmont, Ships in a Storm, pen on wood, private collection
[…] de ongebonde Zee, vol spooreloose baren

Doet tusschen hoop en vrees, mijn lievend’ herte varen:
De liefd’ is als een Zee, een Minnaer als een schip,
U gonst de haven lief, u af-keer is een klip;
Indien het schip vervalt (door af-keer) komt te stranden,
Soo is de hoop te niet van veyligh te belanden:
De haven uwes gonst, my toont by liefdens baeck,
Op dat ick uyt de Zee van liefdens vreese raeck.
(On the unbounded sea of trackless waves,

My amorous heart sails between hope and fear:
Love is like the sea, a lover like a ship,
Your favor a safe harbor, your rejection a rock;
If the ship were to run aground,
All hope of a safe return would be dashed;
Show the harbor of your favor, by a beacon of love,
So that I may escape the sea of love’s fear.)646
The rough sea carrying the rocking ship in our picture stands for the dangers and
emotions of love; the picture within the picture represents the contents of the letter, or
rather the storm of emotions taking place inside the woman who, on the outside, is
calmly reading the letter.
230
The idea of love as the sea and of lovers as sailors or ships are metaphors, or
imagery in language. Dutch painters then translated the imagery into their pictures. The
metaphors are not simply visualized, but rather represented as pictures within pictures.647
Thus the image of the ship in a sea storm as an image, as a metaphor, is clearly marked
as a frame of interpretation. What seems like ‘pure’ painting is in fact a reference to the
realm of love letters, to written and read texts, to words. Seeing this kind of painting
invokes possible letters, memories of letters written or received, various letter writers
and epistolary poems. In order to understand
the painting, viewers must be familiar with
646 Jan Harmenszoon Krul, Minne-beelden, Amsterdam
1634, p. 2 – 3, quoted here after de Jongh, exh. cat. Ams- the culture of love letters. The imagination
terdam 1976, p. 270.
647 There are a few rare exceptions of panel paintings aroused when viewing the painting feeds off
where the metaphor fills the entire image. One case the knowledge of the genre, but the reference
is a painting by an anonymous Dutch painter showing
a stormy sea with a ship in distress; at shore we see to language remains indeterminate and purely
three couples. This is a visualization of the epigram
of the dangers of love, represented by the sea storm, associative. The image is not an illustration of
in the medium of panel painting. (ill.: Goedde 1989, any specific text; it refers to language without
p. 134 f., fig. 88).
648 I would like to thank Karl Schütz, head of the Gemäl- becoming absorbed in language. The letter’s
degalerie at KHM Vienna for his tip. Jeroen Giltaij
and Jan Kelch (eds.), Lof der Zeevaart. De Holland- contents (the words) appear as a picture within
se Zeeschilders van de 17e Eeuw, exh. cat. Museum the picture, while the picture refers to language,
Boymans van Beuningen Rotterdam and Staatliche
Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie im Bodemuseum which in turn refers to images: image and lan
1997. In his article (p. 408, cat. no. 96) on Witmont,
Friso Lammertse already suggests that Metsu may
guage merge in dialectic unity.
have wanted to allude to a penschilderij in his Dublin
painting, but does not consider the implications that
come with it. The painterly style in Metsu’s seascape, The continuous (‘colorless’) gray scale
however, speaks against this theory. of the seascape, finally, is reminiscent of mari
649 Calligraphy was so highly esteemed that folios with
handwriting were hung on walls next to paintings. Four time pictures drawn on wood panels or canvas
main styles were dominantly taught, chosen according
to subject and addressee. The style could change with pens. They are known as pen paintings
within one text. Ornaments, figures and all sorts of (penschilderij) and were pioneered by Willem
decorations were incorporated — relics from medieval
illumination. Calligraphy reveals the close link between van de Velde the Elder or Heerman Witmont
script and image, but also that between script and
voice. (Vondel, for example, uses different types scripts (fig. 104).648 It seems plausible that the proximity
in his tragicomedy Het Pascha from 1612 to distinguish of image and writing were supposed to be
the choir.) See: Ann Jensen Adams, Disciplining the
Hand, Disciplining the Heart: Letter-Writing, Paint pointed out. Writing is written and thus visual
ings and Practices in Seventeenth-Century Holland,
in: exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 63 – 76, espec
ized language. Like an image, language in
ially p. 67. On the programmatic representation of the written form is perceived through the eye.
pictoriality of script in Dutch still lifes of books, see:
Heike Eipeldauer, “books are different.” Holländische Calligraphy played an eminent role in the
Bücherstillleben im 17. Jahrhundert am Beispiel von Netherlands; it was an essential element in
Jan Davidsz. de Heem: Zum Verhältnis von Bild und
Text, Sehsinn und Tastsinn, master thesis, University the art of letter writing.649 Moreover, (real)
of Vienna 2007. On general issues on Schriftbildlich
keit: Sybille Krämer, ‘Schriftbildlichkeit’ oder: Über eine letters were produced with the same tools as
(fast) vergessene Dimension der Schrift, in: Sybille penschilderij: with pens and ink.
Krämer, Horst Bredekamp (eds.), Bild, Schrift, Zahl,
Munich 2003, p. 157 – 176; Sybille Krämer, Operations-
raum Schrift: Über einen Perspektivwechsel in der Be-
trachtung der Schrift, in: Gernot Grube, Werner Kogge,
Sybille Krämer (eds.), Schrift. Kulturtechnik zwischen
Auge, Hand und Maschine, Munich 2005, p. 23 – 57. 231
Language and images — a methodological dispute among art historians
Metsu’s Woman Reading a Letter exemplarily demonstrates the close connection

between image and language through the medium of painting. It is exactly this relation
ship between image and language that lies at the center of a long-lasting methodological
dispute among art historians dealing with Dutch painting: the dispute between iconolo
gists and anti-iconologists. The controversy revolves around the fundamental question
of how image and language relate to visual reality, or rather social reality. Is realist Dutch
painting a depiction of the visual world, a mirror of social reality, an ode to the beauty of
the world, art for the sake of art, or are there symbols and hidden (moralizing) messages
hidden beneath the visible surface?
Eddy de Jongh’s texts and exhibitions brought fundamental change to the research
scene on Dutch painting in the 1960s — changes that continue to mark research to this day.
De Jongh rejected the hitherto accepted opinion that Dutch genre painting was a depic-
tion of Dutch society.650 De Jongh applied Panofsky’s iconological method, particularly
the concept of disguised symbolism, to Dutch
genre painting and interpreted its realism
650 De Jongh 1967; de Jongh 1976; fundamental text: Re-
as seeming realism which concealed the alism and Seeming Realism in Seventeenth-Century
Dutch Painting, in: Franits 1997, p. 21 – 56, Dutch origi-
actual, symbolical and most often moralizing nal: Realisme en schijnrealisme in de Hollandse schil-
meaning.651 The basis of his interpretation derkunst van de zeventiende eeuw, in: exh. cat. Remb-
randt en zijn tijd, Brussels 1971, p. 143 – 194. However,
was mainly emblematic art, which indeed de Jongh was not the first to dispute the general under-
played a crucial role in 17 th century Holland. standing of Dutch genre painting as a depiction of nat
ural reality. The new approach was initiated by Hans
De Jongh was able to offer plausible Kauffmann, Die Fünf Sinne in der niederländischen
Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts, in: Kunstgeschichtliche
interpretations of singular motifs in Dutch Studien für Dagobert Frey, Breslau 1943, p. 133 – 157.
genre painting — including seascapes with This was followed by works on individual issues such
as Panofsky’s study on Rembrandt’s Danaë, Herbert
sailing ships as metaphors for love. Scholars, Rudolph’s on vanitas, Ingvar Bergström’s on the still
life and Konrad Renger’s Lockere Gesellschaft. For a
particularly those in the Netherlands, largely short overview of research since Hegel and Bohde,
followed de Jongh, even though various see: Möbius, Olbrich 1990, p. 7 – 45.
651 Erwin Panofsky, Jan van Eyck’s Arnolfini Portrait, in:
iconological analyses often led to contrary Burlington Magazine 64, 1934, p. 117 – 127; Erwin Pa-
nofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origin and
interpretations. The most prominent opposition Character, 2 vols., Cambridge 1953.
to de Jongh’s approach came from Svetlana 652 See especially Wayne Franits’s volume “Realism Re-
considered” from 1997; W. Franits, The Relationship
Alpers in her book The Art of Describing from between Emblems and Dutch Paintings of the 17th
1983. Alpers aims her critique at de Jongh’s Century, in: Marsyas. Studies in the History of Art,
22, 1983 – 1985, New York 1986, p. 25 – 32; Peter Hecht,
application of iconologist methods to Dutch The Debate on Symbol and Meaning in Dutch Seven-
teenth-Century Art: An Appeal to Common Sense, in:
painting. She argues that tracing visual art Simiolus 16, 1986, p. 173 – 187; Jochen Becker, Der Blick
back to texts is a method devised for Italian auf den Betrachter: Mehrdeutigkeit als Gestaltungs-
prinzip niederländischer Kunst des 17. Jahrhunderts,
Renaissance art and thus not an adequate tool in: L ’ Art et les révolutions, Section 7, XXVIIe cong-
rès international d’histoire de l’Art, Strasbourg 1989,
p. 76 – 92; Jochen Becker, Are these Girls really so neat?
On Kitchen Scenes and Method, in: Freedberg/ Vries,
232 p. 138 – 173, especially p. 139 f.; Eric Jan Sluijter, Didactic
for interpreting Dutch painting. She sees the latter’s significance in the description of
surfaces and in obtaining knowledge of the world through optical perception. This, Alpers
states, is in harmony with the enormous importance of contemporary insights into the
field of optics (Kepler, Descartes). Alpers takes the realism of Dutch painting seriously.
She does not misconceive it as an immediate reflection of natural or social truth, but
rather in the sense of Roland Barthes’s ‘effect of reality’ (effet de reel) as a specific form
of representation in sync with scientific discourses of the time. In more recent years, the
absolute prevalence of iconological approaches has been questioned from numerous
points of view.652 Even de Jongh himself revises the fixation on emblematics and the
absolutization of one specific meaning in his more recent work, for example in his essay
On Balance from 1998.653 The 1990s fortunately saw a surge in texts that refuse to adhere
to the polarized view and instead call for the synthesis of different approaches.654
Even though the polarity is still persistent in interpretations of Dutch painting, I
find it obsolete, in light of more recent developments, to revisit and extensively discuss
the opposing positions. What research has missed, however, is that in spite of their con-
trasting views, both sides are determined by the same structural dichotomy: the separa-
tion of word and image. The relation between
word and image is exactly at the center of debate
and Disguised Meanings? Several Seventeenth-Centu-
ry Texts on Painting and the Iconological Approach to today. In other words: the underlying problem
Dutch Paintings of this Period, in: David Freedberg, J.
de Vries (eds.), Art in History, History in Art. Studies in
is indeed quite topical and its relevance goes
Seventeenth-Century Dutch Culture, 1991, p. 175 – 207, beyond the methodological debate on Dutch
reprinted in: Franits 1997, p. 78 – 87; Weber 1994.
653 De Jongh 1998; de Jongh in: exh. cat. The Hague, painting between art historians. In the following
Washington, D. C. 2005/06. I will elaborate and historically contextualize my
654 See especially: Goedde 1989; Norman Bryson, Looking
at the Overlooked. Four Essays on Still Life Painting, theory that iconologists and their opponents
London 1990, especially p. 120 ff. on vanitas; Celes-
te Brusati, Artifice and Illusion. The Art and Writing base their arguments on the same paradigm.
of Samuel van Hoogstraten, Chicago 1995; Honig
1997; Kettering 1993 (1997); Stoichita 1998, especially
p. 166 – 173; the essays in Franits 1997; Gaskell 1998 Eddy de Jongh tirelessly points out
and 2000, works in which he distances himself from
his earlier iconological approach; Elizabeth Alice Ho- that Dutch painting is not l’art pour l’art, but
nig, Desire and Domestic Economy, in: Art Bull. 83, has a deeper meaning. This is undoubtedly
2001/2, p. 294 – 315. A balanced view can be found in
the text by Peter C. Sutton in exh. cat. Philadelphia, Ber- true. However, meaning for de Jongh is tied
lin, London 1984.
655 Arthur Henkel, Albrecht Schöne, Emblemata. Hand-
exclusively to words. He has a foreshortened
buch zur Sinnbildkunst des XVI. und XVII. Jahrhun- view of the relation between text and image
derts, Stuttgart 1967, cols. 1462 und 1467 – 1468; Al
brecht Schöne, Emblematik und Drama im Zeitalter and assumes images are illustrations of words.
des Barock, Munich 1968 (2nd edition); Peter M. Daly, Even in the field of emblematics research it has
Emblem Theory. Recent German Contributions to the
Characterization of the Emblem Genre, Wolfenbütte- been asserted that pictura (the image) is not the
ler Forschungen, vol. 9, Nendeln/Liechtenstein 1979;
Carsten-Peter Warncke, Sprechende Bilder — sichtba- illustration of a motto and the epigram is not
re Worte. Das Bildverständnis in der frühen Neuzeit, an explanation of the riddle between motto and
Wolfenbütteler Forschungen, vol. 33, Wiesbaden 1987,
p. 161 – 192; Thomas Cramer, Fabel als emblematische pictura.655 The three elements of the emblem
Rätsel. Vom Sinn der Illustrationen in den Fabelsamm-
lungen von Posthius und Schopper, 1566. Ein Beitrag
zur Kulturgeschichte des nichtlinearen Lesens, in:
Wenzel 2001, p. 133 – 157. 233
are rather connected in a flexible, yet tension-laden relationship. Each one elucidates the
other in the name of a shared idea. The image here is quite equal to text. In other words:
Even in emblems, where the relationship between image and text is extremely close,
the image is not dissolved in text. Moreover, images alone cannot make up an emblem
book. De Jongh defends his approach in the catalog to the exhibition Leselust in Frankfurt
from 1993:
My emphasis of language by no means intends to relativize the significance

of formal aspects such as composition, coloring, form and rendering of the
material. […] I find both aspects equally important, form and content, which
I believe have lost balance in our perception due to recent debate. Now that
the polemics have been subdued, there is no doubt in my mind that lan-
guage plays a decisive role, despite what has been vehemently contested.
Of course the amount of language is not the same in each art work. It can
easily be demonstrated that throughout the 17th century […] there were ar-
tists who lacked the esprit to bestow significance to their pictures through
real or visualized words.656
De Jongh is equally interested in form and content. He thus only sees form as
something formal, like a costume, but never as a bearer of content. According to him, if
there is no text illustrated by visual motifs, then these pictures lack esprit, spirit, sense.
Therefore, de Jongh believes that meaning can only be carried by those motifs, which
explicitly refer to words and thus to language, while form itself (the aesthetic structure,
the staging) can never bear meaning.
Svetlana Alpers rightly criticizes the hierarchy of text as superior to image within
the text-image relation. However, she absolutizes the autonomy of the visual and
minimalizes the relevance of words for images. In her analysis of inscriptions in Dutch
paintings, she comments on Metsu’s quotes on virginals: “The inscription, in other
words, does not seem to be providing an interpretive key to the painting.” 657 Alpers
even denies the meaning and significance of text in still lifes of books, letters and other
written media, which explicitly address the relationship between text and image, by
simply ignoring their content.658 In her opinion, the depiction of letters signals “visual
attention without deeper meaning” 659 and the texts in many Dutch paintings “[…] extend
[what to look at] without deepening the reference of the works.” 660 When describing
Metsu’s Woman Reading a Letter, she ignores the motif of the picture within the picture.
Alpers follows a cultural studies approach and thus considers images as representations.
It is difficult to understand why she defends images against words; perhaps her fervid
234
opposition to iconologists is the reason. Next to Alpers there are anti-iconologists whose
arguments are not even remotely as differentiated: they contrast the meaning of images
with the meaning of language, or, in the sense of l’art pour l’art, reject that images carry
any deeper meaning at all.661
The dichotomy of language and image
As opposing as these positions may seem, they are structurally connected in

their joint dissociation of language and image. Iconologists assume a hierarchy which
considers language superior; images can only carry meaning and significance if they
refer directly to language, if they illustrate words; only their decidedly lingual content,
attestable in specific motifs, refers to meaning. How something is depicted is considered
an exclusively formal matter that has nothing to
do with content. For Alpers, on the other hand,
656 De Jongh, Die “Sprachlichkeit” der niederländischen
Malerei im 17. Jahrhundert, in: exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M. words are insignificant for the interpretation of
1993, p. 23 – 33, here: p. 27. Alpers (1985, p. 376 – 381)
rightly points out that in Dutch emblem literature, images. For those who see a depiction of reality
especially by its most prominent author, Jacob Cats, in Dutch painting, or even interpret it as l’art
meaning is usually conveyed in a visually easy to com-
prehend visual language and not in secret, difficult to pour l’art, there is also a stringent difference
understand messages.
657 Alpers 1984, p. 186.
between image and language, since they would
658 It is astonishing that during the methodological dis- not deny the semantic dimension of language.
pute, so little attention was paid to still lifes of books,
because this genre is the painted commentary on the
relationship between image, (hand)writing, print and The polarization of word and image,
text. Eipeldauer (2007) breaks down polar interpreta-
tions in her analysis, which includes the materiality of engrained in both contrary positions, is neither
painting into the process of meaning production. She
demonstrates that “in their promise of encompassing natural, nor inherent to the respective medium,
sensuality, still lifes of books thwart the traditional but rather a historical paradigm. It was Gotthold
dualism of transparent spirit and meaning on one
hand and materiality and sensuality on the other: They Ephraim Lessing who most precisely defined
exhibit ‘meaning as sensually embodied meaning’
through the depiction of books, which are commonly and lastingly established the difference between
connected to the idea of being bearers of immaterial image and language in his work Laocoon. An
thought.” (p. 10) English by translator.
659 Alpers 1984, p. 192. Essay Upon the Limits of Painting and Poetry
660 Ibid., p. 187.
661 For example Peter Hecht, Dutch Seventeenth-Century
from 1766.662 His observations were internalized
Genre Painting. A Reassessment of Some Current Hy- so thoroughly that they determined thought
potheses, in: Franits 1997, p. 88 – 97.
662 Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Laocoon. An Essay upon until at least the early 20th century and, to a
the Limits of Painting and Poetry (translated by Ellen certain extent, continue to resonate to this
Frothingham), Boston 1874 (1766). Lessing had not
planned a systematic aesthetic; his text was a polemic day. Lessing’s Laocoon signals the final break
against Winckelmann’s dictum on the “noble simplici-
ty and quiet grandeur” of Greek art. Lessing disagrees between poetry and painting. According to
with Winckelmann and asserts that Laocoon’s scream Lessing, poetry (language) can represent time,
was subdued by reasons of aesthetics and not ethics.
See, a. o. the discourse-analytical analysis by W. J. Tho- while painting (visual art) can only represent
mas Mitchell, Iconology. Image, Text, Ideology, The
University of Chicago Press 1987, chapter 2/4: Space
and Time. Lessing’s Laocoon and the Politics of Genre,
p. 95 – 114. 235
space.663 He explains that the theme of visual art is the body and not actions, which
are reserved to poetry.664 The invisible — and thus the realm of ideas — can only be
represented by poetry, not by painting.665 Visual art does not serve the truth like science,
but only exists for pleasure 666, its only aim is (‘pure’) beauty 667 and not meaning.
Lessing states that knowledge is only possible by means of language. Despite contrary
assurances, he hierarchizes the relationship between poetry and painting in favor of
poetry or language.
Of course, Lessing is not the only one who proclaimed this radical separation of
poetry and painting. His theory is rooted in a tradition of aesthetics which goes back to
Edmund Burke and Du Bos. 668 At the same time as Lessing, Diderot developed similar
theories.669 However, the difference between painting and poetry Lessing postulates
in his text is unparalleled in its extensive argumentation and long-lasting influence.
His theory prevailed, even though some of
his contemporaries, among them Herder, 663 Lessing speaks of painting and poetry, but subsumes
emphasized the proximity of these art forms.670 visual art under painting and includes under poetry
“those other arts whose imitation is progressive,” p. VI.
664 Lessing 1874, p. 90 f.: “[…] there is this essential differ
ence between them: one is visible progressive action,
The separation of language and image the various parts of which follow one another in time;
was codified in aesthetics, but it was not an the other is a visible stationary action, the develop-
ment of whose various parts takes place in space.
invention of aesthetic theory. An entire host Since painting, because its signs or means of imita-
tion can be combined only in space, must relinquish all
of reasons lead to the paradigm of difference. representations of time, therefore progressive actions,
Before becoming a discourse of its own, a as such, cannot come within its range. It must con-
tent itself with actions in space; in other words, with
different perception of the relation between mere bodies, whose attitude lets us infer their action.
image, writing and language developed. From a Poetry, on the contrary […] Objects which exist side by
side, or whose parts so exist, are called bodies. Con-
media theory point of view, the invention of the sequently bodies with their visible properties are the
peculiar subjects of painting. Objects which succeed
printing press is the first step to be mentioned. each other in time, are actions. Consequently actions
The media turn it caused dissolved the intrinsic are the peculiar subjects of poetry.” p. 109: “The rule
is this, that succession in time is the province of the
connection between image and writing in poet, co-existence in space that of the artist. To bring
together into one and the same picture two points of
medieval illumination.671 In medieval initials, time necessarily remote, as Mazzuoli does the rape of
writing and images melt into one as letters turn the Sabine women and the reconciliation effected by
them between their husbands and relations; or as Titi-
into ornaments, animals and human formations an does, representing in one piece the whole story of
the Prodigal Son — his dissolute life, his misery, and
(fig. 105, p. 238). The word is looked at (fig. 106,
repentance — is an encroachment of the painter on
p. 238) and writing is integrated into images the domain of the poet, which good taste can never
sanction.”
(fig. 107, p. 238). Even spoken words are visualized, 665 Lessing 1874, p. 77 ff.
often as empty banderoles (fig. 108, p. 239).672 666 Ibid., p. 10: “[…] for the object of science is truth. Truth is
a necessity of the soul; […] The object of art, on the con-
The invention of printing ultimately destroyed trary, is pleasure, and pleasure is not indispensable.”
667 Lessing 1874, p. 11, 13, 18, 41, 142. Lessing argues
the symbiotic relationship between image and against Winckelmann that Laocoon’s cry was not
writing, even though the symbiosis at first depicted as drastically and pain-stricken because the
ancients rightly favored beauty over expression (p. 13).
continued in block books and single leaf prints. Of course Lessing’s plea for autonomy of art must
be seen within the art historic context as a bourgeois
statement against nobility and religion: “[…] we should
discriminate and call only those works of art which
236 are the handiwork of the artist, purely as artist, those
A further premise for Lessing’s theory is linear perspective; it assigns the viewer’s
gaze to a single moment. It is on the basis of images organized in linear perspective that
Lessing determines painting as the fruitful moment (den fruchtbaren Augenblick) and thus
denies its ability to represent time.673 In medieval and early modern art a veritable range
of possibilities was available to describe temporal sequences. Continuous narrative cycles
in illuminations and wallpaintings developed as early as the Roman Trajan’s Column
and structurally still present in today’s comic strips (fig. 109, p. 238) are one example that
comes to mind. In these media, time could also be experienced on the level of reception,
indeed in analogy to reading. A temporal sequence could also be represented in a single
painting, like in Memling’s Seven Joys of Mary or Scenes from the Passion of Christ, in
which episodes taking place at different times come together in one pictorial space (fig.
110, p. 240). Early Netherlandish painters from Van Eyck’s circles knew how to convert
pictorial space into temporal space, into a
where he has been able to make beauty his first and chronotope, where past, present and future
last object. All the rest, all that show an evident re- become legible in one image (fig. 111, p. 240).674
ligious tendency, are unworthy to be called works of
art. In them art was not working for her own sake, but (The procession of Christ bearing the cross
was simply the tool of religion, having symbolic repre-
sentations forced upon her with more regard to their proceeds from Jerusalem in the background,
significance than their beauty.” (p. 63) On banishing representing the past; the foreground renders
the fear of images through beauty, see Mitchell 1987,
p. 95 – 114. the present, while in the left background
668 Warncke 1987, p. 28.
669 Ibid., p. 61.
Golgotha, the site of execution, refers to the
670 Johann Gottfried Herder, Treatise on the Origins of future.) Representations of time do exist in
Language (1772), in: Michael N. Forster (ed.), Herder:
Philosophical Writings, Cambridge 2002, p. 65 – 164. post-medieval and linear perspective images,
For Herder the connection of the senses, particular- especially from the Baroque. Here we encoun
ly the senses of sight and sound, is a prerequisite for
knowledge and reflection. ter a completely different type of temporal
671 On the interconnection of image and script during the
Middle Ages, see: Wenzel 1995; Wenzel, Repräsenta- experience. It is less about narrating events
tion und Wahrnehmung. Zur Inszenierung höfisch-ritter in sequence but rather about transience. In
licher Imagination im ‘Wellschen Gast’ des Thomasîn
von Zerclaere, in: Gerd Althoff (ed.), Zeichen — Ritua- Caravaggio’s paintings the light shaft, seemingly
le — Werte. Internationales Kolloquium des Sonderfor-
schungsbereichs 496, Universität Münster, Münster emitted from a source outside the scene,
2004, p. 303 – 325; Wenzel, Visio und Deixis. Zur Inter- suggests how what we see before us could look
aktion von Wort und Bild im Mittelalter, in: Mitteilun-
gen des Deutschen Germanistenverbandes: Sprache completely altered in a different light, perhaps
und Bild II, vol. 2, 2004, p. 136 – 152; Wenzel, Medien-
geschichte vor und nach Gutenberg, Darmstadt 2007;
be even invisible or disappear completely (fig. 112,
Wenzel, Die Beweglichkeit der Bilder, in: Asymmetrien. p. 241).675
Festschrift zu Ehren von Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat,
edited by the University of Applied Arts Vienna, Vien- An image organized in linear perspec
na 2008, p. 91 – 98. On structural similarities between tive also produces the illusion of being a
the reading of images and the reading of text, see:
Sabine Groß, Schrift-Bild. Die Zeit des Augen-Blicks, ‘natural’ depiction of apparent reality. It some
in: Christoph Tholen et al. (eds.), Zeit-Zeichen, Wein-
heim 1990, p. 231 – 246. what denies its semiotic character. This under
672 Meyer Schapiro, Words, Script and Pictures: Semiotics standing of the image is what makes it possible
of Visual Language, New York 1996.
673 Lessing 1874, especially p. 16 f. On this see: Groß 1990, for Lessing to confine it to a merely depicting
especially p. 240.
674 Wolfgang Kemp, Die Räume der Maler. Zur Bilderzäh-
lung seit Giotto, Munich 1996.
675 Hammer-Tugendhat 2008, p. 177 – 189. 237
Fig. 105: Book of Kells, Chi Rho, c. 800, Dublin, Trinity College Library, Ms. 58, fol. 34r
Fig. 106: Drogo Sacramentary, Te Igitur, Metz, c. 823 – 855, Paris, Bibl. Nat., Cod. lat. 9428, fol. 15v
Fig. 107: Folkunge Psalter, Annunciation, Northern England, second half of the 12th century, Copenhagen,
Kongelige Bibliotek, Hs. Thott 143, fol. 8
function; he despises allegorical representations.676 Works that do not predominantly

aim at beauty, but rather at religious meaning are excluded from the realm of ‘art’ in this
bourgeois concept of autonomous art. Visual art, which (like poetry) aims at meaning
and expression is also not art, according to the concept.
Lessing’s theory is based on the privileging of word over image instated during
Reformation. What is a bit unsettling, however, is the double-tracked development in
Calvinist Holland. If religion was paramount, then one could expect visual art to be of
less importance. We know the opposite is true — painting was the number one medium.
Nonetheless, reformers undoubtedly contributed to the more aggravated separation of
word and image.677 Even more than religion, the development of the natural sciences
contributed to the dissociation of word and image. In early modern science, beginning
in the Renaissance, the proximity of visual art and science, of image and language, was
still intact: both shared an interest in perception, description, empiricism and the idea
that the world could be explained with geometric-mathematical laws. The problems of
modern science most often lay well beyond description. In logocentric discourse the
laws of nature only seemed apprehensible in seemingly neutral language; images were
excluded as merely mimetic or imaginary.
We must keep in mind that any statements on the relationship between image
and text are always linguistic. Authors tend to favor their own medium — language — over
visual media. This is an important point to keep in mind when reading the abundance of
treatises, essays and theories on text and image.
238
Fig. 108: Moralia in Job
of S. Gregory, title page
of the Engelberg
codex 20, c. 1143 – 78,
Cleveland, The
Cleveland Museum
of Art
Fig. 109: Trajan’s

Column, detail, Rome,
AD 113
The dispute on the relationship between image and text can be traced back as far
as Antiquity, when different opinions on the status of the image and its role in capturing
the truth were already propagated. Plato was skeptical toward images because they
could only reflect things incompletely; things, which were only poor reflections of ideas.
Plato’s disdain for art and images is countered by Aristotle’s view, according to which
the development of thought is based on perception. Mimesis does not merely mean
imitating nature, but imitation of its inherent essence. Following Aristotle, this means
that sight and art works directed at the sense of sight are adequate ways of gaining
knowledge.678 The early modern period saw a continuance of the medieval idea of en
twining and joining text and image while maintaining a connection to Neo-Platonic and
Aristotelian concepts.679 An understanding of images analogous to that of words — often
times described in the phrase ut pictura poesis — became constitutive. Instead of
Horace’s original call for using a lot of imagery
676 Lessing 1874. in language, the phrase was employed as a
677 On the reformers’ concept of images, see Stoichita
1998, especially p. 89 – 102; Häslein 2004, especially
demand for the equality of image and word.
p. 23 – 53. It is surprising that Alpers does not address The prevalent idea was speaking images as
the meaning of the word in Calvinism. This is symp
tomatic of her denial of language’s relevance for Dutch visible words, as ist were.680 However, this meant
painting. that images were subject to literary esthetics.
678 Warncke 1987, p. 21 ff.
679 Unlike Plato, Neo-Platonism deems it possible to ob- Rhetoric, the prevailing communication theory
tain knowledge through images with the help of rea-
son and imagination. See Warncke 1987, p. 23 f., On of the time, was now also applied to images,
the interconnection between text, script and image in including its demand for imitation, invention
the Middle Ages, see Wenzel 1995.
680 Warncke 1987, especially p. 24 ff.; Rensselaer W. Lee, and decorum. This began with Alberti’s
Ut pictura poesis: The Humanistic Theory of Painting,
in: The Art Bulletin 22, 1940, p. 197 – 269; Rensselaer,
Ut Pictura Poesis. The Humanistic Theory of Painting,
New York 1967. 239
Fig. 110: Hans Memling, The Passion of Christ, end of 15th century, panel, Turin, Galleria Sabauda
Fig. 111: After the Master of the Turin-Milan Hours (Jan van Eyck?), Christ Carrying the Cross, 16th century,
panel, Budapest, Szépműveszéti Múzeum
De pictura from 1435 and found repetition, in different variations, in treatises on painting
lasting well into the 17 th century.681 It was not until the logocentric discourse of the 18th
century — Lessing’s time — that essential differences were ascribed to the two media.
Verbal signs were explicitly regarded as superior to iconic signs in regard to their content
of truth and knowledge. Logos, intellect and reason were now only linked to language,
while images were connected with the senses and affects.682 Painting and literature
drifted apart. No other culture has ever conceived word and image as separately as
European modernity after the 18th century.683 Aesthetic theory became so engrained that
all art before modernity seemed forgotten. The schism was furthered by institutionalizing
the respective disciplines, with literary studies and linguistics on one hand and art history
on the other. This even led to grotesque situations such as the artificial separation of
medieval illuminations into text and image. Even though their meaning can only be
understood when analyzed together, each discipline applied its respective methods to
describe and interpret the ‘fragment’ in isolation.684 The discipline of art history followed
two basic trends: one was the path of complete isolation in the sense of an autonomous
history of styles; the other was to identify with the hegemony of language — allegedly
the sole representation of intellect and mind — and to only acknowledge an image
as a carrier of meaning and relevance if it illustrated language. Losing memory of the
once so intimate relationship between the two media even went so far that pertinent
literature on the image-text relationship spotted a revolution in early 20th century avant-
garde art. In his seminal book Worte werden Bilder from 1977, Wolfgang Max Faust
describes the iconization of literature and the lingualization of visual art, the crossing
240
Fig. 112: Caravaggio,
The Calling of St. Matthew,
1600, canvas, Rome,
San Luigi dei Francesi,
Contarelli Chapel
of boundaries between the two media and their reciprocal permeation as the core
subject of the European avant-garde since the 1920s. An exhibition on the subject, Die
Sprache der Kunst, curated by Toni Stooss at Kunsthalle Wien in 1993, reflected Faust’s
findings.685 Descriptions of various image-word relations in Cubism, Futurism, Dadaism,
Constructivism, Surrealism and abstract art 686, in literature, in Duchamp’s work, in
Klee’s oeuvre and in art after 1945 are exceptional and enlightening in their analysis and
differentiation. However, it is incorrect to celebrate the overcoming of the separation
of word, image and writing as an invention of
20th century art. Cubists like Braque, Picasso
681 Warncke 1987, p. 24 ff.; Klaus Dirscherl, Elemente ei- and Gris were not the first to integrate writing
ner Geschichte des Dialogs von Bild und Text, in: Dir-
scherl, Bild und Text im Dialog, Passau 1993, p. 15 – 26, into their images. The technique can be found
especially p. 18 – 22.
682 On this especially see Mitchell 1987. throughout the Middle Ages and early modern
683 Moritz Wullen with Andrea Müller, Anne Schulten and period (fig. 107, p. 242). Calligrams by Lissitzky
Marc Wilken (eds.), Das abc der Bilder, exh. cat., Staat-
liche Museen zu Berlin in co-operation with Hermann (and later on, in commercial graphic design)
von Helmholtz-Zentrum für Kulturtechnik, Berlin
2007, p. 10.
have ancestors in medieval illuminations and
684 For fundamental work on this, see Horst Wenzel (see late medieval figurative alphabets (fig. 113, p. 242;
note 671).
685 Eleonora Louis und Toni Stooss (eds.), Die Sprache fig. 114, p. 243).687 The iconization of writing,
der Kunst. Die Beziehung zwischen Bild und Text in beginning with Mallarmé’s Un coup des dés
der Kunst des 20. Jahrhunderts, exh. cat. Kunsthalle
Wien, Vienna 1993. or Apollinaire, which led to visual poetry in the
686 Faust plausibly demonstrates how language also plays
a role in abstract art, namely in the form of the com- 1960s, has a longstanding, almost uninterrupted
mentary necessary for its understanding. There are tradition, reaching from the figurative and
few other artists who wrote as much on their work as
Kandinsky, Mondrian and Malevich. visual poems of Antiquity, to the Middle Ages
687 On the relationship between modern art — particularly
Lissitzky — and modern typography: Johanna Drucker,
The Visible Word: Experimental Typography and Mo-
dern Art 1909 – 1923, Chicago 1994. 241
Fig. 107: Folkunge Psalter, Annunciation,
Northern England, second half of the
12th century, Copenhagen, Kongelige
Bibliotek. Hs. Thott 143, fol. 8
Fig. 113: Master E. S., Figure Alphabet,

c. 1466, engraving, Washington, D. C.,
National Gallery of Art
Fig. 114: El Lissitzky, Figure Alphabet,

design for a children’s book, calculating:
1 worker + 1 farmer + 1 soldier in the red
army = 3 comrades, 1928, watercolor,
coll. Sophie Lissitzky-Küppers
well into the early modern period (figs. 115 – 119, p. 244 f.).688 Vilém Flusser pointedly and
slightly provocatively apostrophizes this convergence:
The structure of our communication, developing all around us,

is clearly similar to the one prevailing before the invention
of printing, in the Middle Ages. Our present communication
revolution is thus basically a return to the initial situation,
interrupted and disrupted by printing and general alphabetization.
We are returning to an original state, which was only interrupted
by a 400-year exception called the ‘modern period.’ 689
Of course I am not proposing to equate

the specific text-image connections from the 688 Klaus Peter Dencker, Text-Bilder. Visuelle Poesie inter-
national. Von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, Cologne
avant-garde with works of medieval or early 1972; Ulrich Ernst, Carmen figuratum. Geschichte des
Figurengedichts von den antiken Ursprüngen bis zum
modern art. Moreover, audio-visuality in Ausgang des Mittelalters, Cologne, Weimar, Vienna
predominantly oral medieval culture differs 1991; Ulrich Ernst, Von der Hieroglyphe zum Hyper-
text. Medienumbrüche in der Evolution visueller Texte,
significantly from audio-visuality as we expe in: Horst Wenzel, Wilfried Seipel, Gotthart Wunberg
(eds.), Die Verschriftlichung der Welt. Bild, Text und
rience it in the age of new media. However, Zahl in der Kultur des Mittelalters und der Frühen
in the Middle Ages and early modern period, Neuzeit (Schriften des Kunsthistorischen Museums
Wien, vol. 5), Vienna 2000, p. 213 – 239.
images were also not received as direct de- 689 Vilém Flusser, Kommunikologie, edited by Stefan Boll-
pictions of visual reality, but rather as signs — mann and Edith Flusser, Frankfurt a. M. 1998, p. 53.
English by translator.
quite similar to the avant-garde.690 In pre- 690 On semiotics in the Middle Ages, see Winfried Nöth,
Handbuch der Semiotik, Stuttgart, Weimar 2000, es-
scientific times the entire world appeared to pecially p. 9 – 14. Further literature is also noted.
be a book, a text: meaning was ascribed to all 691 This was explicitly reflected by René Magritte, for ex-
ample, in the famous ceci n’est pas un pipe. Dated as
sorts of phenomena. Language and images early as 1926, the drawing juxtaposes a ‘realistically’
depicted pipe with an abstract rendition and the word
pipe. The oil painting La trahison des images (The
Treachery of Images) followed in 1929, depicting a pipe
242 and the words ceci n’est pas un pipe (this is not a pipe).
were equivalent paths for getting from visible things to invisible truths. The meanings
obtained, however, were not understood as culturally encoded, but rather as manifest
and sanctioned by God. The central aim of avant-garde art was to point out just that: the
depiction of signs as signs. Integrating language into Cubist paintings and graphic works
reveals them as signs. Cubist images intended not to be seen as iconic depictions, but
rather as sign systems, like language.
When we speak of lingual and iconic signs as signs, we can detect an analogy
to the development of semiotics by Saussure and Pierce. It is remarkable that both
science and art worked on similar issues while remaining completely detached from
one another. Delving deeper into this question
would go beyond the scope of this book, but I
He concluded the series in 1966 with Les deux mystères: would like to add one comment: In the art of
La trahison des images is depicted resting on an easel
with another pipe hovering above it. Margritte explores the avant-garde an interpictorial reflection took
the differences between the point of reference and its
respective iconic and verbal sign. Michel Foucault replace on the status of iconic and lingual signs
acted to these works in his seminal essay ceci n’est pas and on their relationship with each other and
un pipe from 1973. On the analogy between Magritte
and Wittgenstein’s philosophy on language, see: Suzi (non-artistic) reality.691 One example is Paul
Gablik, Magritte, Munich, Vienna, Zurich 1971.
692 Marianne Vogel, Zwischen Wort und Bild. Das schrift-
Klee, who had a very particular way of poetically
liche Werk Paul Klees und die Rolle der Sprache in sei- combining figural and non-figural (entirely
nem Denken und in seiner Kunst, München 1992; Rai-
ner Crone, Paul Klee und die Natur des Zeichens, in: painterly) elements with graphic characters (fig.
Rainer Crone, Joseph Leo Koerner, Alexandra Stosch, 120, p. 245).692 In Legend of the Nile Klee spells
Paul Klee und Edward Ruscha. Projekt der Moderne
— Sprache und Bild, Munich 1998, p. 25 – 72; Joseph out various representational systems and
Leo Koerner, Paul Klee und das Bild des Buches, in:
ibid., p. 89 – 136. Foucault deemed Klee the epitome points out their similarities and differences.
of modern painting. He explains how Klee abolished We are made aware that we can only recognize
the hierarchizing order of verbal and visual signs.
His work is the first where the system of representa- and interpret single elements as such because
tion, through similarity, intersects with the system of
reference, through signs. See: Michel Foucault, This
Is Not a Pipe. Edited by James Harkness, Quantum
books 2008. 243
Fig. 115: Simias of Rhodes, visual poetry, 300 BC (reconstruction by G. Wojacek 1969)
Fig. 116: Visual poetry, Cygnus, 14th century, abbey of Göttweig, Ms. 7
Fig. 117: Johann Leonhard Frisch, Berlin Bear, 1700
of their reciprocal contextualization. We can only decipher abbreviated signs on blue

surfaces as a boat at sea and the sky because they reciprocally create their context. The
seeming opposition between graphic characters, which signal meaning, and the painterly
background of blue surfaces, which we are prone to perceive as ‘pure’ painting (void
of meaning), is completely erased. The title Legend of the Nile points to the origins of
writing in Egyptian hieroglyphs and the unity of image and writing in pictograms. It is
no coincidence that the rowing figures are reminiscent of musical notes: they evoke the
rhythmical beat of oars hitting the water, which, together with the dancing pose of the
figure standing beside the boat, incorporates the sister arts of music and dance into the
painting. Klee demonstrates the inseparable link between iconic and lingual signs in
the generation of meaning — also in a semiotic sense. However — and this is something
only art can achieve — despite its analytical reflection, the painting is able to maintain a
sense of poetry, cheerfulness and emotion.
The art of the avant-garde found numerous ways to address the relationship
between word and image and the surmounting of their separation, while the discipline
of art history needed more than a century to accomplish the same. And yet, to this day
the equality of word and image and the reciprocal crossing of their respective boundaries
is only conceded to the art of the avant-garde, but not to art prior to the 20th century.
Especially art between the Renaissance and the early 20th century is most often deemed
mimetic or purely depictive, or, diametrically, as focused solely on language. It is this
division that we find reflected in the scholarly debate on Dutch painting.
244
Fig. 118: Guillaume Apollinaire, Horse, 1917
Fig. 119: Claus Bremer, Pigeon, 1968
Fig. 120: Paul Klee, Legend from the Nile, 1937, pastel on cotton and jute, Bern, Kunstmuseum
Not only in art history (regarding 17 th century Dutch painting in particular as well
as art in general), but also in cultural studies (Kulturwissenschaften), current discussions
on the relationship between word and image continue to adhere to the polarity of an
essential difference between word and image. This is truly astonishing, especially since
Kulturwissenschaften are based on semiotics, Foucault’s discourse theory and trans-
disciplinarity. All of these concepts assume that the world is only relayed to us through
signs and that semiotic systems cannot be reduced to verbal language. The main point
is the interconnectedness of different symbolic systems and social practices. Next to a
greater distinction of semiological and discourse-analytical approaches, the most recent
media shift and the new audio-visuality it introduced have changed the perception of text
and image and have promoted the formation of new theory.
Nonetheless, the discourse of differentiating word and image has persisted in

manifold ways. Even though visual art after the avant-garde is often acknowledged as
bearing semantic potential, the same cannot be said of art before the 20th century. I will
quote Klaus Dirscherl as a representative example for this belief.693 In his introduction
to the volume Bild und Text im Dialog, which he
edited and published in 1993, Dirscherl writes:
693 This is a randomly chosen, yet symptomatic quote for
the still prevalent understanding of the relationship
between image and text. This also includes experts
from the field of text-image research. For example,
Wendy Steiner writes (in her preface to “The Colours
of Rhetoric. Problems in the Relation between Modern
Literature and Painting,” The University of Chicago
Press 1982, p. XI): “As I see it, this importance lies in
the fact that painting has until very recently been taken
as mimetic, a mirror of the world.” 245
The hierarchal subordination of the image to text was a given in the illu-
stration of great literature and not questioned until the 20th century […];
the marking of images through texts was prevalent in painting far beyond
the Renaissance. […] In the 17th, 18th and even 19th centuries we are still a far
cry from a mimetic image continuum that offers the viewer a quasi-realistic
view of the world that is no longer dependent on text, as, for example, the
impressionist landscape will a bit later. […] The mimetic medium of paint
ing seems to not have won principal autonomy — at least for a while —
until 19th century Realism and Impressionism.694
I oppose with the following: The hierarchization of painting and language in

favor of language is false. (Dutch) painting was quite independent in the 17 th century
and not only served as an illustration of text. It is foolish to propose mimesis as the
only alternative to text-dependent images. Just because an image is independent of
text does not mean it is mimetic or ‘true-to-nature.’ There is no such thing as a fully
mimetic, ‘true-to-nature’ image. There is also no such thing as an image that is entirely
independent of any text or language. Metsu’s Woman Reading a Letter is not the
illustration of any specific text, and yet the painting is embedded in the realm of love
letters and thus language. The picture within the picture is a direct reference to metaphors
from the love discourse and as a tableau is only conceivable within the context of
Holland’s culture of writing and reading in general, and epistolary culture in particular.
In the preceding chapter I have demonstrated how Vermeer lead a pictorial

discourse in Woman Holding a Balance, using only painterly means to reflect the
possibilities and conditions of meaning production. Vermeer does not illustrate a given
text; nor does he strive for a ‘true-to-nature’ depiction (of a woman holding a balance in
a domestic setting). An exclusive choice between language dependence (and meaning)
or mimesis makes no sense. In fact, images always produce meaning, analogous to
language; they are closely tied to language, but function with their own, medium-specific
means.
Another variation of the reductionist model of the relationship between text

and image is the limitation to image and script. The point can surely not just be to
demonstrate the interconnection between image and script like the exhibition and
eponymous catalog Das abc der Bilder postulated in 2007. Even in this catalog, which
presents itself as innovative and calls for the rejection of the traditional separation
of image and script, we can find the following remark:
246
It seems that humankind can only tolerate image without text
information in small doses.695
The division of the universe of communication into separate galaxies of text

and image, the catalog continues, is artificial and unrealistic. Image culture since the
early modern period supposedly only reflected itself and exclusively dealt with its own
differentiation and refinement. Even though
694 Klaus Dirscherl 1993, p. 15 – 26, here: p. 20 f. English by results of this specialization, such as the
translator.
development of linear perspective, chiaroscuro,
695 Exh. cat. Berlin 2007, p. 10. Introduction by Moritz
Wullen. English by translator. etc., garnered worldwide admiration, it cannot
696 Ibid., p. 10. English by translator.
697 Ibid., p. 8. be denied that
698 Within Bildwissenschaften there are manifold, at times
contrary currents. In this case I am not referring to
explicitly inter- and transdisciplinary studies aimed at […] it is in fact a somewhat over-
visual culture, which investigate non-artistic images.
Within the discipline of art history, the term was also drawn form of communication,
established, particularly by Hans Belting, who defines only sustainable and tolerable for
the image from an anthropological perspective; see
Hans Belting, Bild-Anthropologie. Entwürfe für eine humankind in the safe confines
Bildwissenschaft, Munich 2001; Hans Belting (ed.),
Bilderfragen. Die Bildwissenschaften im Aufbruch, of a museal setting.696
Munich 2007. By conjuring an ostensible iconic turn,
Gottfried Boehm attempts to rescue the autonomy
of the image and to wipe out all questions of me- Despite criticizing semiotics and modern
aning beyond the iconic (lingual, discursive, social);
see Gottfried Boehm, Die Wiederkehr der Bilder, in:
communication theories such as system
Gottfried Boehm (ed.), Was ist ein Bild, Munich 1994, theory or constructivism for their “policies of
p. 11 – 38; Gottfried Boehm, Jenseits der Sprache? An-
merkungen zur Logik der Bilder, in: Christa Maar, separation” 697, the author dismisses images’
Hubert Burda (eds.) Iconic Turn. Die neue Macht der genuine semantic potential. Consequently, we
Bilder, Cologne 2004, p. 28 – 43. I cannot fathom how
this iconic turn could become such a rage. Boehm con- can see an adherence to the traditional disregard
ceived it as the diametrical opposite to the linguistic
turn he misunderstood as pertaining only to (verbal) for the pictorial medium despite opposite claims
language. What is known as the pictorial turn, pro and despite the exhibition’s ambitious demand
claimed by the US English and art history scholar
W. J. T. Mitchell, refers to the fairly new and growing for a reformulation of the relationship between
relevance of visuality in social communication and
new media. (W. J. T. Mitchell, Picture Theory. Essays text and image.
on Verbal and Visual Representation, Chicago 1994;
Christian Kravagna (ed.), Der Pictorial Turn, in: Privileg
Blick. Kritik der visuellen Kultur, Berlin 1997, p. 15 – 40. The dichotomization of word and image
For a critique on the absurdity of turns see the analysis
by Sigrid Schade, in which she suggests reinstating
paradoxically finds continuance in part of the
the term semiotic inquiry coined by Norman Bryson newly established image studies (Bildwissen
(Bal, Bryson 1991). Sigrid Schade, Vom Wunsch der
Kunstgeschichte, Leitwissenschaft zu sein. Pirouetten schaften) — but in reverse. Sigrid Schade rightly
im sogenannten ‘pictorial turn,’ in: Jürg Albrecht, Kor- dismisses the pirouettes of iconic, pictorial,
nelia Imesch (eds.), horizonte. Beiträge zu Kunst- und
Kunstwissenschaft, 50 Jahre Schweizerisches Institut performative, etc. turns and, in reference to
für Kunstwissenschaft, Stuttgart 2001, p. 369 – 378;
Sigrid Schade, What do “Bildwissenschaften” Want? In Norman Bryson, instead suggests speaking of
the Vicious Circle of Iconic and Pictorial Turns, in: Kor- semiotic inquiry.698
nelia Imesch, Jennifer John, Daniela Mondini, Sigrid
Schade, Nicole Schweizer (eds.), Inscriptions / Trans-
gressions. Kunstgeschichte und Gender Studies, Bern
2008, p. 31 – 51. See also: Maar, Burda 2004, especially
the essay by Willibald Sauerländer, Iconic turn? Eine
Bitte um Ikonoklasmus, p. 407 – 426. 247
Farewell, Laocoon …
Cultural studies have seen a surge in research on the relationship between text,
script, image and number in recent years and decades.699 This growth is mostly due to
experiences and developments in new media. My investigation is part of the discussion
aimed at overcoming the dichotomy of text and image. I want to explicitly stress that
feminist art theory and gender studies significantly contributed to this because of their
early reception of semiotic theory, Foucault, Barthes, Lacan and Derrida.700
Theories articulated in cultural studies on the interconnectedness of image and

language have been confirmed in recent years by researchers from the fields of sign language,
primate research, neurology and perception theory.701 Spelling out the reciprocal linking
of image and language is necessary, but not enough. The persistent hierarchy between
language and image does not have to take on 699 See, a. o. (with further literature): Roland Barthes, Rhet-
the form of a discourse of difference. Equally oric of the Image. Semiotics. An Introductory Reader,
London 1985; Roland Barthes, Is Painting Language?
common is the ostensible equality of image and In: Roland Barthes, The Responsibility of Forms, New
York 1985, p. 149 – 152; Mitchell 1987; Oskar Bätsch-
language expressed in the idea of reading images mann, Bild-Text: Problematische Beziehungen, in:
like texts. When dealing with this discourse we Kunstgeschichte — aber wie? Edited by the faculty Mu-
nich, Berlin 1989; Volker Bohn (ed.), Bildlichkeit, Frank-
often (not always) find that the materiality of furt a. M. 1990; Martin Heusser et al. (eds.),Word &
Image Interactions. A Selection of Papers Given at the
culture and particularly the materiality of signs Second International Conference on Word and Image,
is neglected.702 Meaning is always attached to a Zurich University 1990, Basel 1993; Ulrich Weisstein,
(ed.), Literatur und bildende Kunst, 1992; Mitchell 1994;
medium. There is no such thing as knowledge Boehm 1994; Nelson Goodman, Languages of Art —
of reality detached from media, no para-media An Approach to a Theory of Symbols, London 1969;
Wenzel 1995; Wenzel 2001, further literature by Wenzel
thought and no pure image of the world without see note 671; Dirk Matejovski, Friedrich Kittler (eds.),
Literatur im Informationszeitalter, Frankfurt, New York
media. We cannot have meaning without me- 1996; Bredekamp, Krämer 2003; Barbara Naumann,
dium and thus without materiality of the sign. Edgar Pankow (eds.), Bilder-Denken. Bildlichkeit und
Argumentation, Munich 2004; Maar, Burda 2004.
Different kinds of meaning are closely linked 700 In the German-speaking countries, see works by Sigrid
Schade and Silke Wenk.
to their respective material semiotic substrate, 701 Primates already have a neurological point of conver-
they are not preceded by any ‘neutral’ cognitive gence for somaesthetic, visual and auditive informa-
tion. Recent research on primates and on sign lan-
form.703 Therefore meaning / content is tied to guage has revealed that communication with gestures
most likely preceded and/or coincided with verbal
the specific materiality of the medium. Language communication. We can assume today that language
and images are media 704; they are not neutral re- was audio-visual from the beginning. It was already a
visual medium before it was set in writing. See: Lud-
presentations of reality, but rather generate their wig Jäger, Sprache als Medium. Über die Sprache als
own specific semantics. Being a medium is not audio-visuelles Dispositiv des Medialen, in: Wenzel,
Seipel, Wunberg 2001, p. 19 – 42, includes further liter
only the condition for their transferability, but ature. On the issue of whether images can be read like
texts, see Groß 1990; on neuro-physiological findings
for the formation of meaning itself, argue Peter that images, like language, are not depictions, but
Koch and Sybille Krämer.705 The aim is to revalue rather neurological constructions, see: Wolf Singer,
Das Bild in uns — Vom Bild zur Wahrnehmung, in:
the status of a sign’s materiality: Maar, Burda 2004, p. 56 – 76.
702 On the meaning of material in visual art, see: Monika
Wagner, Das Material der Kunst. Eine andere Ge-
schichte der Moderne, München 2001.
248 703 Ludwig Jäger, Text-Bild-Verständnisse, in: Asymmetrien.
Their [the signs’] function can no longer be limited to the representation,
transport or conveyance of contents, because they are constitutively in-
volved in the genesis of these contents.706
I find the theory of transcription (Transkription) developed by the linguist and

cultural theorist Ludwig Jäger can help us grasp on a theoretical level both the inter
connectedness of different media and the autochtonous inherent semantics of media
(for example image and language).
Semantic and aesthetic effects do not derive from — Jäger elaborates —
the reference or different kinds of

references by symbolic systems
Festschrift zu Ehren von Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, to a pre-symbolic world […]. One
edited by the University of Applied Arts Vienna, Vienna could say that they derive from
2008, p. 35 – 44, here: p. 38.
704 Jäger rightly criticizes that current debates on media the kinds of reference […] that do
often fail to acknowledge that language is a medium,
or actually the archmedium. Instead, a definition of not primarily take place — in an
media reduced to newer technologies is often as epistemological sense — between
sumed. Media are not technical means of conveying
information. Jäger argues that complaints by media symbolic systems and the world,
critics, such as Baudrillard, often still adhere to the
Cartesian fiction that there is a way to gain knowledge
but rather at first between differ-
without obstruction and without the interference of ent symbolic systems (of media)
media; he asserts that there is no crisis, just a growth in
complexity of media-related and symbolic semantics. and then also within these sym-
See: Ludwig Jäger, Transkriptivität. Zur medialen Logik bolic systems themselves.707
der kulturellen Semantik, in: Ludwig Jäger, Georg
Stanitzek (eds.), Transkribieren. Medien/Lektüre, Mu-
nich 2002, p. 19 – 42; Ludwig Jäger, Transkription. Über-
legungen zu einem interdisziplinären Forschungs Thus, references can take place within the
konzept, in: Rolf Kailuweit, Stefan Pfänder, Dirk Vetter medium (intramedia) or as a translation between
(eds.), Migration und Transkription — Frankreich, Euro-
pa und Lateinamerika, Berlin 2010; Ludwig Jäger, two media (intermedia). These forms of reference,
2001, p. 15 – 35 .
705 Peter Koch, Sybille Krämer, Introduction, in: Peter the recursive, intramedia self-reference of media
Koch, Sybille Krämer (eds.), Schrift, Medien, Kogni and the intermedia connection of different media
tion. Über die Exteriorität des Geistes, Tübingen 1997,
p. 9 – 26, here: p. 12. scripts is what, according to Jäger, “keeps the
706 Jäger, Transkription, 2010, p. 26. English by translator.
707 Jäger, Asymmetrien, 2008, p. 39. English by translator.
symbolic world production process in motion.” 708
708 Ibid., p. 38. English by translator. Cultural semantics do not produce reality through
709 Ludwig Jäger, Transkriptive Verhältnisse. Zur Logik in-
tra- und intermedialer Bezugnahmen in ästhetischen a singular medium, but rather through continuous
Diskursen, in: Gabriele Buschmeier, Ulrich Konrad, processes of interaction between media. Thus,
Albrecht Riethmüller (eds.), Transkription und Fas-
sung in der Musik des 20. Jahrhunderts. Beiträge des the aim is to examine the performative practices
Kolloquiums in der Akademie der Wissenschaften und
der Literatur, Mainz 2004, Stuttgart 2007, p. 103 – 134; of communicative cultures from the perspective
Ludwig Jäger, Transcriptivity Matters: On the Logic of of their intermedia logic of difference. 709 For our
Intra- and Intermedial References in Aesthetic Dis-
course, in: Ludwig Jäger / Erika Linz / Irmela Schneider context, the establishment of media-specific
(eds.), Media, Culture, and Mediality. New Insights
into the Current State of Research, Bielefeld: transcript
2010, p. 49 – 76. Also see Mitchell 1994, p. 94 f.: “All
media are mixed media.” 249
inherent semantics is essential: it is the fact that specific types of meanings are closely
tied to their material semiotic substrates:
This is why the semantics of non-lingual media — such as images — does

not lie in the fact that they express something through images, which could
also be expressed through language or other means. Neutral contents/
information, which seem to be transferred untainted (‘orginaliter’) between
different media are unconceivable because only media-based variations of
contents exist. There is no such thing as a pre-media original. Every form
of transferring content from one medium into another thus inevitably takes
the form of transcription (Transkription), or, in other words, of a reconstitu-
tion conditioned by the media shift. 710
Every theory that denies non-lingual media their own genuine semantics
simultaneously attacks their aesthetic form. 711
Thanks to the differentiation of theories in cultural studies, semiotics and

discourse analysis, in historical and (neuro-)psychological research as well as changes
introduced through media shifts and new audio-visuality, we are now able to comprehend
image and language as interconnected, reciprocal referential structures and bearers of
inherent semantics.
We can thus easily leave art-historical disputes on the subject behind us. Histor
ians, cultural and literary scholars, on the other hand, would profit immensely from
abandoning their fixation on language in favor of a (frequently invoked, yet rarely truly
implemented) interdisciplinary perspective. Visual sources are as equally important as
lingual ones. 712
The inclusion of non-lingual media, in our case painting, could potentially lead
to drastic shifts in historical views: Perhaps the culmination of epistolary culture already
took place as early as the latter half of the 17th century and not in the 18th as previously
proposed. In Holland, bourgeois culture reached its first heights at the time in the
medium of painting. 713
250
4 The Gender of Letters
710 Jäger, Transkription, 2010, p. 27. English by translator. The primary characteristic of letters is
711 Jäger, Asymmetrien, 2008, p. 38. English by translator.
712 The paragone between text and image also took place that they are means of communication. We write
in Holland (on the close link between image and lit them, we receive them and we reply to them. In
erature in the Netherlands, see Schenkeveld van der
Dussen 1991 and 1993). I would like to quote one ex- a private context, especially in a romantic one,
ample that illustrates how a writer and a painter ar-
gued whether painting could depict the invisible. Joost
it could happen that one person always writes
van den Vondel, the most prominent dramatist of his the letters and the other only receives and reads
time, wrote the following verses in response to an et-
ching by Rembrandt (1641), portraying the Mennonite them. Surely this type of imbalance would be
priest Cornelis Anslo: the exception rather than the norm. Fact is, a
“Ay Rembrant, maal Cornelis stem
Het zichtbre deel is ’tminst van hem: person reading a letter means that someone has
’t Onzichtbre kent men slechts door d’ooren
Wie Anslo zien wil moet hem hooren.” written a letter. A look at Dutch genre painting,
(O Rembrandt, paint Cornelis’s voice, however, could create the paradox impression
The visible part is the least of him:
The invisible can only be known through the ears. that only women receive and read love letters
Who Anslo wants to see must hear him.)
(Dutch quote: Schenkeveld van der Dussen 1993, p. 66; (and in rare cases) write them. Men, on the
English quote: Martha Gyllenhaal, Rembrandt’s Artful other hand, never seem to receive or write them.
Use of Statues and Casts, doctoral thesis, Temple Uni
versity, 2008, p. 124). The etching only shows Anslo, In works by Dirck Hals, Pieter Codde, Pieter de
gesturing towards a book. In his later painting of An-
slo, Rembrandt included his wife as a listening figure
Hooch, Jan Steen, Frans van Mieris, Jan Vermeer
and changed the pointing gesture into a speaking and others, women are the only ones who re
gesture (figs. 121, 122). Vondel’s verses are written on
the back of a red chalk sketch of Anslo, made by Rem- ceive, read and in rare cases write private letters.
brandt in preparation of the oil portrait. His answer to We only know of four paintings of men reading
the writer’s criticism is that he, Rembrandt, can depict
word, speech, the invisible — with the means of paint- or writing letters by Ter Borch (figs. 123, 124, p. 253).
ing. See the chapter Die Stimme malen in: Pächt 1991,
p. 173 – 188. Pächt also points out that Rembrandt held These men are all officers or other members
a type of sermon with his Hundred Guilder Print. of the military. 714 Only two paintings allow us
713 I will elaborate on this in the final chapter.
714 On Ter Borch: S. J. Gudlaugsson, Gerard ter Borch, 2 to assume a romantic context because of an
vols., The Hague 1959 – 60; Arthur K. Wheelock (ed.),
Gerard ter Borch, exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, ace of spades playing card on the floor. In the
Washington, D. C., American Federation of Arts, New painting of a young officer reading a letter, the
York, New Haven, London 2005. Also see exh. cat.
Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 90 – 107; Alison McNeil context remains unclear. None of the men are
Kettering, Gerard ter Borch’s Military Men: Masculini-
ty Transformed, in: Wheelock, Seeff 2000, p. 100 – 119.
alone; they are all surrounded by other men.
Like no other Dutch artist, Ter Borch extensively dealt We know of one image by Ter Borch depicting
with members of the military and the new situation
after the peace of 1648. He depicts soldiers and officers a man reading a letter alone, but in this case
unheroically, in private situations, at times revealing
it is not a love letter; in fact, it is not a letter
their loneliness and dislocation. Both his birth town
Zolle and the town where he later lived, Deventer in at all, but rather a leaflet, a means of public
Overijssel, were garrison towns. Experiences he made
there may have sparked his interest in the subject. Ketter- communication. 715 Caspar Netscher, one of Ter
ing rightly emphasizes that the peace of 1648 made Borch’s students, painted one picture of a single
the new alternative and peaceful character of military
members found in Ter Borch’s art possible. The oddity man, dressed in bourgeois civilian clothes,
that only military men and no civilians are involved in
his images of letter writing is not addressed.
715 Detroit, Institute of Arts, from ca. 1680; ill.: exh. cat.
Washington, New York 2005, cat. no. 50, p. 180. 251
Fig. 121: Rembrandt, Portrait of Mennonite Preacher Cornelis Claesz. Anslo, 1641, etching
Fig. 122: Rembrandt, Portrait of Mennonite Preacher Cornelis Claesz. Anslo and his Wife Aeltje
Gerritsdr. Schouten, 1641, canvas, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
writing a letter (fig. 125). 716 This painting is truly an exception. Portrayed in a melancholy
gesture, with his head resting in his hand, the man seems to pause from writing the letter
for a moment; his gaze drifts into the distance. The intimate setting suggests that his
letter is private, perhaps even a love letter, even though there are no definite attributes
marking it as such. The first mentioning of the work in an inventory from Dresden for
August the Strong (1772) describes the man as “a scholar writing a letter.” Gender roles
in letter writing were apparently already so set in the 18th century that an interpretation of
the image as private or even romantic was automatically dismissed.
Even though letters are a medium of reciprocal communication, there is only

an exceedingly small number of companion paintings portraying this aspect. Scholars
generally agree that there must have been a companion painting to Ter Borch’s Officer
Writing a Letter (fig. 123): Woman Sealing a Letter
(fig. 126, p. 254). 717 We only know of two further
716 Wieseman 2003, cat. no. 11, p. 108 ff.
instances of pendant paintings, both by Gabriel 717 Exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, cat. nos. 8, 9, p. 99–104.
Metsu, who adopted Ter Borch’s invention. 718 718 Man Writing a Letter, Musée Fabre, Montpellier, Girl
Receiving a Letter, Timken Museum of Art, San Diego,
His painting Man Writing a Letter (fig. 127, p. 254) both ca. 1660; ills.: exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003,
is the companion piece to Woman Reading cat. nos. 16. and 17, figs. p. 124 and 125.
719 The pendant theory is supported by the fact that next
a Letter (plate 11) discussed in the previous to stylistic similarities, the paintings have the same
size and were first mentioned together at a sale by
chapter. 719 The letter writer’s room is much Hendrick Sorgh on March 28, 1720, in Amsterdam.
more lavish, with its lush Persian rug and See Robinson 1974, p. 39 – 41; exh. cat. Dublin, Green-
wich 2003, cat. nos. 18 und 19, p. 128 – 133. The only odd
massively gilt picture frame. The opened thing is that neither the composition nor the colors
are coordinated.
720 In the mentioned example by Ter Borch, the man is
also the one writing the letter while the woman is just
252 sealing her letter.
Fig. 123: Gerard Ter Borch, Officer Writing a Letter, c. 1658 /59, canvas, Philadelphia Museum of Art
Fig. 124: Gerard Ter Borch, Officer Reading a Letter with a Trumpeter, c. 1657 /58, canvas, Dresden,
Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 125: Caspar Netscher, Man Writing a letter, 1664, panel, Dresden, Staatl. Kunstslg., Gemäldegalerie
window, which the man is turned to, and the globe both point to his worldliness, while
his female pendant is more secluded in her domestic setting. Here, the heavy curtain
separates her from the outside world, and the laundry basket and needlework characterize
the space as feminine. In both companion pieces by Metsu the men are the ones writing
the letters while the women are the ones receiving and reading them. 720
The world was divided in two. Men used letters to correspond, as I elaborate
further in the final chapter, about matters such as science, education, religion, economic
and political organization and, as mentioned before, private issues. Women, on the other
hand, were reduced to private matters. 721 In art, letters were a popular male attribute
in both genre paintings 722 and portraits. Letters mark the portrayed men as well-read,
well-educated and of public importance. If, however, the theme is applied to women,
the letters are marked as bearers of a different meaning, namely as love letters. It is
not surprising that letters are absent in female
721 There is still only a small number of works on how

portraits, yet extensively present in genre
many women were literate in 17th century Holland. paintings of women in domestic settings.
Compared to other European countries the percen
tage was surely quite high. However, we must assu- Therefore, these women are not portrayals of
me that many women could read, but not write. It actual (female) personalities, but rather im
was common to have letters, including private ones,
written by scribes. Maids, as they were often depic- aginary images of femininity. The invention of
ted in the love letter paintings, were rarely able to
read, even less so to write. Calvinists encouraged the letter trope coincided with the depiction
women and girls to learn reading (the bible), but of women in private, bourgeois homes: Dirck
not writing. See: Adams in: exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M.
1993, especially p. 70 ff.; Adams in: exh. cat. Dublin, Hals, one of the pioneers of genre painting,
Greenwich 2003, p. 64.
722 See, for example, portrayals of old men and notaries
with letters by Adriaen van Ostade, exh. cat. Dublin,
Greenwich 2003, cat. nos. 28 – 30, p. 155 – 161. 253
Fig. 126: Gerard Ter Borch, Woman Sealing a Letter with a Maidservant, 1658/59, canvas, New York, priv. coll.
Fig. 127: Gabriel Metsu, Man Writing a Letter, 1665 – 67, panel, Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland
Pl. 11: Gabriel Metsu, Woman Reading a Letter, c.1664 – 67, panel, Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland
began depicting women with children or letters (figs. 100, 101) in the early 1630s. Interior
space was defined as the site of femininity. 723 The male authors of these letters, however,
remained invisible — with the exception of the few instances mentioned above. They
must have existed; after all, this form of communication would have been impossible
without them. Scholars have registered this asymmetry. Ann Jensen Adams, for example,
notes in the catalog to the exhibition Leselust from 1993 that men writing letters are an
exception and thus concludes: “Special attention should be paid to the numerous letter-
writing women in 17th century Dutch painting.” 724 I believe we must go further than merely
acknowledging this paradox phenomena. One of the conclusions I draw from the analysis
in the first part of this book is the basic question of what is not represented. What or
who is made invisible in a specific context
and what real consequences does the act of
723 In contrast to public space, which was dominated by
rendering someone invisible have? group portraits and history paintings with almost ex-
clusively male figures (see Part I, Chapter 2), private
space was decisively marked by genre paintings and
First we will examine the literary still lifes. Within the field of genre painting, domestic
scenes make up the largest group. Domestic scenes
treatment of letters as a subject. Briefschryver, reflect, among other things, the new site of bourgeois
letter-writing manuals written by male art: the private interior. See: Imagination, note 866
(Stoichita 1998, p. 158). Interiors in images are conno-
authors, were predominantly aimed at ted as feminine; see: De Mare 1992; Honig 1997; Ma-
male recipients. Only men were entitled riet Westermann (ed.), Art and Home. Dutch Interiors
in the Age of Rembrandt, exh. cat. Denver Art Museum
to initiate amorous pen friendships, while and The Newark Museum, Zwolle 2001; Marta Hollan-
der, An Entrance for the Eyes. Space and Meaning in
it was only deemed seemly for women Seventeenth-Century Dutch Art, Berkeley 2002. The
to respond. 725 The cover image of Puget demarcation between public, male-dominated space
and female social space is created, in part, by diffe-
de La Serre’s Dutch Secretaris d’A le mode rences in public and private images. We basically see
women with children or maids, doing housework or
reading letters. Men, even though they lived in the ex-
act same spaces, are barely ever represented. In the
254 few cases they are present, they are usually depicted
Fig. 100: Dirck Hals, Woman Tearing a Letter, 1631, panel, Mainz, Mittelrheinisches Landesmuseum
door de Heer van de Serre, published 1652 in Amsterdam, shows a male letter writer
contemplating over a blank sheet of stationary (fig. 128, p. 256). In cases of social practice,
of actual authorship, men writing letters were still visible. The genre of epistolary novels
related to this image is revealing: with very few exceptions, epistolary novels were
written by men who give women a chance to ‘speak.’ In the visual arts, we also mostly
find male artists who envision women with love letters. Thus it is remarkable that we do
not know of one single artwork on the subject by Haarlem genre artist Judith Leyster. 726
One prominent literary example are the Letters of a Portuguese Nun from 1669, one of the
first and most famous examples of the genre. Today’s scholars agree that the apparent
translator Joseph Gabriel de Guilleragues also authored the letters. 727 By using the form
of letters, he suggests authenticity, which makes
up the fascination of the genre. 728 The fiction of
as visitors. On the precarious role of women in public
space, at the market, see the excellent essay by Honig authenticity found here corresponds with the
2001, p. 294 – 315. realism of Dutch painting. They share similar
724 Exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M. 1993, p. 89. In her later article
in the catalog Dublin, Greenwich 2003, Adams em- effects: as recipients, we feel as if we are observ
phasizes the fictional character of images of women
reading letters.
ing a true depiction of genuine femininity, or
725 Women respond, are receptive, listen; men hold the as if we are reading their own, authentic words.
power over the word. Notice how this idea is con-
sistently present in Rembrandt’s oeuvre, where the The most prominent figures of 18th century
word is of particular importance. The portrait of Anslo British epistolary literature, Samuel Richardson’s
and his Wife (fig. 122, p. 252) is one example.
726 On Judith Leyster: Frima Fox Hofrichter, Judith Leyster. Pamela and Clarissa, became icons of femininity;
A Woman Painter in Holland’s Golden Age, Doornspijk
1989. Judith Leyster excelled in genre portraits and laug their male author virtually disappeared behind
hing figures, particularly musicians. As a student of Frans their ostensible authenticity. In his novella The
Hals in Haarlem, she was surely familiar with the the-
me of letters, developed by Frans’s brother Dirck Hals. Misused Love Letters from the collection The
727 See note 620.
728 Anette C. Anton, Authentizität als Fiktion. Briefkultur
im 18. und 19. Jahrhundert, Stuttgart, Weimar 1995,
especially p. 1 – 32. 255
Fig. 128: Title page from Jean Puget de
La Serre’s Secretaris d’A le Mode door de
Heer van der Serre, Amsterdam 1652, The
Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek
People of Seldwyla (1874), Swiss author Gottfried Keller exaggerates the figment of female
authorship to a point where its fictionality becomes clear: Successful businessman Viggi
Störteler feels a higher calling to poetry, with which he wishes to rise to fame. He decides
to travel for an extended period and forces his wife Gritli to answer his love letters — all
with a future publication of the amorous correspondence in mind. Gritli does not feel
capable of adequately responding to her husband’s highbrow letters and resorts to a ruse.
She fools her neighbor Wilhelm, a schoolteacher infatuated with her, into believing the
feeling is mutual and gets him to write love letters to her. Subsequently, both men send
amorous letters to Gritli, who copies them in her own hand before she sends them on to
the other man. In the end two male authors correspond under the fictitious premise of a
female addressee.
So why are all the “great letter writers who are remembered to this day all
female?” 729 Just think of Madame Sévigné, Lady Montagu, Rahel Varnhagen and Jane
Carlyle. Was and is there a specifically female competence in letter writing after all?
Indeed women’s writing has been synonymous with letter writing since the early 18th
century. The genre was defined as feminine. Christian Fürchtegott Gellert, one of the
most influential scholars on epistolary literature at the time, declares women’s style of
256
letter writing an ideal in his works Gedanken von einem guten deutschen Briefe (1742)
and Briefe, nebst einer praktischen Abhandlung von dem guten Geschmacke (1751). He
argues that the naturalness of the female gender is congruent with the naturalness of a
(good) letter. 730
The downside of this seemingly positive ascription was the confinement of female
writing to the private sphere. 731 Letter writing was the only lingual activity in media that
was deemed acceptable for women. 732 Defining private letters as a genuinely female form
of communication excluded women from any kind of public writing, whether in poetry or
science. The actual position of author was denied to them. However, many women em
braced the option of letter writing and successfully used it to gain a bit of emancipation,
reflection and self-authorship. 733
Conclusion: During the 17 th century, a visual discourse began in Dutch painting,

which was verbally consolidated in the 18th century, gradually defining letter writing as a
genuinely feminine genre. 734 In social practice — at least in the 17th century Netherlands —
this ascription was not yet fully established. Men of high standing such as Huygens,
Hooft and others still excelled in private correspondence, including love letters. Private
and public correspondence were not clearly demarcated yet. 735 I also know of no written
text from the time that apostrophizes the genre as feminine. Thus we can trace how
supposedly ‘genuine’ female letter writing was gradually produced. Around the early
18th century, letters actually became a productive field for women. Painted fictions on
this subject played a crucial role in forming this discourse. ‘Realist’ Dutch painting from
the 17 th century is not a reflection of the times’
social reality. It is exactly this realism that
729 This question is asked by literary scholar Karl Wagner makes gender-specific asymmetries appear as
in: Konstanze Fliedl, Karl Wagner, Briefe zur Literatur
(Ein Briefwechsel), in: Hämmerle 2003, p. 35 – 53, here: natural order instead of as the social construc
p. 36.
730 Hämmerle, Saurer in: Hämmerle 2003, p. 7, 20. tions they are. Painting has contributed to
731 It goes without saying that the subject of letters is a produce certain gender identities and ‘realities.’
deeply bourgeois discourse, which principally identi-
fies femininity with privacy, domesticity, love and the
entire realm of emotion.
732 Hämmerle 2003; Elizabeth Goldsmith (ed.), Writing
the Female Voice. Essays on Epistolary Literature, Bos-
ton 1989; Earle 1999.
733 Birgit Wagner, Briefe und Autorschaft. Suor Maria
Celestes Briefe aus dem Kloster, in: Hämmerle 2003,
p. 71 – 86; Wagner, Laferl 2002.
734 In Dutch painting from the last quarter of the 17th cen-
tury, we can still detect a faint tendency to depict male
protagonists writing private or even love letters — at
least in Ter Borch’s and Netscher’s work. Unlike the
many paintings of women and letters, these attempts
never came to fruition.
735 Many letters, often quite private, were published. It
was common to read them out loud. Hämmerle 2003,
especially p. 23 – 26; see Adams in: exh. cat. Dublin,
Greenwich 2003, especially p. 64 f. 257
5 Affect / Emotion / Imagination
It is, as we have seen, significant that the figures represented in paintings with
love letters are almost exclusively female, since the subject is about private correspon
dence, about love, about emotion. The topic of this final chapter is the representation
of emotions, their relationship to cultural codes and the production of imagination in
the viewer.
As the opposite of reason, feelings were

736 See the argument for a study of the emotions from for a long time taboo within the academic
the perspective of Kulturwissenschaften put forward
by Thomas Anz: Zur Resonanz von Daniel Golemans discourse; perceived as irrational, subjective and
‘Emotionale Intelligenz’ und aus Anlass neuerer Bü-
cher zum Thema ‘Gefühle,’ in: literaturkritik.de, no. 2, therefore ‘unscientific,’ they were considered to
3, March 1999; http://www.literaturkritik.de/txt/1999- lie outside the bounds of serious scholarship. 736
02-03.html, retrieved June 8, 2012.
737 Wiebke Ratzeburg (ed.), Aufruhr der Gefühle, exh. cat. This was and in part still remains true for art
Museum für Photographie Braunschweig, Kunsthalle
Göppingen, 2004. Symptomatic is the “Languages history, which thereby ignores fundamental
of Emotion” cluster of excellence, one of the very aspects of its objects. The tabooing of the emo-
few humanities research projects currently funded in
German universities, which began its interdisciplina- tional applies to representation as well as pro
ry work under the direction of Winfried Menninghaus
in autumn 2008 at the Free University of Berlin. Ute
duction and reception. Today, however, emotion
Frevert has established the new “History of Emotions” is very much back on the agenda. Affects and
Research Center at the Max Planck Institute for Hu-
man Development in Berlin, where she is a director. emotions are being talked about everywhere,
738 See esp., each with further reading: Catherine Lutz, and exhibitions, lectures, publications and re
Lila Abu-Lughod (eds.), Language and the Politics
of Emotion, Cambridge 1990; Florian Rötzer (ed.), search projects on the subject are in vogue. 737
Große Gefühle, Kunstforum 1994; W. Gerrod Parrott
(ed.), The Emotions. Social, Cultural and Biological This recent turn was initiated not by the human
Dimensions, London 1996; Hartmut Böhme, Gefühl, ities or cultural theorists, but by neuroscience.
in: Christoph Wulf (ed.), Vom Menschen. Handbuch.
Historische Anthropologie, Weinheim, Basel 1997, Ever since the early 1990s, when neurobiologists
p. 525–548; Claudia Benthien, Anne Fleig, Ingrid Kasten
(eds.), Emotionalität. Zur Geschichte der Gefühle, Co- Antonio Damasio, Joseph LeDoux, Wolf Singer
logne, Vienna et al. 2000; Oliver Grau, Andreas Keil and others demonstrated the close connection
(eds.), Mediale Emotionen. Zur Lenkung von Gefüh-
len durch Bild und Sound, Frankfurt a. M. 2005; Rom between thinking and feeling in the human
Harre, Antje Krause-Wahl, Heike Oehlschlägel, Ser-
joscha Wiemer (eds.), Affekte. Analysen ästhetisch-
brain, sociologists, philosophers, cultural theo-
medialer Prozesse, Bielefeld 2006; Katharina Sykora rists and experts in the fields of media, com
(ed.), Fotografische Leidenschaften, Marburg 2006.
For film studies, see especially: Gertrud Koch (ed.), munication and film studies have been turning
Auge und Affekt, Frankfurt a. M. 1995; Hermann Kap- their attention to emotions. 738 Antonio Damasio,
pelhoff, Matrix der Gefühle: Das Kino, das Melodrama
und das Theater der Empfindsamkeit, Berlin 2004. in particular, has helped popularize brain re
739 Antonio R. Damasio, Descartes’ Error. Emotion, Rea-
son and the Human Brain, New York 1994; The Feeling search with his writings. 739 Although I find it
of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of irritating and strange that it took brain research
Consciousness, Harcourt 1999; Looking for Spinoza.
Joy, Sorrow and the Feeling Brain, Harcourt 2003. Brain to be able to finally overcome the dichotomy
research has been able to show that the cortical struc-
tures responsible for cognition are closely linked to the
subcortical systems, the limbic system, so that ratio-
nal and non-rational, emotional processes converge. 259
740 For example: Gerhard Roth, Das Gehirn und seine
Wirklichkeit. Kognitive Neurobiologie und ihre philoso-
phischen Konsequenzen, Frankfurt a. M. 1997 (1994).
deeply anchored in the hegemonic discourse, of For Roth, “cognition is not possible without emotion”
(p. 178).
reason versus emotion, we may nevertheless 741 On criticism on the part of Kulturwissenschaften, see,
among others: Sigrid Weigel, Pathos — Passion — Ge
also see this as a profound opportunity to re- fühl, in: ead., Literatur als Voraussetzung der Kulturge
flect critically upon our Western thought struc schichte. Schauplätze von Shakespeare bis Benjamin,
Munich, Paderborn 2004, p. 147 – 172. On the incomp
tures. A certain euphoria can be observed in atibility with psychoanalysis: Edith Seifert, Seele — Sub-
jekt — Körper: Freud mit Lacan in Zeiten der Neurowis
cultural studies (Kulturwissenschaften) over senschaft, Gießen 2007.
the fact that it might be possible, within the 742 Marie-Luise Angerer, Vom Begehren nach dem Affekt,
Zurich, Berlin 2007. Angerer’s book undoubtedly re-
discourse on affects, to establish a link with presents one of the best analyses and critiques of
the current affect discourse. From the standpoint of
the natural sciences, and in particular with a psychoanalytical and poststructuralist theory of the
bioscience. 740 Skeptical voices have also been subject, she argues against contemporary trends, in
particular in media and film theory and cyber-femi-
raised, however, pointing out the irreconcilable nism, which — based on Bergson, Deleuze and Tom-
differences between Kulturwissenschaften and / kins — wish to dismiss, through their immersion in
supposedly basal affects, language, representation, all
or psychoanalysis and the natural sciences. 741 forms of medial communication and hence (cultural)
meaning. Angerer interprets this as an attempt at a
In particular the phantasm of a direct and radical departure from the (incorrectly understood?)
language-independent knowledge about the linguistic turn, as an attempt to switch off language in
order to arrive at an immediacy between body and feel
truth of feelings has been rightly criticized. The ing. On the historical genesis of this yearning for lan-
guage-independent knowledge of the truth of feelings,
desire for affect, the dispositive of the affective, see Weigel 2004. In my view, the current discourse on
whose potency shows itself not only in sciences evidence is heading in the same direction. See the con-
versation between Ludwig Jäger and Helmut Lethen:
but also in art and media, might be analyzed as “There are not two classes of worlds this side and that
side of the semiotic demarcation line, but many worlds,
an illusionary yearning for immediate experience all of them medially coloured.” The linguist Ludwig Jä-
and as a denial of the split of the subject. 742 ger talks with Helmut Lethen about the turns in Kul
turwissenschaften and why there is such a turn toward
The parallelism between the current affect substance, presence and reality, in: IFKnow, issue 2,
euphoria and the strategies of manipulation by 2008, p. 3 f (summary) and in: Zeitschrift für Kulturwis-
senschaften 2009/1.
modern-day politics should likewise make us 743 In addition to Angerer 2007, see: Ute Frevert, Auch
Gefühle haben ihre Geschichte. Über die Emotionali-
suspicious. 743 sierung des öffentlichen Raums und einige verwandte
Phänomene, in: NZZOnline, July 26, 2008.
744 After the seminal works by Aby Warburg on the revival
The appeal to neurobiology becomes of antique pathos formulae in the Renaissance, the dis-
cipline has long shied away from closer investigation
problematic when it is associated — as of the field of emotions. Aby Warburg, Gesammelte
is generally the case — with the idea that Schriften, edited by Gertrud Bing with the assistance
of Fritz Rougemont, Leipzig, Berlin 1932. On Warburg
emotions are anthropological constants: see in this regard esp.: Ilsebill Barta Fliedl, Christoph
Geissmar (eds.), Die Beredsamkeit des Leibes. Zur
natural, ahistorical and equally characteristic Körpersprache in der Kunst, exh. cat. Albertina Wien,
of everyone. Salzburg, Vienna 1992; Ilsebill Barta Fliedl, Kokuritsu-
Seiyō-Bijutsukan (eds.), Rhetorik der Leidenschaft: Zur
Bildsprache der Kunst im Abendland. Meisterwerke
aus der Graphischen Sammlung Albertina und aus
In the following discussion I start
der Portraitsammlung der Österreichischen National-
from the viewpoint that emotions, even if bibliothek, exh. cat. National Museum of Western Art,
Tokyo, Museum für Kunst and Gewerbe, Hamburg,
they undoubtedly have biological compo 1999. See also: Fritz Saxl, Die Ausdrucksgebärden der
nents, are also always culturally coded, have bildenden Kunst, in: Bericht über den XII. Kongress der
Deutschen Gesellschaft für Psychologie in Hamburg
changed over the course of history and can 12. – 16. April 1931 [Report on the 12th Congress held by
the German Society of Psychology in Hamburg, April
12 – 16 1931], Jena 1932, p. 13 – 25, reprinted in: Aby M.
Warburg, Ausgewählte Schriften and Würdigungen,
260 edited by Dieter Wuttke, Baden-Baden 1979; Michael
Baxandall, Painting and Experience in 15th-century Italy,
Oxford 1988, esp. the chapter “The body and its lan-
guage,” p. 56–70. The interdisciplinary research program
for PhD students Psychische Energien bildender Kunst
[Psychological energies of visual art] under the direction only be communicated via language and re
of Klaus Herding at Frankfurt University has devoted
itself to the subject on a broad basis, as did the interdis- presentations, by which they are also shaped.
ciplinary conference and its resulting publication: Klaus
Herding, Bernhard Stumpfhaus (eds.), Pathos, Affekt, I am interested in the discourses on the mean
Gefühl. Die Emotionen in den Künsten, Berlin, New ing, function and evaluation of emotions and
York 2004. Thomas Kirchner, L’Expression des passi-
ons. Ausdruck als Darstellungsproblem in der französi- their relationship to the aesthetic forms in
schen Kunst und Kunsttheorie des 17. und 18. Jahrhun-
derts, Mainz 1991; Freedberg 1989; Richard Meyer (ed.), which these are articulated. I thereby base
Representing the Passions. Histories, Bodies, Visions, myself not solely upon art-historical scholar
Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles 2003. On Nov. 17
and 18, 2006 the conference “The Passions in the Arts ship 744, but also — and above all — upon his
of the Early Modern Netherlands” was held in Kingston
under the direction of Franziska Gottwald. The results
torical and cultural studies published in more
were only recently published in book form (Nederlands recent years. 745 I restrict myself essentially to
Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 60, 2010). On specific areas
of enquiry relating to the portrayal of affects, see below. the motif of the woman reading a letter. I am not
745 Peter N. and Carol Z. Stearns, Emotionology: Clarifying writing a history of the representation of the
the History of Emotions and Emotional Standards, in:
The American Historical Review 1985, 90, p. 813 – 836; emotions in Dutch art of the 17 th century. This
Rüdiger Campe, Affekt und Ausdruck. Zur Umwand-
lung der literarischen Rede im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert, chapter is intended simply as a contribution
Tübingen 1990; Volker Kapp (ed.), Die Sprache der in that direction. There is nothing fortuitous
Zeichen und Bilder. Rhetorik und nonverbale Kommu-
nikation in der frühen Neuzeit, Marburg 1990; James about my choice of focus, however: the pic-
2003; Stephen Gaukroger (ed.), The Soft Underbelly
of Reason: The Passions in the Seventeenth Century, torial theme of the woman reading a letter
London et al. 1998; Albrecht Koschorke, Körperströme is a characteristic one. In the variations and
und Schriftverkehr. Mediologie des 18. Jahrhunderts,
Munich 1999; Querelles. Jahrbuch für Frauenforschung changes this motif underwent in the period
vol. 7: Kulturen der Gefühle in Mittelalter und Früher
Neuzeit, 2002; Barbara H. Rosenwein, Worrying about
from approximately 1630 to 1670, we can also
Emotions in History, in: The American Historical Re- follow the profound shifts that took place in
view 107/3, 2002, p. 821 – 845; Gerhard Jaritz (ed.),
Emotions and Material Culture, Vienna 2003; Stephen the conception of the emotions.
Jäger, Ingrid Kasten (eds.), Codierungen von Emotio-
nen im Mittelalter/Emotions and Sensibilities in the
Middle Ages, Berlin, New York 2003; J. A. Steiger et al. A brief clarification, first of all, of
(eds.), Passion, Affekt und Leidenschaft in der Frühen
Neuzeit. 11th annual meeting of the Wolfenbüttel work the terms I employ; terms that will assume
ing group for Baroque research, Herzog August Biblio- greater substance as we go on. I write about
thek, Wiesbaden 2004; Rüdiger Schnell, Historische
Emotionsforschung. Eine mediävistische Standortbe- affects 746, passions and ‘movements of the
stimmung, in: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 38, 2004,
p. 173 – 276; Gail Kern Paster, Katherine Rowe, Mary soul’ (gemoedsbewegingen) — terms that were
Floyd-Wilson (eds.), Reading the Early Modern Pas- common in Holland in the 17 th century.
sions. Essays in the Cultural History of Emotion,
University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia 2004; Drawing upon Greek and Latin, the Dutch
Kirsten Dickhaut, Dietmar Rieger (eds.), Liebe und
Emergenz. Neue Modelle des Affektbegreifens im fran-
spoke of hartstocht (and its synonym, passio)
zösischen Kulturgedächtnis um 1700, Tübingen 2006; and affect, of gemoedsaandoening and
Christina Lutter, Geschlecht, Gefühl, Körper — Kate-
gorien einer kulturwissenschaftlichen Mediävistik? In: gemoedsbeweging. 747 The term emotion
L’HOMME. Europäische Zeitschrift für feministische
(émotion) was first used by Descartes in his
Geschichtswissenschaft (Geschlechtergeschichte, ge-
genwärtig) vol. 18, issue 2, 2007, p. 9 – 26; see also the Traité sur les passions de l’âme of 1649. I avoid
literature cited in notes 738, 741 and 742.
746 Hartmut Grimm, Affekt, in: Karl-Heinz Barck et al. the word feeling; it corresponds to the Dutch
(eds.), Ästhetische Grundbegriffe, vol. 1, Stuttgart, Wei- gevoel and came into widespread use only in
mar 2000, p. 16 – 49.
747 WNT (Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal) 1889, vol. the 18th century, having appeared at the end
IV. In his 1678 theoretical treatise on painting, Inleyding
tot de Hooge Schoole der Schilderkonst, Hoogstraten uses
the following terms: driften des gemoeds, lijdingen der
ziele, hartstochten (p. 109), see: Weststeijn 2005, ch. IV: 261
“De uitbeelding der hartstochten,” p. 137–174, here p. 138.
Fig. 129: Dirck Hals, Woman Tearing a Letter, 1631, panel, Mainz, Mittelrheinisches Landesmuseum
of the 17 th century. It points to a different and new ‘dispositive of emotion’ in the direction
of sensibility, in which the passions are sooner excluded. 748
Affects: Dirck Hals
The earliest secular representations of women with letters we know of were

executed by Dirck Hals.749 A painter in Haarlem and the brother of Frans Hals, Dirck
Hals (1591– 1656) was one of the pioneers of genre painting and was known for his
Merry Company scenes in interior and outdoor settings and for small, intimate genre
scenes of everyday life. 750 Three versions of women with letters are accepted as autograph
and a further two are attributed to his hand.751 In the two autograph versions of 1631 and
1633, the emotional atmosphere is described as precisely as possible and in a way that is
clearly comprehensible to the viewer (figs. 129, 130).
This affective atmosphere is characterized by the following pictorial elements:
by the corresponding gestures and facial expression of the figure portrayed, by the picture
within the picture, and by the aesthetic structure of the scene, in particular the use of light
and shadow and the choice of palette. What is crucial is that all these pictorial elements
concur and mutually contextualize and enhance each other. In the earlier version (fig. 129),
the woman is tearing up the letter; the iconography points to a dramatic narrative.
Corresponding to this sense of drama is the placing of the figure — asymmetrically on
the far left of the picture and thus brought into the light, thereby making palpable the
262
yawning emptiness of the gloomy room. The exaggerated diagonal slant of the white
apron apostrophizes the movement of the figure as inner agitation. The woman gives
the impression that she is standing or tipping sideways rather than actually sitting on the
chair. Her face turned towards the window and her eyes raised heavenwards reinforce
her abrupt movement, as does her raised foot with its slipper threatening to fall off. The
almost empty room with its deep shadows underlines the desolate, eerie mood. The
only other item of furnishing is a second chair, whose position — so prominent and yet
so isolated — beneath the painting of a storm at
sea, points to someone absent. The final accent
748 James (2003) translates Descartes’s émotion with is provided by the picture within the picture: a
“emotion.” Descartes often writes of “émotion de
l’ame or émotion interieur.” In contrast, Stephen H. raging tempest. How different the picture in
Voss in the lexicon of French terms accompanying Philadelphia (fig. 130): a figure seen frontally
his translation of René Descartes, The Passions of
the Soul, Indianapolis 1989: “Descartes uses émotion in the center of the room and filling it almost
extremely broadly, to refer to a disturbance or com-
motion or excitation, in soul or body.” Voss translates entirely. She is seated on her chair in a relaxed
émotion as “excitation” throughout and stresses that fashion, one arm draped over the back, her
the English word “emotion” is never right. Descartes
1989, p. 138. WNT, vol. IV: At the end of the 17th and foot firmly on the footwarmer. Here the second
beginning of the 18th century, the Dutch gevoel was un-
derstood to mean the sense of touch, feeling in the chair has been brought close to her, so that
sense of sentiment, and opinion. On the semantics she seems to embrace it. She looks out of the
of the German word Gefühl and the difficulties that
arise from an unreflected use of this historically highly picture with a smile on her moon-shaped face.
charged concept in brain research, see Weigel 2004.
See also: Brigitte Scheer, Gefühl, in: Karl-Heinz Barck
This cheerful figure is gaily dressed in gold skirts
et al. (eds.), Ästhetische Grundbegriffe, vol. 2, Stutt- and a pale blue jacket with a large white collar.
gart, Weimar 2001, p. 629 – 660.
749 On the paintings of women with letters produced only The painted seascape behind her could hardly
shortly afterwards by Pieter Codde and Willem Duys- be more harmonious and calm. Naturally we do
ter, see below.
750 Britta Nehlsen-Maarten, Dirck Hals 1591 – 1656. Oeu- not know the contents of either letter, but we
vre und Entwicklung eines Haarlemer Genremalers,
Weimar 2003; Franits 2004, p. 31 – 34; Peter C. Sut- see that in one case it bears bad and in the other
ton, Dutch Genre Paintings in the Age of Vermeer, in: good tidings of a loved one.
exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003, p. 16 and ibid. the
catalog entries on p. 79 – 84.
751 The third autograph painting (formerly Kiev, Khanen-
ko Collection) of this subject likewise dates from 1631
and roughly corresponds with the Mainz panel in its Emotion: Rembrandt
dimensions (47/57 cm). Its composition, too, is rela-
ted. The woman is seated at a table and rests one arm
upon it, while her other arm hangs down at her side,
holding the letter. Her eyes seem to be gazing into the
Let us return once more to Rembrandt’s
distance with a questioning and yearning look. I have Bathsheba (plate 1). 752 It goes without saying
not been able to decipher the motif in the picture within
the picture from the reproduction. Nehlsen-Marten that this work derives from a different, religious
p. 180 ff., cat. no. 360, p. 313, fig. 206. The other two iconography. The versions by Dirck Hals — and
versions that are attributed to Hals show a young girl
seated by candlelight; in the Amsterdam version she is this is what makes them new — are secular
evidently reading a letter aloud. See: Nehlsen-Marten,
p. 183, cat. nos. 363 and 364; only the version held by paintings of women with letters. The epistolary
the former Muller’s auction house in Amsterdam is culture in Holland had an impact upon art:
illustrated (fig. 209); for the work in the Accademia
Carrara, Bergamo, see exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich it changed the iconography of the biblical
2003, cat. no. 1, p. 79 ff., ill.: p. 81.
752 See Chapter 1, in which I analyze the aesthetic means
and structures with which Rembrandt produces effects
of interiorization and pychologization. 263
Pl. 1: Rembrandt, Bathsheba, 1654, canvas, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 131: Rembrandt, Haman Recognizes his Fate, c. 1665, canvas, St. Petersburg, Hermitage
Bathsheba motif and produced corresponding innovations in the unfolding sphere of

secular painting. Symptomatic of this development, as we saw in Part I, Chapter 1, is the
fact that Bathsheba is no longer fetched by a messenger as described in the bible, but
that communication is established by a letter. It is equally indicative of the blossoming
of letter writing in Holland during this period that the motif of the love letter should now
find its way into secular art. These secular versions are no longer rooted in a sanctioned
story with traditional iconography. In the case of Rembrandt’s Bathsheba, we know the
biblical episode and consequently the approximate contents of the letter. This knowledge
and hence the associations triggered by the motif are lacking in the case of the secular
picture, since there is no authorized narrative.
Rembrandt thus has no need of allegorical accessories (such as a picture of a
storm at sea) in order to convey the contents of the letter we cannot read. It was also
characteristic of Rembrandt, it should be said, to avoid allegorical references. Like the
women visualized by Dirck Hals, Bathsheba has already read the letter; what we are
shown is her reaction to its contents. The two artists differ, however, in the way they
portray the affective reactions of their respective figures. In contrast to Hals, Rembrandt
conveys Bathsheba’s psychological reaction via her face. Her countenance becomes
the dominant vehicle of expression. Her ambivalent feelings and her meditative state
are mirrored in her face. Nothing of them can be read in her body or in her physical
gestures. The new and unusual combination of a desirable naked female body with
an individualized, pensive face in Bathsheba is discussed in Part I, Chapter 1. To put it
simply: within this iconography, one would traditionally expect to see a different head
264
on such a body — a head that is only beautiful, not individualized, one that does not
radiate this form of subjectivity. Hence our eyes are invariably drawn back to Bathsheba’s
face as the heart of the composition. Joseph Leo Koerner aptly apostrophized this as the
“epiphany of the face.” 753 Koerner has expounded, in exemplary fashion, the eminent
significance of the face in Rembrandt’s oeuvre. He rightly draws attention to the privileged
position of the face in northern art 754 and to the pioneering role played by Alois Riegl in
researching this specifically Dutch solution to the representation of “interiority.” 755 Riegl
also pointed out the discrepancy frequently seen in northern European art between the
movement of the body and the direction in which the figures are looking. It is this dis
crepancy that first creates the form of attentiveness (Aufmerksamkeit) that evokes the
idea that the figures have a psychological inner life. 756
It goes without saying that Rembrandt also uses physical gestures and poses
to portray specific affects and emotions, but we may nevertheless speak of a shift of
significance away from the body to the face. 757 There are many works in Rembrandt’s
oeuvre in which the privileging of the face at the expense of the body and allegorical
symbols is even more extreme. One example is the painting known under the title
Haman Recognizes his Fate and dated to around 1665 (fig. 131).
Significantly, art historians have been unable to agree either upon a title for the
picture or indeed upon its subject. It seems to me entirely plausible that the figure in the
foreground with his hand pressed to his heart
should be intended to represent Haman; the
753 Joseph Leo Koerner, Rembrandt and the Epiphany of
the Face, in: RES 12, 1986, p. 5 – 32. figure with the crown on the right would then be
754 Ibid., p. 12, note 21: “[…] all represent aspects of the
face’s privileged position in northern art, a phenome- King Ahasuerus and the old man Mordecai. 758
non whose character and significance remains largely Rembrandt scholars are misguided, however,
unexplored.”
755 Ibid., p. 12: “Riegl refuses, that is, to indulge in that when they attempt to identify the scene as a
peculiar art historical habit of trying to read into the
represented face the sitter’s thoughts and feelings.” specific point in the narrative, such as the mo
p. 13: “Thus shifting attention away from guesswork ment when the King commands Haman to lead
about character and thought, Riegl sets the stage for
an enquiry into the invention and uses of interiority as Mordecai in a triumphal procession around the
it is conveyed by the represented face.”
756 Riegl 1902. See also Koerner 1986, esp. p. 25 ff.
city. Mordecai was not present in that scene,
757 The phenomenon of a discrepancy between facial and the worried look on his face would therefore
expression and physical movement can also frequently
be observed, see Koerner 1986, p. 25 ff. On the emin be hard to explain. It is significant that it seems
ent significance of the face in cinema: Gilles Deleuze, impossible to elicit the concrete textual basis,
Cinema I. The Movement-Image. Translated by Hugh
Tomlinson and Barbara Habberjam, Minneapolis, the specific narrative, from the painting. This is
1986; Koch 1995; Christa Blümlinger, Karl Sierek
(eds.), Das Gesicht im Zeitalter des bewegten Bildes, due not only to the gap in time between then
Vienna 2002. and now (the subject was probably difficult to
758 Haman’s plot against the Jew Mordecai was discov
ered by Esther, the Jewish wife of King Ahasuerus; this decipher even for Rembrandt’s contemporaries),
led to the fall of the grand vizier and the salvation of
the Jewish people. Rembrandt treated themes from
the Book of Esther on several occasions. See Part I,
Chapter 1, note 26. 265
but also to the elimination of all recognizable action and surroundings, and the restriction
of the protagonists to three figures, themselves no more than fragmentary and reduced
almost wholly to their faces. Only in the figure of Haman does Rembrandt introduce the
additional gesture of the hand. Indeed, hands as vehicles of expression play a major role
in Rembrandt’s oeuvre.
The deep shadow that falls like a blindfold over Haman’s lowered eyes reminded
Otto Pächt of the figure of speech “He veiled his head in shame.” This sentence from
the Book of Esther, Pächt suggests, may have provided the inspiration for Rembrandt’s
picture. 759 The veiling of the head as a way of representing the unportrayable is an antique
topos; it goes back to the myth of the Greek painter Timanthes of Kythnos, transmitted
to the Renaissance and the Baroque via the writings of Pliny and Cicero. 760 Rembrandt
knew the myth from van Mander, who recounts the episode in his Schilder-Boeck. 761 The
story tells of Timanthes’s attempt to paint the Sacrifice of Iphigenia. Timanthes wanted
to communicate the drama and anguish of the scene in the faces of those in attendance.
He despaired of being able to portray the face of Agamemnon, however, since this was
t o convey not just the father’s infinite grief over the loss of his daughter, but also his
awareness of his own guilt. Such a complex task exceeded the possibilities of representa
tion, and so Timanthes came up with an ingenious solution: he shrouded Agamemnon’s
face beneath a veil. Rembrandt, it seems to me, took up the challenge of rendering anguish
and a sense of guilt visible at the same time — and in the face, no less. The challenge of
making visible what cannot be represented and what cannot be seen.
Just as in Bathsheba, all action has ceased and the drama has been entirely inter
nalized. Thus it is not one specific moment within the narrative that is being presented;
rather, the profound meaning of the whole story is being invoked or, more accurately,
generalized as a human situation of conflict. We are not offered a piece of Baroque thea
ter in which the bodies act out their passionate affects; we are shown no affects that can
be clearly read as spontaneous and which would be comprehensible to the viewer as a
reaction to an external event.
Through his privileging of the face as a vehicle of expression of the affective inner
life, Rembrandt distinguished himself (in his late works) not only from Dirck Hals but
also — and far more significantly — from the whole Italian tradition of the Renaissance
and from Baroque contemporaries such as Rubens. There, the inner workings of the
human soul are declared by the body and its gestures. This approach derives from a
dispositive that the Renaissance adopted from Antiquity. 762 It was based on the notion
that affective processes within a person manifest themselves in outward physical signs
that can be read. A quasi-natural relationship was thereby posited between outward
266
appearance (physical movements, gestures and facial expression) and the human
psyche. 763 The foundations for these ideas can be found in humoralism, with its theory
of the four bodily fluids and their corresponding temperaments, and in the rhetoric that
went with it. Most influential of all were the rhetorical treatises of Aristotle, Cicero and
Quintilian. For the fine arts (as for the dramatic arts), the canon of actio acquired
particular relevance: the practice of non-verbal communication. Speech was thus to be
accompanied by appropriate body language. According to Quintilian, silent gestures in a
picture are capable of stirring the heart so powerfully that they seem even to surpass the
force of oratory. Leon Battista Alberti reclaimed the principles of rhetoric for the fine arts
under the motto ut pictura poesis. 764 In his treatise Della pittura from 1435 he called not
only for imitatio, inventio and the three duties
of the orator, docere, delectare and movere,
759 Pächt 1991, p. 161.
760 C. Plinius Secundus, Naturalis Historiae, Book 35, but also for the appropriate representation
p. 72 f., in: Naturkunde, edited by R. König, Munich
1987, p. 60 f.; M. T. Cicero, Orator, 22, 74, edited by B. of the affects via corresponding gestures and
Kytzler, Munich 1980, p. 60 f., cited here from: Ralf Ko- movements of the body. For Leonardo, the
nersmann, Der Schleier des Timanthes. Perspektiven
der historischen Semantik, Frankfurt a. M. 1994, esp. expression of human feelings through the pose
p. 13; Claudia Benthien, Schweigen als Pathosformel in
der Frühen Neuzeit, in: Steiger 2005, p. 109 – 144. and movement of the body was the foundation
761 Karel van Mander, Schilder-Boeck, edited and trans- of fine art:
lated by Rudolf Hoecker, Quellenschriften zur hol-
ländischen Kunstgeschichte, 1916, p. 134 – 167 (Dutch
original text with German translation), commentary:
p. 334 – 336, here fols. 26r, 40 – 43.
The good painter has to paint
762 Medieval art, in particular from Giotto onwards, of two principle things, that is to
course also had the ability to communicate men-
tal and emotional states via physical gestures, facial say, man and the intention of
expressions, animated draperies, etc. The theory of his mind. The first is easy and
emotion is based on Augustine and Thomas Aquinas,
both of whom drew in turn upon antique tradition, in the second difficult, because
particular upon Aristotle and Cicero. Grimm in: Barck
2000, p. 21 – 25; J. Schmidt in: Historisches Wörter- the latter has to be represented
buch der Rhetorik, vol. I, edited by Gert Ueding, Darm- through gestures and move-
stadt 1992, p. 224 – 226.
763 Kapp 1990; Campe 1990. ments of the limbs. 765
764 Lee 1940; id. 1967.
765 “Il bono pittore a da dipingere due cose principali, cioè
l’homo e il concetto della mente sua, il primo è facile, il Leonardo thereby recommended study
secondo difficile perché s’ha á figurare con gesti e mo-
vimenti delle membra.” Leonardo da Vinci, Della pittu- ing not only the art of Antiquity but also
ra, part II, fol. 60v. Cited here from: Martin Kemp (ed.),
Leonardo on Painting, English by Martin Kemp and
sources outside the sphere of art, such as the
Margaret Walker, New Haven, London 2001, p. 144. gestures made by orators and the mute. 766
766 Baxandall 1984 (1977), p. 76 – 93.
767 On the use and meaning of the term pathos formula There was no lexicon of gestures and their
by Warburg and his followers: Martin Warnke, Pathos- meaning, but a traditional understanding of
formel, in: Werner Hofmann, Georg Syamken, Martin
Warnke, Die Menschenrechte des Auges. Über Aby pathos formulae. 767 In 16th century literature
Warburg, Frankfurt a. M. 1980, p. 61 – 67. See also: Fritz
Saxl, Die Ausdrucksgebärden der bildenden Kunst, on decorum, and first and foremost in Casti
in: Bericht über den XII. Kongress der Deutschen Ge- glione’s Il Cortegiano, the rhetorical rules of
sellschaft für Psychologie in Hamburg, 12. – 16. April
1931 [Report on the 12th Congress held by the German actio were transformed into practical rules of
Society of Psychology in Hamburg, April 12 – 16, 1931],
Jena 1932, p. 13 – 25, reprinted in: Aby M. Warburg, Aus-
gewählte Schriften and Würdigungen, edited by Dieter
Wuttke, Baden-Baden 1979, p.1 – 6419 – 431. 267
Fig. 132: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait with a Cap and Eyes Wide Open, 1630, etching, Vienna, Albertina
Fig. 133: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait, c. 1657, panel, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum (see also plate p. 161)
behavior: the perfect courtier was to make his whole body an instrument of language. 768
Physiognomics in turn sought to identify the ‘true nature’ of the individual behind what
were possibly acquired affectations and disguises. 769 Thus the famous physiognomist of
the Renaissance, Giambattista della Porta, wrote in 1586:
Physiognomics is an almost divine science. […] For through the outer signs
that can be observed on the human body, it reveals [a person’s] morality
and character; it seems to penetrate to the most secret parts of the soul, to
the most intimate places of the heart. 770
The physiognomic discourse thus served not just the recognition of a person’s
‘inner truth,’ but the classification and standardization of outer signs for the purposes of
clear legibility. Rembrandt shared this interest in the significance of the face as a means
of understanding what goes on inside the human individual with the physiognomists. But
in diametric opposition to their efforts at categorization and simplification, Rembrandt
showed the elusiveness and ambiguity of the human countenance. 771
268
The privileging of the face, and in particular of the eyes as the windows to the
soul, finds a theoretical parallel in Karel van Mander. 772 In his didactic poem Den grondt
der edel vry schilder-const, published as part of his Schilder-Boeck (1603), van Mander
builds upon the views of his teacher de Heere in arguing against the thesis of ut pictura
poesis. 773 In the sixth chapter, devoted to the Depiction of the affects, emotions, desires
and passions of people 774, van Mander distances himself from his Italian sources. 775
The manner in which affects are to be externalized is new: the secrets of the soul are
revealed not by the movements of the body but solely by the signs in the face and in
particular in the eyes. In a dismissal of physiognomics, however, van Mander rejects
the notion of specific facial types and indeed refutes the belief that facial features can
be clearly read and allow conclusions to be drawn about the character of the person in
question. 776 The eyes are the messengers of
the heart (boden des herten), the seat of desire
768 Kapp 1990, esp. p. 44 ff.
769 Jean-Jacques Courtine, Claudine Haroche, Histoire du as well as of pure virtue (De ooghen den legher
visage. Exprimer et taire ses émotions (XVIe-début der begeerlijckheyt oock nieuwers degher) and
XIXe siècle), Paris 1994 (1988); Rüdiger Campe, Man-
fred Schneider (eds.), Geschichten der Physiognomik. the mirror of the mind (spieghelen des gheests).777
Text, Bild, Wissen, Freiburg im Breisgau 1996.
770 Giambattista Della Porta, De humana physiognomo- An area of common ground can thus be seen
nia Libri IIII, Vici Aequensis 1586. Courtine, Haroche between the Dutch theoretician van Mander
1994, p. 43.
771 Koerner 1986. and the painter Rembrandt with regard to the
772 Van Mander 1916; Karel van Mander, Den grondt der
edel vry schilder-const, edited by Hessel Miedema, 2
unique significance of the face and eyes for the
vols., Utrecht 1973, with scholarly commentary. Wal- representation of a complex inner life.
ter S. Melion, Shaping the Netherlandish Canon. Karel
van Mander’s Schilder-Boeck, Chicago, London 1991.
The idea that the eyes are the gateway to the soul is a How emotions were represented varies
topos that can be traced right back to Antiquity and is
also found in medieval literature. The privileging of the between genres and media and must therefore
eyes as vehicles of expression over the body as a whole
played a particular role in Netherlandish tradition. be evaluated in correspondingly differentiated
773 Melion 1991, p. 136 f. terms. In contrast to history painting, portrai
774 Wtbeeldinghe der Affecten, passien, begeerlijckheden,
en lijdens der Menschen. ture and self-portraiture were not supposed to
775 Van Mander 1916, fols. 22v – 29r; van Mander 1973,
p. 492 ff.; Melion 1991, p. 66 – 69. demonstrate strong emotions, since the sitter
776 Van Mander fols. 25v, 33 – 34. He cites the example of was to be presented as an individual who kept
the Greek statesman Phocion, who successfully de-
ceived his compatriots by concealing his tendency to his or her affects under control. 778 In the early
erupt into sudden rages and so “brought sorrow to
those who believed the nonsense of Trogus, Adaman-
1630s, Rembrandt nevertheless made several
tus and Aristotle.” self-portraits that record him in temporary
777 Van Mander fols. 24v, 26 and 25r, 26. Van Mander is
interested above all in the direction of the gaze, both affective states — angry, melancholy, startled
that of the protagonists in the picture and that of the (fig. 132).
viewer. He illustrates this with the story of Paris and
how he signaled his love to Helen during Menelaus’s
banquet not through his body language, which was
bound by convention, but solely by casting her lustful Here he still stands firmly within Italian
looks — a clandestine message that Helen immedia- Baroque tradition. These self-portraits are
tely understood. Van Mander, fols. 24r, 20. See also
Melion 1991, p. 67. etchings, not oil paintings; nor are they simply
778 Hannah Baader, Das Gesicht als Ort der Gefühle.
Zur Büste eines jungen Mannes aus dem Florentiner
Bargello von ca. 1460, in: Querelles 2002, p. 222 – 240,
esp. p. 226. 269
Fig. 134: Rembrandt,
Judas Returning the Pieces
of Silver, 1629, panel,
England, private collection
drawings and studies for history paintings. 779 Ernst van de Wetering, Rembrandt’s Self-Portraits.
Problems of Authenticity and Function, in: RRP,
Rather, the resulting prints were also intended vol. 4, Ernst van de Wetering (ed.), The Self-Portraits
for sale. Tronies, but with an intrinsic artistic 1625 – 69, 2005, p. 89 – 317; on the expression studies in
the mirror p. 170 f., on the tronies p. 172 ff.
value. 779 It is thus remarkable that Rembrandt 780 On the interiorization of emotion in the case of artists
of the second half of the 17th century, see below.
should portray himself in a state of powerful 781 Koerner (1986, p. 25): “Rembrandt’s study of the face is
emotion. He transferred the mode of repre bound up with his own transformation as an artist. […]
Coming to portraiture from history painting, Rembrandt
sentation employed to portray affects in histor y is able to infuse the physiognomic likeness with a sense
of movement, expressivity, and plot that were totally
painting to the genre of the self-portrait. lacking in, say, the mannerist portraits of Goltzius. On
Through this transfer process, or more accurat the other hand, in his history paintings, Rembrandt ex-
ploits the privileging of the face as it occurs in portrait
ely through this fusion of pathos figures with ure, in order to internalize all events and texts into the
drama of an active and legible physiognomy.”
portraiture, affect types became individualized 782 Hoogstraten 1678, p. 75, see: Weststeijn 2006, p. 171 f.
persons. 783 Arnold Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der neder
lantsche konstschilders en schilderessen 1753: Große
Schouburgh der niederländischen Maler and Male-
rinnen, trans. into German by Alfred von Wurzbach,
These early etchings show clearly de
vol. 1, in: Quellenschriften für Kunstgeschichte and
finable, momentary facial expressions and Kunsttechnik des Mittelalters und der Renaissance,
24, Vienna 1880, p. 112 – 113: “[…] he was inexhaustible,
gestures that can be read as a reaction to an both regarding facial features and pose, and in terms
external event and whose emotional correlative of costume. In this respect he is to be praised above
all others, but especially vis-à-vis those who always
(anger, fear) can be recognized and named. use the same physiognomies and costumes in their
pictures, as if all people were twins. Yes, in this he
A development can be observed within Rem surpassed everyone, and I know none who could have
brandt’s oeuvre that leads from these Baroque, varied their sketches of one and same object in such a
manifold way. This was the result, however, of detailed
expressive studies of affects to a different observations of the most manifold emotions that were
necessarily occasioned by a certain event, and which
reveal themselves in people’s facial features, espe-
cially through a particular expression, and through
270 body movements of all different kinds.”
conception in his late work. 780 No specific affects are presented in the late self-portraits;
rather, the face mirrors, as it were, the sum of life — an intangible psychological com
plexity, a multiplicity of thoroughly contradictory emotions (fig. 133, p. 268). In his history
paintings, too, such as Bathsheba and Haman Recognizes his Fate, outer movement
ceases and the narrative is shifted into the physiognomic expression and thus into the
interior of the figure. The drama is presented as a psychological drama. 781
In his treatise on painting, van Hoogstraten highlighted the particular qualities

of famous artists. When it came to the most convincing portrayal of affects, first place
went to Rembrandt, the undisputed master of the representation of the lijdingen des
gemoeds (passions of the soul). 782 For Arnold Houbraken, too, Rembrandt — an artist
he did not hesitate to criticize for other things — remained unsurpassed in his depiction
of emotions. 783 Rembrandt’s ability to represent emotions was likewise greatly admired
by Constantijn Huygens, secretary to Frederick Hendrick, Prince of Orange, and himself
a poet and one of the most erudite men of his day. In his autobiography (1629), Huygens
delivered a eulogy on Rembrandt’s early work Judas Returning the Thirty Pieces of Silver
(fig. 134):
The picture of the penitent Judas, and the pieces of silver, the price of the
betrayal of our innocent Lord to the high priest, I would have stand as
the example par excellence of all his works. Summon all Italy, summon
whatever remains from remotest antiquity that is beautiful or wonderful,
the portrayal of the despairing Judas alone, leaving aside so many other
stupendous figures in this one single work, the figure of Judas only, I
repeat, a Judas demented, wailing, beseeching foregiveness but not hoping
to receive it or displaying any hope in his features, the awful face, the torn
hair, the clothes rent to shreds, the twisted limbs, the hands clenched so
hard that they bleed, the knee outstretched in an impulsive surge forward,
the entire body contorted in pitiable anguish, I set against all the elegance
of the ages, and I am eager that even those most unenlightened should
know it, those men who (and I have attacked them for it elsewhere) reckon
that nothing can be either done or said today which antiquity has not
already said or done before. For I maintain that nobody, not Protogenes
nor Apelles nor Parrhasius, ever conceived, or if they returned to life ever
could, the things which (I am struck dumb as I tell of them) a mere youth,
a Batavian, a miller, a beardless boy has brought together one by one in a
single human being and given expression to as a universal unity. In truth,
friend Rembrandt, honour is yours: the bringing of Troy, of all Asia Minor
271
to Italy had not such importance as the fact that the highest honour which
belonged to Greece and Italy has now been carried off for the Dutch by a
Dutchman who has still hardly ever left the confines of his native town. 784
Affect awareness (Affekt-Wissen)
Rembrandt was and still is considered the painter of emotions. In general this
was attributed simply to Rembrandt’s genius. Art history has personalized this form of
representation of emotion and pronounced it a specific characteristic of Rembrandt’s
art, often accounting for it in terms of his biography and discussing it at most within
the medium of painting. As one step toward a better understanding of the history of
affect discourses from the perspective of Kulturwissenschaften, it seems to me necessary
to contextualize artistic representations within contemporary literary and theoretical
discourses. This gap in current scholarship could only be filled within the framework of
a broad-based research project. I would nevertheless like to offer a few thoughts and
observations that strike me as relevant in this context.
For Huygens, the ability to express emotion could only be the decisive criterion
that elevated Rembrandt beyond even the best artists of Antiquity, because the passions
and emotions were the principal topics of the day. In the 17 th century, the concept of
affect became a key facet of the understanding of the world and the self. To put it another
way: the discussion on emotions reached its high point in that time. 785 In theology this
applied not only to the rhetoric of the Catholic Counter-Reformation but likewise to
the Protestant Reformers, who although claiming to speak only the ‘objective truth’
nevertheless also operated with rhetorical means. In the secular, political field, it was true
not only of moralist thought at court but also of the ethics and theory of state developing
amongst the bourgeoisie. 786 The Dutch Calvinist theologian and scholar Gerhard Johann
Vossius praised not only the affects that obeyed reason but considered that the affects
constituted a virtue in themselves. 787 For the jurist and philosopher Christian Thomasius,
writing a little while later, knowledge of the affects was the “most necessary science,”
without which it was “impossible for a person to advance in the world,” be it in the
sphere of hermeneutics, moral didactics, rhetoric, therapeutic medicine or ethics. 788
The representation of the affects determined not only the Baroque theater of the Counter-
Reformation and the court, but also bourgeois Holland. The writer Daniel Heinsius
described the theater as palaestra affectuum, as a school of the affects. 789 Jan Konst has
emphatically indicated how individual experience flowed into the Dutch literature of the
17 th century and how the representation of emotions played a new and eminent role. In
272
784 Cited here from: David Bomford, Rembrandt, Yale his view, the primary concern of playwrights
2006, p. 56. The original Latin quotation: Strauss / van
der Meulen 1979, p. 68. and poets Joost van den Vondel, P. C. Hooft, Six
785 Grimm 2000, p. 29 f. van Chandelier, Jeremias de Decker, Constantijn
786 Grimm, ibid., with further reading. Norbert Elias, The
Civilizing Process, 2 vols., trans. by Edmund Jephcott, Huygens and Bredero was less to instruct their
New York 1978 (vol. 1, The History of Manners) and
1982 (vol. 2, Power and Civility). On the specifics of readers than to move and emotionalize them. 790
Jesuit affect theory, see inter alia: Barbara Malmann- It would be revealing to compare the figures by
Bauer, Nicolas Caussinus’ Affekttheorie im Vergleich
mit Descartes’ Traité sur les passions de l’âme, in: Stei- Rembrandt with the portrayal of contradictory
ger 2005, p. 353 – 390. On the significance of the affects
in the Protestant discussion: Ralf Georg Bogner, Be- and ambivalent emotions in Vondel’s dramas 791;
wegliche Beredsamkeit, passionierende Poesie. Zur likewise with the plays Aran and Titus (1641)
rhetorischen Stimulierung der Affekte in der lutheri-
schen Literarisierung der Leidensgeschichte Jesu, in: and Medea (1667) by Jan Vos, a great admirer of
Steiger 2005, p. 145 – 165; Bernd Wannenwetsch, Affekt
und Gebot. Zur ethischen Bedeutung der Leidenschaf-
Rembrandt and an opponent of Andries Pels
ten im Licht der Theologie Luthers und Melanchthons, (who around 1670 orchestrated the shift toward
ibid., p. 203 – 215.
787 “Jam quam praeclara res sunt affectus, si non modo Calvinist classicism and championed theater as
rationi possunt obedire, sed in eo ipso consistit vir-
tus.” Gerhard Johann Vossius, De theologia gentili,
a moral institution). These plays saw Vos boldly
et physiologia Christiana (1641), in: Vossius, Opera, staging a deliberate chaos: theater like life, against
vol. 5 (Amsterdam 1700), 334, cited here from: Grimm
2000, p. 25, note 49. classical rules. 792 It would also be interesting to
788 Christian Thomasius, Die neue Erfindung einer wohl- examine the relationships with kluchten — come
gegründeten und für das gemeine Wesen höchst-
nötigen Wissenschaft das Verborgene des Herzens dies and farces 793 — and song. 794
anderer Menschen auch wider ihren Willen aus der
täglichen Konversation zu erkennen (1692), cited here
from: Grimm 2000, p. 30. Noteworthy, however, is not just the
789 Grimm 2000, p. 26.
790 Jan Konst, review of Frijhoff / Spies 1999; http://web. importance of the passions in the fine arts,
archive.org/web/20021027061027/http://www.leiden-
univ.nl/host/mnl/, retrieved June 12, 2012. Konst right- literature and theater, but the manner in which
ly criticizes the prevailing opinion, recently reiterated passions were discussed and in particular the
by Frijhoff and Spies following on from W. A. P. Smit,
that this literature should be considered as primarily intellectual fields within which affects were
didactic.
791 We might mention here Jephthah (1659), Lucifer (1654) now treated. The area of competence changed:
(a play that characterizes even the figure of Lucifer as affects were no longer primarily the concern of
more than just a wicked devil), and Joseph in Egypt
(1640), in which the inner conflict experienced by theology and rhetoric, but of philosophy, where
Potiphar’s wife is conveyed with great understanding,
see above Part I, Chapter 2 The impossible reversal
they were addressed above all by Descartes and
1 — women as ‘rapists’ or Potiphar’s Wife. Jan Konst, Spinoza, Mallebranche in France and Hobbes
Woedende wraakghierigheidt en vruchtelooze week-
lachten. De hartstochten in de Nederlandse tragedie in England.795 In other words, the emphasis
van de zeventiende eeuw, Assen 1993; Konst 1997;
shifted away from a moralizing of the affects as
Konst 1999; Langvik-Johannessen 1963.
792 Schenkeveld 1991, p. 124. in theology, and away, too, from a rhetorical use
793 Leuker 1992.
794 Nevitt 2003. We should also mention the poems of of affects, toward the investigation and analysis
Tesselschade Roemers: De gedichten van Tesselscha- of affects, their causes and concatenations and
de Roemers, edited by A. Agnes Sneller, Hilversum
1994; Sneller 2001. their relationship to the body and soul. The
795 Anthony Levi, French Moralists. The Theory of the
Passions. 1585 to 1649, Oxford 1964; Campe 1990, focus now fell upon affect awareness (Affekt-
esp. p. 304 – 400; James 2003; Gaukroger 1998; David Wissen). Descartes postulated in his treatise
Summers, Cogito Embodied: Force and Counterforce
in René Descartes’s Les passions de l’âme, in: Meyer Les passions de l’âme (1649) 796 that he was
2003, p. 13 – 36.
796 All quotations here are taken from René Descartes,
The Passions of the Soul, trans. by Stephen H. Voss,
Indianapolis 1989. 273
writing en physicien. 797 The philosopher deliberately disassociated himself from scho
lastic moral theology 798 and from the ancients, in other words from Aristotelian and
Stoic tradition. 799
Les passions de l’âme (1649) by Descartes is of particular relevance in my view.

This fundamental and enduringly influential treatise was composed in Amsterdam
and thus in the same city and at the same time that Rembrandt was working there.
We do not know whether the artist and the
philosopher ever met, whether Descartes
797 “Mon dessin n’a pas été d’expliquer les passions en
ever saw Rembrandt’s pictures or whether orateur, ni même en philosophe moral, mais seule-
ment en physicien.” Cited here from James 2003, p. 95.
Rembrandt was familiar with the writings of Stephen H. Voss (Descartes 1989, p. 17) translates this
the philosopher.800 The following thoughts as: “[…] my purpose has not been to explain the Passi-
ons as an Orator, or even as a moral Philosopher, but
should not be misinterpreted as implying any only as a Physicist.” Descartes refers in particular to
the discovery of the circulation of the blood by William
direct influence of one upon the other. The Harvey, which abrogated the old notion of humoral pa-
humanities, including art history, often tend thology. See, among others, Summers 2003, p. 13 f.
798 It is interesting to compare Descartes’s theory of the
to abbreviate the relationship between artistic affects with that of the Jesuit Nicolas Caussin: Des
cartes is concerned with identifying the causes of affects
products and (normative) texts to one of in terms of a medical natural philosophy, and with the
direct dependence. I see analogous structures precise relationship between physical and emotional
reactions. Caussin, on the other hand, still wholly
between Rembrandt’s artistic statements and in the rhetorical tradition, attempts to manipulate
people via the affects. In contrast to Caussin, Des
Descartes’s theoretical formulations. This inner cartes starts from the conviction that people can cont
kinship was founded upon a common world rol their affects for the good out of their own common
sense. See: Barbara Malmann-Bauer, in: Steiger 2005,
of experience and life in middle-class Amster p. 353 – 390. Links naturally exist with theological tradi
dam, at that time probably the most liberal tion nonetheless, for example with Juan Luis Vives,
De anima et vita, Basel 1555, reprint London 1994, on
city in the western world. The artist and the which see: Campe 1990, p. 313 – 323.
799 Descartes begins his treatise thus: “The defectiveness
philosopher translated and portrayed these of the sciences we inherit from the ancients is nowhere
experiences each in his own specific manner. more apparent than in what they wrote about the Pas-
sions. […] nevertheless what the Ancients taught about
them is so little, and for the most part so little believ
able, that I cannot hope to approach the truth unless
Contrary to the frequently erroneous I forsake the paths they followed. For this reason I shall
reception of Les passions, upon reading the be obliged to write here as though I were treating a to-
pic which no one before me had ever described.” (Des
treatise it is clear that Descartes perceived the cartes 1989, Art. 1). This dismissal of Aristotle is aston
ishingly abrupt, in particular when one bears in mind
affects as an integral, necessary and meaningful that Descartes remains structurally indebted to Aristo
part of man 801; his division of body and soul telian thinking in his basic models of passivity and ac-
tivity. He reverses the relationship between the body
by no means implied a division of reason and and the soul, however: the object producing the pas
emotion.802 According to Descartes, affects are sion acts primarily upon the body; this reacts automat
ically and acts upon the soul. For Descartes, in other
a threshold phenomenon: they mediate between words, the soul is not responsible for the production
of passion, but is responsible for what it makes of the
body and soul. This takes place via the spiritus passions. See: Carole Talon-Hugon, Vom Thomismus
(esprits animaux, animal spirits) in the pineal zur neuen Auffassung der Affekte im 17. Jahrhundert,
in: Jean-Daniel Krebs (ed.), Die Affekte und ihre Reprä-
gland in the brain — structurally a notion wholly sentation in der deutschen Literatur der Frühen Neu-
zeit, Bern et al. 1996, p. 65 – 71. On the roots in natural
philosophy: Michaela Boenke, Körper, spiritus, Geist.
Psychologie vor Descartes, Munich 2005.
274 800 On the parallels between Rembrandt and Descartes
in line with the current neurobiological concept of physical and psychological connectivity
within the nuclei of the brain.
Descartes was interested first and foremost in ethical issues. He was anxious
to show that humans are able to control, with their will, the affects, fantasies and
drives involuntarily created by the spiritus. Humans can deliberately change their own
disposition.803 This theme plays no particular role in the context of this book. Descartes’s
attempts to overcome the division that he postulates between body and soul, and the
difficulties this causes when it comes to defining
the affects, likewise lie outside our present
with regard to their understanding of color and light,
see: Hammer-Tugendhat 2008, p. 177 – 189. remit. From the point of view of a connection
801 Descartes 1989, Art. 211: “And now that we understand
them [the passions] all, we have much less reason to with Rembrandt, what interests me about
fear them than we had before. For we see that they are Descartes, as about the Ethics published a little
all in their nature good and that we have nothing to
avoid but misuses or excesses of them […].” later by Spinoza 804, are certain statements that
802 One proof of the close relationship between affect and
reason is the fact that Descartes makes admiration the describe emotions as an internal, subjective and
first of his six basic affects. The French admiration may complex phenomenon and thus reveal a new
be translated as wonder, which for Plato and Aristotle
represented the starting point of philosophy. (Des understanding of psychological processes.
cartes 1989, Art. 53, Art. 70; Hammacher in: Descartes
1996, p. LI f.)
803 See esp. Boenke 2005, p. 359 f. In the Aristotelian tradition, affects
804 Benedict de Spinoza, Ethics, transl. by Edwin Curley,
London 1996. Spinoza’s Ethica, ordine geometrica were always a passive reaction to a stimulus
demonstrata was published shortly after his death in
1677.
coming from outside. Affects had objects
805 Ancient affect theory may only be understood in the and reasons in the outside world and were
context of Aristotelian philosophy and its theory of
hylomorphism, i. e. the interaction of matter (materia consequently viewed as passio, as something
prima), which is entirely passive, and form (morphe), passively suffered.805 Despite distancing himself
which is conceived as active. The soul-body compo-
site has the ability to feel and judge external sensa- vehemently from the “Ancients,” Descartes
tions, for example as pleasurable or painful. Affects,
too, are always judgments: my anger, for example, is adhered to the fundamental notion of active
a desire for revenge, directed at a particular person, and passive powers of the soul, although he
on the grounds that he has insulted me (James 2003,
p. 37 – 44). also accorded the soul an active faculty with
806 Descartes 1989, Arts. 1, 17. “For Descartes, suffering is
always something other than mere effect, whereby regard to the affects.806 According to Descartes,
action and suffering are reversible, because passive however, how things affect us depends not on
perception is at the same time a mental activity in the
same way as thinking, wishing and wanting, and is their properties but on the meaning we give
indeed self-perception, i.e. it contains an idea that is
none other than this activity itself […].” (Hammacher
them. The grounds for certain emotions are
in: Descartes 1996, p. L). James 2003, esp. p. 86 – 108; relocated into the interior of the subject; indeed,
Boenke 2005, esp. p. 356; Summers 2003, p. 14 ff. For
Spinoza, who does not start from the principle of the this consciousness of one’s own feelings is
division of body and spirit, the soul has both passive what characterizes subjectivity in the modern
and active faculties. In his view, affects can only be al-
tered by other affects. sense.807 Descartes distinguished between three
807 Summers 2003, p. 18: “For Descartes, sensations,
appetites, and passions are ‘subjective’ in a modern types of passions of the soul: perceptions that
sense of that modern word. In fact, the very idea of the arrive from outside, sensations caused by the
subjective as feeling in contrast to the physical-mathe-
matical ‘objective’ is taking shape in Descartes’s writ body, and emotions which are produced only
ing: what we call subjective experiences ‘arise from the
close and intimate union of soul and body,’ they are
for a consciousness and, taken together, constitute an
individual life.” 275
within the soul itself.808 The notion of émotions that were rooted within the soul was
new, and paved the way for the development towards psychology.809 “The new, Cartesian
man must become able to consider his perceptions as representations of his own mental
operations and not as consequences of physical causes,” as Carter aptly puts it.810 This
study of the soul is a secularized form of introspection that is no longer conducted with
reference to a divine authority in the tradition of medieval Christianity. For Descartes as
also for Spinoza, our imagination, thoughts and memories can call forth the same affects
as things that are concrete and present. What originally excited a certain affect often
escapes our consciousness or more accurately our memory, since it occurred in early
childhood. Descartes offers two examples:
[…] I shall content myself with repeating the principle on which everything
I have written about them [the passions] is based: namely, that there is
such a connection between our soul and our body that when we have once
joined some bodily action with some thought, one of the two is never
present to us afterwards without the other also being present to us; and
that the same actions are not always joined to the same thoughts. […] It is
not difficult, for example, to think that some people’s unusual aversions,
which make them unable to tolerate the smell of roses or the presence of a
cat or similar things, come only from having been badly shocked by some
such objects at the beginning of life […]. The smell of roses may have given
a child a severe headache when he was still in the cradle, or a cat may have
frightened him badly, without anyone having been aware of it and without
him having had any memory of it afterwards, though the idea of the
aversion he had then for the roses or the cat may remain imprinted in his
brain to the end of his life.811
Descartes’s physiological explanation of the “spirits” that bury themselves in

a fold of the brain is one we cannot go along with today. But his articulation of the ex
perience — registered subjectively by the individual but at the same time inexplicable —
of unconscious emotions whose origins go right back to childhood, this experience
we share. Sigmund Freud later interpreted these phenomena from a psychoanalytical
perspective. The budding discourse on the psyche, the formulation of its enigmatic,
complex and contradictory nature, in my opinion links Descartes, and also Spinoza,
with Rembrandt. Descartes and Spinoza recognize, despite their enumeration of basic
affects, that the emotions intermix and hence that countless emotional states can
arise 812, and that an individual — and this to me seems particularly significant — can
experience wholly conflicting emotions at once. Descartes explains this as follows:
276
And although these excitations (émotions) of the soul are often joined with
the passions that are like them, they may also frequently be found with
others, and may even originate from those that are in opposition to them.
For example, when a husband mourns his dead wife, whom (as sometimes
happens) he would be upset to see resuscitated, it may be that his heart
is constricted by the sadness which funeral trappings and the absence of
a person to whose company he was accustomed excite in him; and it may
be that some remnants of love or pity, presented to his imagination, draw
genuine tears from his eyes — in spite of the fact that at the same time he
feels a secret Joy in the innermost depths of his soul.813
In Rembrandt’s work, both in his self-portraits and in his history painting, we can
observe a development from the (Baroque)
representation of concrete affects towards
808 Descartes 1989, Arts. 25 – 29. complex emotional states, as illustrated for
809 Descartes 1989, Art. 147, About the inner Excitations of
the soul (Des emotions interieurs de l’âme): “I shall add example by Bathsheba and Haman Recognizes
but one further consideration here, which seems to
me to be very good for keeping us from suffering any his Fate (plate 1, figs. 131– 133, p. 264, p. 268). I see
distress from the Passions: our good and our ill de- a kinship between the artistic representations
pend principally on inner excitations, which are excited
in the soul only by the soul itself — in which respect by Rembrandt, in particular in his late oeuvre,
they differ from those passions that always depend on
some motion of the spirits […] And when we read of
and the writings of the two philosophers.
unusual adventures in a book or see them represented This kinship lies firstly in the fundamental
on a stage, this sometimes excites Sadness in us, so-
metimes Joy or Love or Hatred, and in general all the importance accorded to the emotions, and
Passions, according to the diversity of the objects offe- secondly in the acknowledgement that emo-
red to our imagination; but along with this we have the
pleasure of feeling them excited in us, and this plea tions can be diverse, can overlay each other and
sure is an intellectual Joy, which can originate from
Sadness as well as from any of the other Passions.” hence be contradictory. It lies in the recognition
Spinoza writes in a very similar vein: “Man is affected that emotions differ from person to person
with the same affect of joy or sadness from the image
of a past or future thing as from the image of a present and often remain unconscious. The working
thing.” (Spinoza, Ethics, Part III, Proposition 18) Cf.
Campe 1990, esp. p. 332 ff. According to Joan Dejean of the philosophers “back into the invisible
(Mapping the Heart, in: Querelles 2002, p. 72 – 84), and dark is unmetaphorical and analytical in
this is the first occasion on which Descartes uses the
term emotion. She rightly points out the eminent signif- contrast to the old working from the inside
icance of the invention of new terms and sees in this
an entirely new approach to the subject of the affects.
out.”814 Campe’s apt characterization also fits
810 Richard B. Carter, Descartes’ Medical Philosophy. The Rembrandt’s attempt to visualize the individ
Organic Solution of the Mind-Body-Problem, Bal-
timore and London, The Johns Hopkins University ual’s invisible inner self. Both Descartes’s and
Press 1983, p. 72. Spinoza’s theories and Rembrandt’s pictures
811 Descartes 1989, Art. 136.
812 Spinoza, Ethics, Proposition 57 (1996, p. 101): “Each af- resulted from human experiences of ambivalent
fect of each individual differs from the affect of another
as much as the essence of the one from the essence states of emotion, which were now greeted with
of the other.” Ibid., Proposition 59 (p. 103): “[…] it is particular attention and an analytical attitude.
clear […] that the various affects can be compounded
with one another in so many ways, and that so many The differences between their philosophical
variations can arise from this composition that they
cannot be defined by any number.”
813 Descartes 1989, Art. 147.
814 Campe 1990, p. 331 f. English by translator. 277
Pl. 11: Gabriel Metsu, Woman Reading a Letter, c.1664–67, panel, Dublin, Nat. Gallery of Ireland
Fig. 140: Pieter Codde, A Woman Seated at a Virginal with a Letter, panel, early 1630s, Boston,
private collection
and artistic articulations are also clear, however, along with their respective impact upon
and relevance for the reception of their day. Descartes, for example, recognizes that emo
tional reactions vary from one individual to the next. Thus he writes:
The same impression that the presence of a frightful object forms on the
gland which causes fear in some men may excite courage and boldness in
others. The reason for this is that all brains are not disposed in the same
manner […].815
This apposite observation of the differences in our individual emotional make-

up is given a biological explanation, which, in its specific historical details, is no longer
acceptable to us. A corresponding artistic differentiation between individual characters,
each exhibiting specific emotional reactions, can be seen in Rembrandt. Here, however,
the differences in their emotional reactions can be explained in another way, namely
as dependent upon the differences in their social class, age and gender.816 This is
most telling with regard to the relationship between the artistic portrayal and the
theoretical justification of certain phenomena perceived — on account of their common
cultural disposition — by both painter and philosopher. Art is evidently in a better
position to convey these experiences to us today, in a way we can comprehend, than
the explanations of theory.
278
Fig. 141: Willem Duyster, Woman with a Letter and a Man, early 1630s, panel, Copenhagen,
Statens Museum for Kunst
Fig. 135: Gerard Ter Borch, Curiosity, c. 1660, canvas, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Interiorization: Vermeer
Let us return to a painting already discussed in Part II, Chapter 3, Metsu’s Love
Letter (plate 11), but now consider the work in terms of its representation of affects. The
picture follows the iconography of portrayals of women with love letters in domestic
scenes. Still wholly in the tradition of Dirck Hals (p. 262), the picture within the picture
illuminates the nature of the letter. In contrast to Dirck Hals, however, neither the body
nor gestures of the female figure, nor the aesthetic structure of the scene as a whole,
point to the storm of emotions that is signaled by the picture within the picture. In contrast
to Hals, and even more so to Rembrandt, the reader’s face likewise reveals nothing of
what is going on inside her. The storm of emo
815 Descartes 1989, Art. 39: “[…] and that the same move- tions is articulated purely metaphorically in the
ment of the gland which in some excites fear, in others
makes the spirits enter the brain’s pores that guide
painted storm at sea.
part of them into the nerves that move the hands for Metsu was by no means the first to erase
self-defense, and part of them into those that agitate
the blood and drive it toward the heart in the manner the portrayal of (strong) affects. He was thereby
needed to produce spirits suitable to continue this de- following a trend that had been pursued by prom
fense and sustain the volition for it.”
816 Take Rembrandt’s history paintings, for example, such inent Dutch genre painters since the middle
as Samson Posing the Riddle to the Wedding Guests
(1638, Dresden, Gemäldegalerie), in which several fig of the 17 th century and whose introduction is
ures react differently to one and the same event. linked to Ter Borch.817 It was Ter Borch who
817 Gudlaugsson 1959 – 60; Gerard Ter Borch, Zwolle
1617 – Deventer 1681, exh. cat. Landesmuseum Müns- made the letter a central motif within his oeuvre,
ter 1974; Kettering (in: Franits) 1997; exh. cat. Dublin,
Greenwich 2003, p. 90 – 107; Sutton in: ibid., p. 17 – 22;
Adams in: ibid., p. 63 ff.; exh. cat. Washington, D. C.,
New York 2005. 279
Pl. 12: Jan Vermeer, Woman Reading a Letter at an Open Window, c. 1657, canvas, Dresden,
Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister
Fig. 136: X-ray photograph: Jan Vermeer, Woman Reading a Letter at an Open Window
painting no less than sixteen variations on the theme from the late 1640s onwards and
popularizing the genre.
At the same time — and this is significant — it was Ter Borch who, taking up
from the late work of Rembrandt and from Pieter Codde and Willem Cornelisz. Duyster
(figs. 140, 141, p. 278 – 279), began portraying his figures in an affective state that remained
non-specific or, more accurately, impossible to determine.818 This is frequently true of
several figures within the same picture, as in Curiosity (fig. 135, p. 279) and The Letter,
works in which the relationship between the figures also remain enigmatic. Narratives
are suggested that nevertheless remain untold; it is left up to the viewer to invent a
story. Take the standing female figure in Curiosity: although placed prominently in the
foreground and looking out at the viewer, her function within the scene is impossible to
fathom. Her upright pose and the absence of all expression on her face are characteristic
of Ter Borch. Strong or clear affects are never to be read from his figures of women
reading or writing 819; we are left in the dark as to the psychological mood of those
portrayed.
I shall examine this new form of representation in two works by Vermeer.820

Vermeer’s small oeuvre includes six paintings of women 821 with love letters. This is
280
a remarkable number: apart from motifs related to music, the artist explored no other
theme in such depth. The earliest version, dating from around 1657, is the Young Woman
Reading a Letter at an Open Window (plate 12).
Like Ter Borch before him, Vermeer here omits
818 On the new significance of privacy and its visualization
in Rembrandt’s etching Jan Six Standing at a Window the allegorical reference provided by the motif of
Reading (1647), in which the link between reading in
private and introspection is first addressed: David
the picture within the picture.822 The knowledge
Smith, I Janus: Privacy and the Gentleman Ideal in that pictures of women with letters were about
Rembrandt’s Portraits of Jan Six, in: Art History 11,
1988, p. 42 – 63. Smith starts from the assumption love was already firmly anchored. Vermeer’s
that Rembrandt’s invention influenced Ter Borch,
decision to erase all allegorical symbols can be
Pieter de Hooch and Vermeer. On the significance of
Carel Fabritius in this process: David R. Smith, Ca- seen in the actual production process itself.
rel Fabritius and Portraiture in Delft, in: Art History
13, 1990, p. 151 – 174. On the relationship to the two X-rays have revealed that a large painting of
Amsterdam painters Codde (1599 – 1678) and Duyster Cupid — a picture that Vermeer integrated
(1598/99 – 1635): exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003,
esp. p. 16 ff., p. 84 – 89. within several of his other works — originally
819 Ter Borch was also the first to represent women not
just receiving or reading letters, but also actively en- hung on the rear wall (fig. 136).823 Vermeer sub
gaged in writing them, as in his 1655 Woman Writing sequently painted over this Cupid and literally
a Letter (The Hague, Mauritshuis; exh. cat. Dublin,
Greenwich 2003, cat. no. 5). hid it behind a curtain. We have already men
821 Male protagonists with love letters are strikingly ab- tioned the eminent significance and multiple
sent in Vermeer’s oeuvre. He painted two works show- meanings of the curtain in Dutch painting and
ing male individuals in an interior: The Astronomer
(1668, Paris, Louvre) and The Geographer (1669, within Vermeer’s oeuvre.824 Here Vermeer has
Frankfurt a. M., Städelsches Kunstinstitut). They are
not writing or reading love letters, however, but con-
consciously played with its placing within the
ducting their research. The interior is a studiolo. composition: is the curtain part of the room in
822 As seen in the chapter on Vermeer’s Woman Holding
a Balance [Part II, Chapter 2], Vermeer certainly integ- the painting, or does it fall in front of the picto-
rated paintings within his pictures, albeit in a relation- rial plane, as it were? Whatever the case, it
ship to the main scene that is in most cases complex
and not simply illustrative. I would like to recall the disp- conceals part of the interior and makes us aware
ute that I outlined in the chapter Farewell Laocoon …
According to de Jongh, Young Woman Reading a Letter that we are unable to see everything there is.
may strictly speaking signify nothing, since it contains The curtain conceals and reveals.825
no unequivocal references to literary sources.
823 The picture of Cupid evidently goes back to an original The curtain drawn to one side exposes
by van Everdingen that was probably in Vermeer’s col
lection. Vermeer integrated this painting into his own an interior in which a young woman is seen
compositions on several occasions: in Girl Interrupted standing in front of a window, immersed in
at her Music (New York, Frick Collection), A Young Wo
man Standing at a Virginal (London, National Gallery) reading a letter. The open window provides no
and, albeit fragmented to the point of unrecognizabi-
lity, A Maid Asleep (New York, Metropolitan Museum).
view of what lies beyond, but simply signals the
On the various significances of Cupid in Vermeer’s pic outside world from where the letter has arrived.
tures within pictures: Gaskell 1998, p. 225 – 233.
824 See: “Inversions: Woman in Bed” in Part I, Chapter 1, With this aesthetic setting, Vermeer succeeds in
and notes 600, 634 – 638 in Part II. simultaneously evoking a sense of near and far,
825 The curtain here reveals not the holy or the divine as in
a longstanding tradition, but rather the visible world. of intimacy and distance, and thus in visualizing
This secularization becomes all the more potent when
we consider that one iconographical source for the an essential aspect of epistolary culture. Reading
motif of a woman reading a letter was the Annuncia- a (love) letter signifies communication with
tion. In the late Middle Ages, the Virgin was often de-
picted reading. Horst Wenzel (1995, p. 287 – 291) has someone absent, but communication that is
drawn attention to representations in which Archangel
Gabriel hands Mary an epistle. In Vermeer, the rays
of divine light correspondingly become real sunlight
streaming in through the open window. 281
Pl. 13: Jan Vermeer,
Woman in Blue Reading a Letter,
c. 1662 – 64, canvas, Amsterdam,
Rijksmuseum
nonetheless intimate. This is a new form of communication, one made possible by the
letter.826 It is about love, but the beloved is not there; instead of a body there is writing,
instead of an embrace a fantasized relationship.827 Near and far at the same time. The
view into a private interior is an intimate view that suggests physical proximity. The sense
of proximity is heightened by the fact that the viewer imagines him or herself in the same
room as the female figure — an impression created by the omission of floor, ceiling and
enclosing side wall. Yet the female figure is at the same time distanced by her smallness
within the large room. The table with the carpet bunched up for no apparent reason and
the tilting fruit bowl literally form a barrier.828
The young woman is reading with the greatest attention, as conveyed by her
downcast eyes and slightly parted lips. Of the content of the letter and her concrete
feelings, however, we learn nothing. Her upright body, and the strict right angle of her
arms bent at the elbows, signal control. Neither through gestures nor facial expression
does she betray what is going on inside her. It is precisely because no specific affect is
shown that we are made aware of the invisible, intimate location of emotion. The staging
of near and far, of intimacy and remoteness reinforces this impression. The effect of
this contradictory tension between the articulation of emotion and the non-definition
of this emotion, and the exclusion of the viewer from this staged intimacy, is the recog-
nition that emotions occur inside the individual and are invisible. The inaccessibility of
this inner realm is further apostrophized via the young woman’s reflection in the open
window. Ever since the paragone of the Renaissance (i. e. the rivalry between the media,
here the competition between painting and sculpture regarding the overall representation
282
of a subject), reflections have served amongst other things as a means of capturing the
human body and face from all sides, as it were. The window’s lead glazing in turn
prompts associations with the squared grid used by artists since the Renaissance,
with whose aid the human body could be drawn to exact scale. In Vermeer’s painting,
however, the reflection functions in the opposite way: the window grid breaks up the
face and mirrors only blurred fragments. This blurred reflection underlines the inner
inaccessibility of the young woman reading. Scientific instruments, mathematical per
spective, laws of optics, camera obscura — all the tools of knowledge of which Vermeer
was a virtuoso master evidently reflect only the presence of phenomena, but without
being able to capture their substance. In the terms of Daniel Arasse: “With extreme
precision, Vermeer worked in certain places to blur or prevent the identification of
what he depicts.” 829
These observations are confirmed by the other versions of this theme in Vermeer’s
oeuvre. In his Woman Reading a Letter 830 (c. 1662– 64), Vermeer concentrates the interior
setting even more rigorously upon its ‘interior’ quality (plate 13). This interior room be
comes the interior of the figure, as it were. There are no boundary side walls, no floor
and no ceiling. The composition is presented slightly from below with a high horizon
line, so that as viewers we effectively find our
selves in the same room and very close to the
826 Although the private letter played a certain role even figure in the picture. The rear wall seals the
in the Middle Ages, the enormous spread of letter
writing in 17th century Dutch society, in the wake of pictorial space and we are unable to see into
increased literacy, nevertheless signified a qualitative other rooms. The outside world is no longer
leap forward. See, among others: Karen Cherewatuk,
Ulrike Winthaus (eds.), Dear Sister. Medieval Women represented even by a window and penetrates
and the Epistolary Genre, Philadelphia 1993.
827 The world of the love letter is an imaginary one. This this private sphere only at second hand, com
also implies a sublimation of feelings, something rec municated by the light and by the map 831, which
ognized and appreciated by contemporaries. As James
Howell observed in his book ‘Instructions for Forraine indicates the distant regions from where the
Travell’ published in 1642 in England: “And of all kind
of Humane Meditations, those of ones absent Friends letter has arrived.
be the pleasingist, specially when they are endeared The sense of proximity created in this
and nourished by correspondence of Letters, which
by a Spirituall kind of power do enamour, and mingle way is nevertheless contrasted here, too, by
Soules more sweetly than any embraces.” (cited here
from: James Howell, Instructions for Forreine Travell,
the blocking of the foreground with the table
edited by E. Arber, London 1868, p. 28) draped in a dark cloth and the chair, and by the
828 The fruits — apples and peaches — stand for fertility
and eroticism; the bowl is tipped towards her womb. woman’s absorption in her letter. The ‘interior
829 Daniel Arasse, Vermeer. Faith in Painting, trans. by Ter- of the interior’ that is suggested and at the same
ry Grabar, Princeton 1994, p. 73.
830 Exh. cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C. 1995, cat. no. 9, time denied to us is restated in the jewelry box,
p. 134 – 139, with further reading.
831 On the significance of maps in Vermeer and in Dutch which is open but faces away from us behind
painting: Richard Helgerson, Genremalerei, Landkar- its raised lid, so that we cannot see inside.
ten and nationale Unsicherheit im Holland des 17.
Jahrhunderts, in: Ulrich Bielefeld, Gisela Engel (eds.), We participate in the presence and absolute
Bilder der Nation. Kulturelle und politische Konstruk-
tionen des Nationalen am Beginn der europäischen
Moderne, Hamburg 1998, p. 123 – 153; Alpers 1985,
p. 213 – 286; Stoichita 1998, p. 173 – 184. 283
concentration of the female figure but we know nothing about the object of her attention,
the contents of the letter and her accompanying emotions. We realize that intense emo
tions are at play even though we learn nothing at all from this monumental female figure
in her upright pose. The severity of this pose is underlined by the composition: the objects
frame the woman and incorporate her into a system of coordinates, so to speak. This
form of representation corresponds to the
practice of reading: reading absorbs the atten
832 This interpretation of emotion as individual and not
tion, stills bodily movements and centers com- legible for others is also found in other themes in Ver
meer’s painting, for example in A Maid Asleep (c. 1657,
munication inside the individual. To put it
New York, Metropolitan Museum). See: Hammer-Tu-
another way: as a pictorial theme, the letter is gendhat, Arcana Cordis, 2002, p. 234 – 256.
833 Nevitt (2001, p. 89 – 110) and Adams (2003, p. 63 – 76)
a motif ideally suited to convey this notion of reach very similar conclusions. See also: Wolf 2001,
the psychological dimension.832 esp. p. 143 – 188. It is symptomatic that the letter theme
is absent in Vermeer’s early oeuvre and that in paint
Emotions are thus represented in Ver ings such as The Procuress of 1656 (Dresden, Gemälde-
galerie), human communication is still portrayed in a
meer’s paintings as private, intimate and not direct and physical manner.
to be read by others.833 Edward Snow describes 834 “And although a core of human inwardness holds
the world of Woman in Blue in place, what Vermeer
this as “inaccessible otherness” in his Vermeer stresses is the private, inaccessible nature of that ex-
perience, constructing a veritable force field around
monograph.834 This corresponds, in my view, its otherness.” Snow 1994, p. 6. Snow’s description
to the incommunicability that Niklas Luhmann of this picture is so fitting that it may be cited here:
“The letter, the map, the woman’s pregnancy, the emp-
described as the discovery of the 18th century.835 ty chair, the open box, the unseen window — all are
intimations of absence, of invisibility, of other minds,
Luhmann draws exclusively from literary sour wills, times and places, of past and future, of birth
ces, however, and in particular from French and perhaps loss and death. Yet with all these signs
of mixed feelings and a larger context, Vermeer insists
literature. The characterization of this new on the fullness and sufficiency of the depicted mo-
form of literature can equally well be applied to ment — with such force that its capacity to orient and
contain takes on metaphysical value.” (p. 4) “But if we
the pictures of Vermeer, Ter Borch and other attempt to force a story out of Woman in Blue, we vio-
late our agreement with the painting and become voy
contemporary Dutch artists: eurs peering into a world that our own gaze renders
distant and superficial.” (p. 6) Whether the woman is
pregnant is a question that remains unresolved. For
It was not possible to fully convey arguments for and against this hypothesis, see: Winkel
1998, p. 330 – 332.
the complex psychic reality of the 835 Niklas Luhmann, Love as Passion. The Codification of
participants within a message […].836 Intimacy, trans. by Jeremy Gaines and Doris L. Jones,
Cambridge (Mass.) 1986, p. 121 – 129. Luhmann acknow-
ledges that this tendency had its origins in the 17th cen-
tury: “During the seventeenth century the great heroic
The experience of incommunicability adventures — particularly with respect to love — had
is one aspect of the differentiation already started to be internalized.” (p. 121)
836 Ibid., p. 121.
of social systems for intimacy. It 837 Ibid., p. 123.
does not contradict intimacy, but 838 Ibid.
839 Adams in: exh. cat. Dublin Greenwich 2003, p. 63 – 76,
corresponds to it […].837 here: p. 64.
840 For a monographic and thereby more detailed dis-
cussion of this picture: Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat,
The problem in question is far more Kunst der Imagination / Imagination der Kunst. Die
Pantoffeln Samuel van Hoogstratens, in: Klaus Krüger,
radical in form and centers on whether Alessandro Nova (eds.), Imagination und Wirklichkeit.
Zum Verhältnis von mentalen and realen Bildern in
der Kunst der frühen Neuzeit, Mainz 2000, p. 139 – 153.
Le Siècle de Rembrandt, exh. cat., Petit Palais, Paris
284 1970, no. 117, p. 110 – 111 (detailed description of the
there is not meaning — especially in intimate relationships — that is
destroyed by virtue of being made the object of an utterance.838
The relevance of this convergence of 18th century literature and 17 th century

painting is a subject to which we shall return later on.
picture’s provenance and attributions); Sumowski

vol. 2, 1983, p. 1304, no. 894 (with extensive bibliogra- Imagination: Hoogstraten
phy); Georgel, Lecocq 1983, p. 158, 169, 242; Daniel
Arasse, Le Détail. Pour une histoire rapprochée de la
peinture, Paris 1992, p. 145 – 148; Bettina Werche in: Ann Jensen Adams describes the private
exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M. 1993, p. 228, no. 47; Stoichita
1998, p. 48 f.; Brusati 1995, esp. p. 83 – 86, 204; Mi- letter of the early modern period as “something
chiel C. C. Kersten and Danielle H. A. C. Lokin (eds.), of an oxymoron”: supposedly “a written record
Delft Masters, Vermeer’s Contemporaries. Illusionism
through the Conquest of Light and Space, exh. cat. of the spontaneous production of the innermost
Stedelijk Museum het Prinsenhof, Delft, Zwolle 1996,
p. 201; J. Foucart, Le tableau du mois no. 29: Les Pan reaches of the soul,” in practice “both the form
toufles par Samuel van Hoogstraten (Louvre handout, of letters and the scripts in which they were
see documentation in the Louvre), September 1996;
Svetlana Alpers, Picturing Dutch Culture, in: Franits written were increasingly codified […]” 839 The
1997, p. 64; Innenleben. Die Kunst des Interieurs.
Vermeer bis Kabakov, exh. cat., Städelsches Kunst letter-writing handbooks of the epoch represent
institut, Frankfurt am Main, Ostfildern-Ruit 1998, esp. simply the forms of address, stylized into linguis-
the essays by Sigrid Metken and Wolfgang Kemp.
The work was mentioned for the first time in 1842, tic formulae, of a wider dispositive. This dual
in the Catalogue raisonné of the works of the most
eminent Dutch, Flemish and French painters (sup-
structure of the culture of writing love letters —
plément, 9, London 1842, p. 569, no. 20) compiled by the unfolding of subjective, individual utterances
John Smith, who described it as unsigned and undat
ed and presented it as a work by Pieter de Hooch. W. on the one hand, and their conventionality and
Bürger-Thoré (Van der Meer de Delft, in: Gazette des fixing in cultural codes on the other — shows
Beaux-Arts 21, 1866, p. 22) also described the picture,
which he brought to Paris for an exhibition, as a work itself in exemplary fashion in a picture attributed
by Pieter de Hooch, basing himself on a signature that
had meanwhile appeared on the picture and a dating to Samuel van Hoogstraten, dated to the late
to 1658. By 1883, the signature PDH had once more 1650s (plate 14).840
vanished. The picture was subsequently attributed to
a number of different artists: Pieter Janssens Elinga? In his version of the love-letter theme,
(Hofstede de Groot, De Schilder Janssens, een na-
volger van Pieter de Hooch, in: Oud Holland 9, 1891, Hoogstraten depicts no human figures at all.
p. 292 f.); circle of Vermeer around 1660 (Clotilde Instead he shows us three empty rooms. The
Brière Misme, Au Musée du Louvre. La donation de
Croy. Les tableaux hollandais, in: Gazette des Beaux letter motif exists only as a picture on the wall.
Arts 1933, p. 231 – 238); Hendrik van der Burgh (G.
Bazin, see documentation in the Louvre). Only in 1956
The woman reading the letter in this picture
did E. Plietzsch (Randbemerkungen zur holländischen within the picture is seen, moreover, in rear
Interieurmalerei am Beginn des 17. Jahrhunderts,
in: Wallraf-Richartz-Jahrbuch 18, 1956, p. 175, note 1) view. No affects whatsoever are represented;
ascribe the work to Samuel van Hoogstraten, an at nevertheless I argue that these are evoked in the
tribution that was generally accepted — rightly, in my
view. The painting must have been produced after recipient. Hoogstraten initiates imagination with
1655 — the year in which Ter Borch painted the original
whose paraphrase was in turn copied by Hoogstra- his picture. The picture is simultaneously a
ten — and before the View of a Corridor (Dyrham Park, self-reflection on the medium of painting and its
Gloucestershire, National Trust) painted in England in
1662, which already signals Hoogstraten’s embrace of affective power.
classicism. From a stylistic point of view, The Slippers
can be linked most closely with Hoogstraten’s Peep
show with Views of the Interior of a Dutch House in the
National Gallery in London. 285
Pl. 14: Samuel van Hoogstraten, The Slippers, 1658 – 60, canvas, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 139: Samuel van Hoogstraten, The Slippers, detail (see Pl. 14)
From our position on a threshold, our eyes travel across three successive rooms,
each seen through a door standing wide open. A broom leans against the opposite wall
of the first room, a large towel hangs down beside it from a wooden shelf higher up, and
flax has been draped over the door frame — all signs of female domestic industry. Through
a door hinged on the left, we look into a corridor; the light falling from the right points
to a fourth door that we cannot see but which evidently leads outside. In this brightly lit
hallway, nothing is to be seen but a round mat bearing two greenish wooden clogs.
The viewer ‘trips’ over these shoes; as we look into the room we are forced
to stop and reflect upon their semantic meaning. Discarded shoes are frequently found
in Dutch genre paintings — we might think of Metsu’s Love Letter. Their iconology has
been interpreted in different and conflicting ways. Countless figures of speech, myths,
fairy tales and marriage rites, for example, testify to the significance of discarded shoes
as erotic allusions.841 On the other hand, the same motif has been interpreted — with
reference to Plutarch — as a symbol of virtue. The only conclusion that may be drawn
is that the symbol of discarded shoes in Dutch genre pieces is semantically laden but
can prompt various associations (at once). The shoes in Hoogstraten’s picture do not lie
in the first room alongside the unmistakable attributes of female industry, nor do they
stand in the third, intimate room. Their place is in the space between. The impossibility
of determining the semantic fixing of the shoes could not be illustrated more clearly than
through their situation between the rooms. This corridor has no other characterization
286
Fig. 137: Gerard Ter Borch, The Gallant Conversation (‘The Paternal Admonition’), c. 1654, canvas,
Fig. 138: Caspar Netscher, Woman Reading a Letter (paraphrase after Ter Borch), after 1655, location
unknown
than that of being a space in between. Shoes and intermediate space mutually interpret
themselves as openness and indeterminateness.
A third door with a massive bunch of keys opens onto the last room, whose
auratic lighting is intensified by the gold damask that is draped over the table and in
which the chair is also upholstered. Mounted on the wall near the picture is a framed
mirror, which — significantly — reflects nothing.842 The view through the open doors into
the furthest chamber is a view into an intimate, feminine sphere. This intimacy, this sense
of privacy and seclusion is exposed to the eye of the viewer. The key, which stands out
meaningfully against the bright background, is inserted into the keyhole directly beneath
the woman in the picture within the picture. The key not only alludes to the woman’s
power within the home but also takes up a sexual symbolism familiar since the Middle
Ages. In the Emblemata Amatoria by Pieter Corneliszoon Hooft of 1611, for example,
Cupid holds a lock with a key in his hand; the title Een die my past (One that fits me)
makes the message clear. The key is employed as a sexual metaphor in numerous Dutch
genre paintings, in particular within the work of
Jan Steen.843 But the key also serves as a clavis
841 See above Part II, Chapter 3, notes 627 – 630.
842 The motif of the mirror radicalizes the question of the interpretandi. In Holland in the 17 th century,
meaning and function of the picture; see Part II, Chap-
ter 1, Mirror, Mirror on the wall … the key (sleutel) was a common metaphor for
843 Malcolm Jones, Sex and Sexuality in Late Medieval unlocking the truth. The key opens the door (the
and Early Modern Art, in: Erlach, Reisenleitner, Vocelka
1994, p. 187 – 304, here: p. 219 (the key that fits the lock picture), but what we see is again just a picture.
as a metaphor for coitus); Peter L. Donhauser, A Key
to Vermeer?, in: Artibus et historiae 14, no. 27, 1993,
p. 85 – 101; ill. of Hooft’s emblem: p. 94, fig. 10; ills. of the
corresponding pictures by Steen: p. 96, 97, figs. 14, 15. 287
The actual narrative and the actors themselves are found only in the painted
picture on the wall. Hoogstraten makes the motif of the picture within the picture — just
one pictorial element amongst many in the work of his colleagues — the true subject
of his painting. What, then, is the picture to which Hoogstraten has assigned such a
central function? The painting shows a woman wearing a silvery satin dress in the style
of Ter Borch, seen standing in rear view in front of a red four-poster bed. Behind a
chair on the left is a small boy, also dressed in red and holding a large hat in his hand.
Art historians originally assumed that Hoogstraten had here copied an original by Ter
Borch, namely the so-called Paternal Admonition (Väterliche Emahnung) of which
versions are housed in Berlin and Amsterdam (fig. 137, p. 287). Since the copy made by
Caspar Netscher, Ter Borch’s pupil, is dated 1655, the original is assumed to have been
completed around 1654.844 In 1765 the German engraver Johann Georg Wille reproduced
Ter Borch’s painting in the form of a print, to which he gave the title Paternal Admonition.
Subsequently extended to the painting itself, this title stipulated how the scene was to
be read: it became an anecdotally flavored picture about decorum. In the 20th century,
a quite different reading was proposed: Ter Borch’s composition was interpreted as
a moralizing picture warning against the selling of love for money.845 The father was
thereby transformed into an officer, the daughter into a prostitute and the mother into a
procuress. A gold coin was imagined between the man’s fingers, although this is visible
neither in the Berlin, nor in the Amsterdam version, nor in the copy by Netscher. That
the same picture can be read in such a contrary fashion is due not just to its changing
reception over the course of time, but to the ambivalence of the picture itself, which
provokes these subjectively different reactions. More recent research has shown that
the quintessence of Ter Borch’s female figures lies precisely in their ambiguity. Alison
Kettering has described Ter Borch’s ladies in white satin as the ultimate in feminine
ideality: in their beauty, passivity and genteel reserve, they corresponded both to moral
izing etiquette books and to the Petrarchan poetry of the day. At the same time, how
ever, the author draws attention to the confusion that the painting’s ambivalent contex
tualization must have caused contemporaries.846
Its ideality coupled with its indefinability ensured this rear-view female figure an
unparalleled career. The very fact that she was not defined by a specific narrative allowed
her to be contextualized in different ways. Thus she was cited in the shape of a lady alone
in an interior, at her toilette, or making music, or combined with other figures such as
an African maid.847 She could likewise be employed, in the same form and pose, as a
woman reading a letter. Hoogstraten copied one of these copies (fig. 138, p. 287).848 He
thereby caused the letter — visible as no more than the white corner of a piece of paper
even in the paraphrase upon which he based himself — to vanish. How is it, then, that
288
we are able to interpret this scene as a woman reading a letter? The answer lies with the
small boy, who is characterized as a messenger by his (waiting) pose and by the large hat
that he has taken off: in the context of the woman seen from behind, the boy’s presence
semanticizes her neutral figure and thus the scene as a whole. We recognize the letter
theme not because we see it, but because we know it. Hoogstraten cites an image from
a well-rehearsed and well-known pictorial tradition; one he could assume would be
correctly picked up by suitably (visually) literate recipients. Hoogstraten could of course
have invented his own version of the letter theme; instead, however, he quotes — and
he quotes a quotation, a copy. He thereby makes the quotation recognizable as such.
Hoogstraten thus places himself within the context of a tradition, allows pictures to be
experienced as cultural codes. We are looking at an interpictorial discourse, or as Ludwig
Jäger puts it, an intramedia transcription.849
As already discussed, pictures with

letters allude to epistolary culture and hence
844 Gudlaugsson 1959 – 60, vol. 1, p. 97, and vol. 2, cat. no.
110. The copy by Netscher is housed in the museum in to language. Analogous to pictures, letters —
Gotha, ibid., cat. no. 110 II a, pl. 12, fig. 1.
845 For the first time in W. Drost, Barockmalerei in den affecting to be the expression of the most pri-
germanischen Ländern (Handbuch der Kunstwissen- vate, authentic emotions — were likewise struc
schaft), Potsdam 1926, p. 187; Jan Kelch, catalog entry
in: exh. cat. Philadelphia 1984, cat. no. 9, p. 144 – 145; tured by conventions. Letter-writing manuals
J. P. Guépin, Die Rückenfigur ohne Vorderseite, in:
exh. cat. Münster 1974, p. 31 – 38. Also Gudlaugsson
with their standard turns of phrase not only
1959 – 60. provided a language through which lovers could
846 Kettering (1997, p. 98 – 115) considers that more than
one reception would have been possible: contempo express their feelings, but indeed created this
raries could have read the painting as a scene in which specific form of ‘feeling’ in the first place. The
an officer is courting a young woman, in the sense of a
marriage proposal. practice of calligraphy, in Dutch schoonschrift
847 On the copies: Gudlaugsson 1959 – 60, 1, p. 97 and 2,
cat. no. 110; Barbara Weber, Im Spannungsfeld von (literally ‘beautiful writing’), reached a high
Subjektivität und Kommerz. Die Kopien der Rücken- point in Holland in the 17 th century; manuals
figur aus Gerard Ter Borchs “Die Väterliche Ermah-
nung,” thesis, Vienna 2008. I should mention for the became popular on how to write in different
record the dissertation by Fatma Yalçin, Anwesende
Abwesenheit. Untersuchungen zur Entwicklungsge- scripts for different languages and above all for
schichte von Bildern mit menschenleeren Räumen, different purposes. Here, too, the dialectic of
Rückenfiguren und Lauschern im Holland des 17. Jahr-
hunderts, Munich, Berlin 2004. (The dissertation falls cultural disciplining and subjectivity makes itself
short of even the minimum standards of a scholarly
piece of work; poor-quality copies whose attribution to
apparent: handwriting was seen quasi as the
Ter Borch had already been dismissed by Gudlaugs- outflowing of a person’s nature, yet the letter-
son and which in some cases date from the 18th cen-
tury are presented without discussion as originals by writer was required to practice at enormous
Ter Borch.) length and in an extremely regulated manner.850
848 Whereabouts unknown, last documented: N. Katz art
dealers, Basel 1948. Gudlaugsson (1959 – 60, 110 IIn) The ‘most personal’ is artificial.
attributes the work to Netscher and dates it to the pe-
riod 1656 – 69. On Netscher: Wieseman 2002. The woman seen in rear view, too, cor-
849 See, among others: Jäger 2008, p. 35 – 44. responded to an ideal that was no less firmly
850 Adams 2003. Adams rightly refers to the research by
Norbert Elias, The Civilizing Process (New York 1978 prescribed, both in her pose, which commu-
and 1982; see note 786 and to Herman Roodenburg’s
more recent investigation into comportment. We
might also mention the works by Luhmann and in par-
ticular by Foucault. On calligraphy, see also note 649. 289
nicates sophistication at the same time as passivity, and in her white satin dress,
in turn signaling purity and wealth in equal measure. Roodenburg shows how the
elite of Dutch society — not just the nobility but also, to a growing extent after 1650,
the upper middle class — consciously demarcated itself from the lower classes by self-
fashioning.851 The foundations for this trend were laid by books of conduct, starting with
Castiglione’s Il Cortegiano (1528) and Erasmus’s De civilitate morum puerilium (1530)
and followed by Stefano Guazzo’s La Civil Conversatione (1574) and still later works such
as Willem Goeree’s Natuurlyk en schilderkonstig ontwerp der menschkunde (Amsterdam
1682).852 The rules laid down by these advice and etiquette manuals should be seen as
linked not only with related discourses such as the writings of Jacob Cats and treatises
on physiognomics and painting (Van Mander, Hoogstraten, Lairesse), but in particular
with body practices, which led as a whole to a certain habitus.853 The language of the
body was considered natural and hence a guarantee of truthfulness.854 A central concept
was welstand, which might be translated as ‘upright conduct.’ It is illuminating to note
the gender-specific differentiations that were made between poses: a head inclined to
one side was inappropriate in a man855 but desirable for a woman as a sign of feminine
grace and humility. The slightly inclined head
of Ter Borch’s female figure in rear view corre
851 Herman Roodenburg, On ‘Swelling’ the Hips and
sponds to this ideal, as does her upright pose Crossing the Legs: Distinguishing Public and Private
in Paintings and Prints from the Dutch Golden Age, in:
as a whole. She is effectively a drapery figure Wheelock 2000, p. 64 – 84; Roodenburg 2004. Rood
who allows nothing to be seen of her body other enburg shows this in the concrete example of Con
stantijn Huygens, who, as a poet from the intellectual
than a tiny glimpse of neck above her high black elite and secretary to the Orange court, was a figure on
collar. Her satin dress with its flowing silhouette the border between aristocracy and the upper middle
class. As well as his biography and many letters, Huy-
is intended to betray as little wilfulness as pos gens left behind a diary in which he writes above all on
the education of his children.
sible. The white of the satin did not correspond 852 Guazzo’s book was translated into Dutch in as early as
to the actual fashion of the day, however. In por 1603, Il Cortegiano not until 1652. See also Nevitt 2003,
p. 71 ff.
traits, including those by Ter Borch, the white 853 Roodenburg deliberately employs this term by Bour
dieu in order to demonstrate how, through discourses
fabric is visible only through a slit in a black and performative acts, certain poses and gestures be-
overdress.856 Altogether, in other words: an ideal come internalized and thereby indeed part of our nature,
as it were.
shell of femininity. 854 See also Kapp 1990, esp. p. 47.
855 Huygens was prepared to submit his son Constan-
tijn, whose neck had grown at a crooked angle, to a
Despite its inscription within traditions dangerous operation. See: Roodenburg 2000, p. 64 f.;
id., 2004, p. 78.
and codes (governing the pictures, letters and 856 Kettering 1997, p. 103.
female figure), Hoogstraten’s picture stimulates 857 Figures in rear view are a favorite theme of Netherlan-
dish painting: from the small figures looking out into
the imagination of the viewer and awakens the landscape in Jan van Eyck’s Rolin Madonna and the
people inside the church in the Requiem Mass in the
multiple associations. Turin Book of Hours, to Pieter Bruegel the Elder and
the church interiors of de Witte, among others.
858 Johann Wolfgang Goethe, as is well known, incorpo-
rated Wille’s engraving after Ter Borch into his Elec
tive Affinities, where it is performed as a tableau vivant.
(J. W. Goethe, Werke, Hamburg edition, edited by E.
Trunz, Munich 1982, vol. 6, part 2, ch. 5, p. 393 f.). One
290 of the spectators calls out: “Tournez s’il vous plaît!”
This is achieved first of all through the conception of the female figure. Her
upright pose conveys no affects of any kind, even though we know (from the love letter
theme) that affects are in play. Through the elimination of the letter, indeed, Hoogstraten
demands that we exercise our imagination in order to ‘see’ the woman as reading a letter
at all. A figure in rear view, moreover, is a figure of projection par excellence.857 Denied all
sight of her facial expression, viewers can place their own fantasies upon this empty shell
of femininity. A figure seen from behind is also one that arouses our curiosity and our
desire 858, in particular since we know that the invisible letter is a love letter.
The viewer’s imagination is also set in motion by the configuration of the picture
as a whole. We project our own thoughts and emotions into these empty rooms and
onto the picture within the picture. The many moralizing interpretations that read the
work as a warning against erotic excess and as a call to virtue mirror the fixations of
certain art historians.859 Depending on how we perceive the relationship between the
three rooms and semanticize the objects portrayed (shoes, closed book 860, extinguished
candle 861, etc.), multilayered axes of meaning arise. We can sense a dangerous tension
between the first room, devoted to housework,
and the last, the room of love, seduction and
(“Please turn round!”), documenting both the fascina-
tion of the rear view and at the same time the aware- desire; we can read the spatial segments and
ness that the fulfilment of this request would destroy
the illusion. On the topicality of this problem: Klaus
the corresponding objects as antitheses.862 The
Krüger, Der Blick ins Innere des Bildes. Ästhetische rooms can also be interpreted as portraits of
Illusion bei Gerhard Richter, in: Pantheon 53, 1995,
p. 149 – 166. real rooms, as those of a bourgeois home in
859 Thus Gerhard Langemeyer (exh. cat. Stillleben in Eu which a picture with an erotic subject hangs and
ropa, Westfälisches Landesmuseum Münster 1979),
Vanessa Betinck (portfolio on the picture Dutch Interi lends the interior new meaning. Another way of
or by C. Bisshop, attributed by her to Hendrik van den
Burgh, Berlin 1982), Bettina Werche (exh. cat. Frank- reading the composition is to see it as a step-
furt a. M. 1993) and Jacques Foucart (in a Louvre hand- by-step initiation from the space occupied by
out of 1996). On the discussion of these moralizing
interpretations: Hammer-Tugendhat 2000 (Kunst der the viewer into the realm of art, from the banal
Imagination), esp. p. 139 – 141.
860 The book is not further specified, neither as a bible, a to the ‘sublime’ and to love. Our imagination
scholarly tome, nor as light reading; in addition, it is may tempt us to suspect that the ‘real’ scene
shut. I have suggested (2000, p. 148 f.) reading it in
terms of a paragone between painting and poetry: the lies behind the door, perhaps in the form of a
book remains closed, the letter invisible, whereas the
picture is open, the picture speaks: ut pictura poesis.
bed in which the anticipated prospect suggested
861 To interpret the extinguished candle exclusively as a by the painting on the wall is actually taking
vanitas symbol, as a reference to a wanton lifestyle,
seems dubious. Extinguished candles are found in place — but this we can neither see nor know.
countless Dutch genre paintings which may certainly Perhaps the picture is about a seduction. Not
not be read as allusions to unchastity. I know of no lit
candles in pictures set in daylight. a seduction through the amorous petitions
862 Illustrating antitheses via the semantics of things is
typical of Hoogstraten. We might consider his 1654 of a man who is physically present, however,
Trompe-l’oeil Still Life with Letter in Kromeriz, in which but through a letter. Seduction through a text,
the objects depicted contrast the liturgical with the se-
cular sphere, or more accurately the vita contemplativa through words. A woman is being wooed in the
with the vita activa. Hana Seifertová, Augenbetrüger
und ihre Motivation im 17. Jahrhundert. Zur Ausstel-
lung ‘Das Stillleben und sein Gegenstand,’ in: Dresd-
ner Kunstblätter 1984, 1, p. 49 – 56. 291
picture, while at the same time the viewer is also being seduced, not by words but by the
picture.863
Hoogstraten has thus done his utmost to trigger different associations. At

the same time, however, he reflects the imaginary and affective power of painting with
pictorial means.
Stoichita has described the door as a symbol of the self-reflection of Dutch
interior painting. In painting as in artistic theory, the doorkijkje — the view through a
doorway — became a metaphor of painting.864 The art of painting opens doors, allows
the invisible to become visible — this is what Hoogstraten’s painting shows. But what
we see is again ‘merely’ a picture. The viewer, looking into the picture from the threshold,
is simultaneously inside and outside the picture. Moreover, the fragmentation of almost
every object makes us conscious that we cannot see everything. The picture also reflects
its own ‘outside’: the light streaming in from outside the picture points to a real world
beyond the canvas.
Through all these artistic strategies, viewers are made aware that they are looking
at a picture and hence that all their imaginings are their own imaginings. The mirror
beside the picture reflects nothing; it is we who semanticize it.
Hoogstraten would have been perfectly capable of such a reflection upon his
medium. He was one of the few Dutch artists who wrote a treatise on painting: Inleyding
tot de Hooge Schoole der Schilderkonst: Anders de Zichtbaere Werelt (‘Introduction to the
academy of painting, or the visible world’) (1678). In the first book of his treatise, in a chapter
on the aim of painting (“What it is and what it produces”), he defines painting thus:
De Schilderkonst is een wetenschap, om alle ideen, ofte denkbeelden, die

de gansche zichtbaere natuer kan geven, te verbeelden: en met omtrek en
verwe het oog te bedriegen. (Painting is a science, in order to depict all the
ideas, or mental images, that the whole of visible Nature can give; and to
deceive the eye with contours and colours.)865
Hoogstraten does not speak of all the phenomena or objects in nature, but of ideas
and mental images.
The Slippers is also a reflection upon art’s new location: the private home.866
It is more than just another painting of a Dutch interior: insofar as Hoogstraten re
duces his composition to rooms devoid of human occupants and to a panel picture
on the wall, he addresses the new location and the function of bourgeois painting per
se. The panel picture in the private sphere allows a new quality of reception: an entirely
292
personal one. This reception can be compared with that of reading a novel. In the case
of 18th century literature, Koschorke argues that absorption in reading a novel was the
most private, most personal and also the most isolating form of reading and served to
heighten the individual’s powers of imagination.867
Coda
In hindsight, we can observe an evolution in the representation of emotions:

starting with the Baroque versions of the love-letter theme by Dirck Hals, in which — still
in the tradition of rhetoric — the body voices what is taking place in the soul, affect
representation becomes concentrated within the face in the work of Rembrandt. Via
the interiorization of emotion in the paintings of Metsu, Ter Borch and Vermeer (the
latter two largely renouncing even the allego
rical device of the picture within the picture),
863 Dutch texts of this same period describe how sensual the path leads to Hoogstraten, who portrays
feelings and lust are aroused via the eye — an effect
admired by some and condemned as immoral by no people at all and thus no affects. Emotions
others. As Sluijter writes in his analysis of 17th century become invisible, they get internalized and
Dutch treatises on painting (1991, p. 188, 204 f., note
74), this issue arose in particular in the context of pic- ultimately migrate into the recipient.
tures of seduction scenes which usually center upon
a young woman. Sluijter (ibid.) quotes van der Venne:
“The eye is never satisfied, desire never quenched, as Emotions can thus be represented in
long as one is involved in art and love.” This analogy
between love and art with regard to desire was thus manifold ways and not just, as one might per
also contemplated at the intellectual level. haps assume, through physical gestures and
864 Stoichita (1998, p. 5 4) refers to the title page of
Philip Angel’s 1642 Lof der Schilder-Konst, in which facial expressions. Rather, emotions can also
the personification of Pictura holds a panel showing a
dorkijkje (ill.: ibid., p. 54). be represented, or more accurately evoked, via
865 Hoogstraten 1678 (1969), p. 24–25. Hans-Jörg Czech, allegorical references such as pictures within
Im Geleit der Musen. Studien zu Samuel van Hoog
stratens Malereitraktat Inleyding tot de Hooge Schoole pictures, via semantically charged objects and
der Schilderkonst: Anders de Zichtbaere Werelt, Müns-
ter 2002 (Niederlande-Studien 27); Hans-Jörg Czech, appropriate aesthetic structures.
Klassizismus mit niederländischem Antlitz. Fundie-
rung und Propagierung im kunsttheoretischen Werk
von Samuel van Hoogstraten, in: Ekkehard Mai (ed.), This development could not be revers-
Holland nach Rembrandt. Zur niederländischen
Kunst zwischen 1670 und 1750, Cologne, Weimar, Vien
ed. To compress it into a concept of linear
na 2006, p. 97 – 118; Weststeijn 2006. progression, however, would be an injustice to
866 Stoichita 1998, p. 44 – 53 and p. 159 f. Pictures of inte
riors were created for interiors and reflected the inte- the artistic complexity of its forms of expression.
rior. See Part II, Chapter 4, note 723. Barely later than Dirck Hals, and most likely
867 Koschorke 1999, esp. p. 169 ff.
868 Both artists lived in Amsterdam. Duyster died influenced by him, Pieter Codde and Willem
young of the plague (1589/99 – 1635) and left behind
only a small oeuvre (approx. 35 paintings). Codde Cornelisz. Duyster produced their own love-
(1599 – 1678), although he lived to a greater age, also letter pictures, in which they appear to anticipate
produced his best works in the 1630s and 1640s.
He was also active as a poet. Both painted primarily the ideas of the second half of the century.868
small-figural genre scenes, Codde chiefly Merry Com
panies with music and dance, Duyster guardroom
scenes (cortegaardjes). The only monograph on these
two highly interesting artists of which I am aware 293
Fig. 140: Pieter Codde, A Woman Seated at a Virginal with a Letter, panel, early 1630s, Boston, priv. coll.
Fig. 141: Willem Duyster, Woman with a Letter and a Man, early 1630s, panel, Copenhagen, Statens
Museum for Kunst
The notion of employing a figure seen in rear view for the love-letter theme was one
that Codde conceived in the early 1630s (fig. 140). The woman is seated motionless at the
virginal, her body at an angle to the keyboard, the letter she has clearly just read held in
the hand hanging down by her side. We are given no information as to the contents of
the letter or her emotional state. But her pose, with her head slightly bowed, the painting
on the wall of a pallid landscape disappearing into nothingness, the viola da gamba set
to one side with a black, almost transparent
veil draped over the carved boss at its upper
is the dissertation by Caroline Bigler Playter, Willem
end, and the dark, eerie shadow on the far wall, Duyster and Pieter Codde: The ‘Duystere Werelt’ of
seem to promise nothing good. The affectively Dutch Genre Painting, c. 1625 – 1635, Harvard Univer
sity 1972; unfortunately, I have not had access to this
charged but unexplained scene in Duyster’s work. See also: exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003,
p. 84 – 89; Franits 2004, p. 57 – 64. In this context we
version (fig. 141) can be seen in turn as a step must also mention Esaias van de Velde, who — even
towards Ter Borch’s psychologically complex if his surviving oeuvre contains no paintings of let-
ters — developed complex psychological relationships
paintings. between the figures in the Merry Companies in open-air
settings which he produced as early as the 1620s, years
during which he was based in Haarlem. See: Nevitt
This ‘simultaneity of the nonsimulta- 2003, esp. p. 57 – 65. Nevitt has rightly described the
artist as a source for Ter Borch.
neous’ (Die Gleichzeitigkeit des Ungleichzeiti 869 See especially Reinhart Koselleck, Vergangene Zu-
gen)869 is also true of the age of Vermeer and kunft. Zur Semantik geschichtlicher Zeiten, Frankfurt
a. M. 1979, esp. p. 125 f., 132, 137, 154, 323 ff., 336, 367.
the late 17 th century. Here we find different and 870 Jennifer Montagu, The Expression of the Passions.
The Origin and Influence of Charles le Brun’s Confé
rence sur l’expression générale et particulière, New Ha-
ven, London 1994; Thomas Kirchner, L’expression des
294 passions: Ausdruck als Darstellungsproblem in der
Fig. 142: Charles Le Brun,
Conférence sur l´expression
générale et particulière des
passions, 1687
indeed contradictory representations of the affects, albeit not under the same conditions
in the same country. Alongside its Dutch versions, Baroque affect rhetoric continued to
flourish in particular in the Catholic countries of the Counter-Reformation, namely Italy,
Germany and Austria. In France, meanwhile, Charles le Brun, court artist and director of
the Académie Royale, in 1668 presented his theories on the passions and their expression,
which he illustrated with drawings of the human face exhibiting a range of different
affects (fig. 142).870 The facial expressions corres
ponding to each human passion were to be
französischen Kunst und Kunsttheorie des 17. und 18.
Jahrhunderts, Mainz 1991; Lars Olof Larsson, Der Ma- systematized. But this fixing of emotion led
ler als Erzähler. Gebärdensprache und Mimik in der to its stylization and extinction: frozen masks
französischen Malerei und Kunsttheorie des 17. Jahr-
hunderts am Beispiel Charles Le Bruns, in: Kapp 1990, appear in place of powerfully expressive faces.
p. 173 – 189.
871 Politicians, as well as the Catholic Church, deliber
The aim was clear: the human passions were
ately used a strategy based on rhetoric to control the to be banished by reason. Speaking here is the
affects of their subjects. Thus Jean-François Senault,
for example, in the dedication to Richelieu accompa- power discourse of the French court.871 Le Brun
nying his book De l’usage des passions (1641), wrote: drew extensively upon Descartes’s Passions of
“But what I particularly admire about your conduct,
and what renders it closer to the resemblance of that the Soul in his characterization of the individual
of God, is that, captivating men by their passions, you
make them serve your own designs, without their real affects. Decartes’s ideas were subsequently re
izing it.” Translated here from Thomas Kirchner, ‘De ceived for the most part in this same sense and
l’usage des passions.’ Die Emotionen bei Künstler,
Kunstwerk und Betrachter, in: Herding, Stumpfhaus consequently misunderstood. But Descartes had
2004, p. 357 – 377, here: p. 364. Closely related, too, are
the writings of the Spanish Jesuit Baltasar Gracián:
Oráculo manual y arte de prudencia (1647), see ibid.
p. 364. 295
expressly pointed out the problematic relationship between the human interior and its
exterior.872 He was fundamentally skeptical about the metaphor of the ‘mirror’ and about
the idea that perception could be identified with objective being.873 Le Brun’s theories,
on the other hand, belonged to the discourse on physiognomics.874 The physiognomic
discourse sought to recognize, name, codify, typologize and standardize a person’s
inner truth from his or her outward appearance. Le Brun is closer to Giambattista della
Porta — the most important physiognomist of the Renaissance, whose own book on the
subject brought together older writings from Antiquity, Arab tradition and the Middle
Ages — than to Descartes. The phantasm of control, and the desire to know what goes
on inside another person, make themselves felt, too, in Le Brun’s systematic drawings.
These faces each visualize one affect, and one affect only, which is clearly defined by
means of specific elements (movement of the eyebrows etc.). As such, they could not
be further from Rembrandt’s late portraits, which seek to convey the depth, complexity
and indefinability of human emotion. They are equally far removed from the approach
adopted by Ter Borch and by Vermeer. Vermeer seems to me the antithesis, so to speak,
of this physiognomic discourse. His art stands for the affirmation of the individual, whose
presence is made tangible simply as presence,
but whose secrets are not named and hence
872 Descartes 1989, Art. 113 (About actions of the eyes and
not divulged. Perhaps the poetry of Vermeer’s face): “But although these actions are easily perceived,
and what they mean is known, that does not make it
pictures also lies in this acceptance of the pri easy to describe them, because each of them is com-
vacy of the human psyche. Through his artistic posed of many changes taking place in the movement
and shape of the eyes, so singular and slight that there
articulation of this withholding of information, is no perceiving each of them separately, even though
Vermeer bestows privacy, intimacy and what results from their conjunction may be quite easy
to recognize. Almost the same can be said of the ac-
subjectivity.875 tions of the face […] they differ so little that there are
men who have almost the same look when they cry as
others when they laugh. It is true that there are some
The aforementioned positions are the that are quite recognizable, like a wrinkled forehead in
anger and certain movements of the nose and lips in
various, conflicting responses and attitudes indignation and mockery, but they do not seem to be
natural so much as voluntary. And in general all the
to one and the same phenomenon: to actions of both the face and the eyes can be changed
individualization and privatization, within which by the soul, when, willing to conceal its passion, it
forcefully imagines one in opposition to it; thus one
the face stands at the center of observation by can use them to dissimulate one’s passions as well as
to manifest them.”
the self and by the other.876 The question of 873 Here we may name first and foremost Descartes’s
the relationship between inside and outside, studies on optics (La dioptrique); Summers 2003, esp.
p. 21 – 26.
between soul / mind / psyche and body, between 874 On physiognomics: Courtine, Haroche 1994; Claudia
inner ‘truth’ and deceptive appearance — this Schmölders, Das Vorurteil im Leibe. Eine Einführung
in die Physiognomik, Berlin 1995; Campe, Schneider
question was not new. It has been asked since 1996 (with extensive bibliography); Claudia Schmöl
ders (ed.), Der exzentrische Blick. Gespräch über
Antiquity, for example, by Euripides’s Medea: Physiognomik, Berlin 1996; Petra Löffler (ed.), Das
Gesicht ist eine starke Organisation, Cologne 2004.
875 Aleida and Jan Assmann write in the introduction to
their book Geheimnis und Öffentlichkeit (Schleier und
Schwelle, vol. 1, Munich 1997, p. 8), with reference to
Georg Simmel: “People use withheld knowledge to
distance themselves from each other; this applies not
296 just to individuals — without this principle of withheld
O Zeus! why hast thou granted unto man clear signs to know the sham
in gold, while on man’s brow no brand is stamped whereby to gauge the
villain’s heart? 877
The reliability of signs had likewise been discussed in the Middle Ages, too; here
the debate concerned primarily the contradiction between the Christian theological
belief the outer is the opposite of the inner and the courtly motto the outer is the re
flection of the inner.878
In the early modern period, however, these questions were asked afresh and
with greater urgency within an altered framework. If we are to come closer to writing
a history of emotions 879 from the point of view of Kulturwissenschaften, what we need
here is a broader-scale interdisciplinary research project. It would explore, among other
things, how affect and body are experienced and interpreted in the fields of medicine,
philosophy, didactics (didaxis) and theology as well as the arts and social and economic
developments. Such a project would need to consider, as already indicated, the differ-
ences in the media and discourses of the day.
It should address the contradictions that
knowledge, there would be no intimacy, no privacy and
no personality based upon them […].” arose out of the different heritage of classical
876 Courtine, Haroche 1994, e. g. p. 10: “To express oneself,
to keep silent, to discover oneself, to mask oneself: the-
medicine and philosophy on the one hand,
se paradoxes of the face are those of the individual […].” and the Christian theological concept of the
877 Euripides, Medea II, 516 – 519. Cited here in the English
translation by E. Coleridge; http://classics.mit.edu// body and soul on the other, and examine the
Euripides/medea.html, retrieved June 14, 2012. consequences of these contradictions for their
878 Horst Wenzel, ‘Des menschen muot wont in den
ougen.’ Höfische Kommunikation im Raum der wech- evaluation of affects. It would need to devote
selseitigen Wahrnehmung, in: Campe, Schneider
1996, p. 65 – 98. See also: Caroline Walker Bynum, Did greater study to the various topoi, i.e. the places
the Twelfth Century Discover the Individual?, in: Wal- where affects were discussed, within which
ker Bynum, Jesus as Mother: Studies in the Spirituality
of the High Middle Ages, Berkeley 1982, p. 82 – 109; framework and with what moral and ideological
Barbara Rosenwein, Y avait-il un ‘moi’ au haut Moyen
Age?, in: Revue historique CCCVII/1, p. 31 – 51. concepts.880 In theological treatises, books of
879 It goes without saying that this could only be a history conduct, and indeed in writings by philosophers
of discourses and representations on emotions; it is im-
possible to reconstruct the feelings of the people of concerned with reason and knowledge, emo
earlier times.
880 As regards the Middle Ages, the differences and the
tions were of course talked about in a different,
overlaps in the way emotions are evaluated within one more moral, normative fashion than was the
society, e. g. between Christian-theological and aristo-
cratic court circles, have been spotlighted above all by case in art.881 The fine arts would in turn need
Barbara Rosenwein. See also: Lutter 2007; Christina to be given proper consideration in terms of
Lutter, ‘Wunderbare Geschichten’. Frömmigkeitsvor-
stellungen und -praxis in miracula des 12. Jahrhun- their own semantic potential and not — as is
derts, in: Jörg Rogge (ed.), Religiöse Ordnungsvorstel-
lungen und Frömmigkeitspraxis im Hoch- und Spät- almost exclusively the case among art histo
mittelalter, Memmingen 2008, p. 41 – 61. rians — explained through linguistic discourses,
881 See Bachorski’s observations on the literature of the
16th century (1991, p. 528): “What, for example, ap- normative writings, rhetorics and treatises
pears in treatises simply as an expression of sexual
drive that needs to be quelled, takes center stage in
countless numbers of farces as Lust, who triumphs
over all the laws of the Church, Judiciary and State.” 297
on art. Indeed, the respective tensions and areas of overlap between the fields and
disciplines could be precisely where important insights are to be gained. In the case of
the arts, it would be imperative to include music and dance as well as the visual and
linguistic media.882 The differences and interdependences between the courtly discourse
and the discourse starting at that time within the upper middle class would also need
to be investigated. Outward self-representation indisputably began to be doubted even
within the aristocratic milieu, too 883 ; on the other hand, the bourgeois discourse cannot
be characterized simply as the search for the inner self and for ‘natural’ feelings. The
Dutch bourgeoisie appropriated books of courtly etiquette; the ‘naturalness’ of feelings
was based on codifications and — as we have seen — was indeed only brought forth by
corresponding discourses and acquired by education. The influence of Protestantism on
the affect discourse in contrast to Counter-Reformationist Catholicism would similarly
need to be analyzed. In order to comprehend the specific nature of Dutch pictures, Dutch
contemporary literature should also be incorporated within the field of study, and it goes
without saying that the investigation into painting should be broadened to include other
motifs, themes and artists.
It is nevertheless possible to identify a number of aspects that deserve closer

investigation. Within the changes that took place in the framework, there are two in par
ticular that link the 17 th century with our own and which offer a parallel, as it were, to our
situation today. These changes concern medicine/neurobiology and media technology,
and they shed light on the interplay between the emotional and other areas and social
practices, and likewise on the ways in which emotions are culturally shaped. In the 17 th
century, the discovery of the circulation of the blood by William Harvey (1628) delivered
a fundamental blow to the medical thought that had informed the view of the workings
of the human body ever since Antiquity, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. This new
medical knowledge cast into question not just the humoral pathology of the past, but
also the entire system of analogies built up around it — the analogies between humans
and other living creatures and between humans and the stars — and the notion of the
mirroring relationship between the inner and outer self. With its correspondences, the
astro-biological paradigm had linked medicine with affect theory, rhetoric, physiognomics
and morality. With the emergence of a medicine oriented toward the natural sciences,
the body was divorced from the soul, despiritualized, demystified. Descartes incorpo
rated Harvey’s discoveries into his philosophy and firmly separated body and soul. The
relationship between inner and outer, between individual psyche and visible and legible
bodily signs now assumed a different and more complex form and had to be defined anew.
In our own day, new medical findings within neurobiology are radicalizing the discussion
about the relationship between physis and psyche and hence about emotions.
298
The effects of media revolutions upon the psyche are probably no less far-
reaching. The impact of the end of rhetoric and of increased alphabetization upon
the change in the culture of emotion, and the emergence of sensibility over the course
of the 18th century, have been described by numerous authors.884 Currently, new
media with their technologies and overpowering strategies are transforming not only
communication, but indisputably, too, the affective life of the individual. Research in
the sphere of neurobiology and the revolutionizing of media technologies have probably
contributed to the fact that the affect discourse (after a long hiatus) is today once again
flourishing so vigorously. To understand and make a critical assessment of the current
situation, it would be illuminating to compare today’s discourse with the discourses
of the 17 th century. It is thereby particularly revealing to identify their differences: thus
in the 17 th century, for example, the affects were always discussed in conjunction with
ethical questions. We, on the other hand, talk about whether and how feelings are
culturally coded and shaped — questions that were quite literally inconceivable in the
anthropological discourse of the 17 th century. Looking at the past in this cultural-historical
light makes it possible for us to see our own present in sharper outline, to grasp more
clearly the possibilities and limits of our current debates, and to identify which disciplines
are currently considered competent to concern themselves with the emotions, and with
what paradigms.885
It is my plea that cultural studies (Kultur

th
882 In the 17 century, too, music was considered a power- wissenschaften), centered upon language and
fully affective artistic genre. See Grimm 2000. It is sig- literature, should finally embrace the visual
nificant that musical instruments should make a pro-
minent appearance in so many Dutch genre pictures. media within their research horizons. In the
883 Explicitly, for example, in La Rochefoucauld, see: Man-
fred Schneider, La Rochefoucauld: Die Lesbarkeit des present case, this visual medium is painting. In
Trugs, in: Campe, Schneider 1996, p. 267 – 281. The Dutch painting in the second half of 17 th century,
experience of the human interior as “closed, inacces-
sible and unfathomable,” however, is already found in forms of representation were developed that
Shakespeare’s Hamlet, there as the painful opposite
to the court persona; see: Aleida Assmann, ‘An we describe emotions as complex, individual and
had the trick to see’t.’ Geheimnis and Neugierde in invisible and transpose them into the inner
Shakespeares Hamlet, in: Aleida and Jan Assmann
(eds.), Geheimnis und Neugierde (Schleier und subject. Scholars in the sphere of literature,
Schwelle, vol. 3), Munich 1999, p. 210 – 221. Klaus Rei-
chert (Hamlets Falle. Das Paradox der Kultiviertheit,
sociology and the humanities usually date
in: Klaus Reichert, Der fremde Shakespeare, Munich, this withdrawal into the inner self to the 18th
Vienna 1998, p. 57 – 86) has shown that Hamlet had still
found no language to articulate his private feelings. It century and thereby concentrate primarily
might be said that, half a century after Shakespeare, upon France, Germany and England. Holland is
Vermeer and his artist colleagues found a ‘language’
for this in Dutch culture, where the bourgeois private disregarded. The new inwardness and sensibility
sphere was already clearly defined.
884 Campe 1990; Koschorke 1999; Roger Chartier, Lesen went hand in hand with the development of
und Schreiben in Europa, Munich 1999, all with exten- the bourgeoisie, which was demonstrably most
sive bibliographies.
885 The frameworks stipulated by certain disciplines vary advanced in Holland in the 17 th century. Forms
greatly and to a large extent determine the ways that
feelings can be talked about. In place of philosophy,
first amongst these disciplines today are neurobiology,
psychology, sociology and media studies. 299
of interiority, only palpable in literature from the beginning of the 18th century, can already
be found in the late paintings by Rembrandt and in the works of Ter Borch, Vermeer and
Hoogstraten. The paintings of women reading love letters in interior settings make visible
what scholars 886 describe as the interrelation between bourgeois privacy, epistolary cul
ture, intimacy and affect modeling.887 Hoogstraten in turn reflects this interplay in the
medium of painting.
Dutch painting, which seems so mimetic, is neither the mere description of visible
reality nor the reflection of social reality. Instead, it opens up new possibilities and spaces
of affective culture and imagination. Dutch painting of the 17 th century thus made an
active contribution to the formation of modern subjectivity.888
886 See above all Koschorke 1999, who considers the

change in the culture of feeling to be “linked with the
spread of a standard of literacy that had a previous-
ly unattained depth of impact” (p. 12) and identifies
a new code of intimacy “whose technical prerequi
site is the written form of communication: the letter.”
(p. 175) Through private absorption in reading (letters,
novels), the power of imagination is increased (see
p. 298, for example).
887 Since the motif of reading a love letter is symptom
atic, it seems to me legitimate to raise the question
of affect modeling in the example of this — admittedly
limited — theme.
888 On the difficult definition of the term ‘subjectivity,’ on
the question of a history of the self and of the percep
tion of the self as an individual, and on the relationship
between subjectivity and the imaginary: Charles Taylor,
Sources of the Self. The Making of the Modern Identi-
ty, Cambridge 1992; Reto Luzius Fetz (ed.), Geschichte
und Vorgeschichte der modernen Subjektivität, Berlin
1998, esp. the essay by Roland Hagenbüchle, Sub-
jektivität: Eine historisch-systematische Hinführung,
p. 1 – 79; Hans-Georg Soeffner, Thomas Luckmann, Die
Objektivität des Subjektiven. G. Ungeheuers Entwurf
einer Theorie kommunikativen Handelns, in: Ronald
Hitzler (ed.), Hermeneutische Wissenssoziologie:
Standpunkte zur Theorie der Interpretation, Cons-
tance 1999, p. 171 – 185; Rudolf Behrens (ed.), Ord-
nungen des Imaginären. Theorien der Imagination in
funktionsgeschichtlicher Sicht. Beiheft der Zeitschrift
für Ästhetik und allgemeine Kunstwissenschaft, Ham-
burg 2002.
Part II: Plates 9 –14
Frans van Mieris
Woman before the Mirror, c. 1670
Jan Vermeer
Woman Holding a Balance, c. 1664
Gabriel Metsu
Woman Reading a Letter, c. 1664 – 67
Jan Vermeer
Woman Reading a Letter at an Open Window,
c. 1657
Jan Vermeer
Woman in Blue Reading a Letter, c. 1662 – 64
Samuel van Hoogstraten

The Slippers, 1658 – 60
301
Plate 9: Frans van Mieris, Woman before
the Mirror, c. 1670, panel, 43 / 31.5 cm
Munich, Alte Pinakothek
302
Plate 10: Jan Vermeer, Woman Holding a
Balance, c. 1664, canvas, 42.5 / 38 cm
Washington, D. C., Widener Collection,
303
Plate 11: Gabriel Metsu, Woman Reading a
Letter, c. 1664 – 67, panel, 52.5 / 40.2 cm
Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland
304
Plate 12: Jan Vermeer, Woman Reading a Letter at an
Open Window, c. 1657, canvas, 83 / 64.5 cm
Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister
305
Plate 13: Jan Vermeer, Woman in Blue Reading a
Letter, c. 1662 – 64, canvas, 46.5 / 39 cm
306
Plate 14: Samuel van Hoogstraten, The Slippers,
1658 – 60, canvas, 103 / 70 cm, Paris, Louvre
307
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Exhibition catalogs
Exh. cat. Amsterdam 1976: Tot lering en vermaak. Betekenissen van Hollandse genrevoorstellingen
uit de zeventiende eeuw, edited by Eddy de Jongh, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam
Exh. cat. Amsterdam 1997: Mirror of Everyday Life. Genreprints in the Netherlands 1550 – 1700, edi-
ted by Eddy de Jongh, Ger Luijten, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam
Exh. cat. Amsterdam, London 2000: Rembrandt the Printmaker, edited by Erik Hinterding, Ger
Luiten, Martin Royalton Kisch, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, British Museum London
Exh. cat. Berlin 1991: Rembrandt. Der Meister und seine Werkstatt, edited by Christopher Brown,
Jan Kelch, Pieter van Thiel, Gemäldegalerie Berlin
Exh. cat. Berlin 2006: Rembrandt. Ein Virtuose der Druckgraphik, edited by Holm Bevers, Jasper
Kettner, Gudula Metze, Kupferstichkabinett Staatliche Museen Berlin
Exh. cat. Berlin 2006: Rembrandt. Genie auf der Suche, edited by Ernst van de Wetering, Jan
Kelch, Gemäldegalerie Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
Exh. cat. Berlin 2007: Das abc der Bilder, edited by Moritz Wullen in collaboration with Andrea
Müller, Anne Schulten and Marc Wilken, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin in collaboration
with the Hermann von Helmholtz-Zentrum für Kulturtechnik Berlin
Exh. cat. Berlin, London, Philadelphia 1984: Masters of Seventeenth-Century Dutch Genre
Painting, edited by Peter C. Sutton, Gemäldegalerie Berlin, Royal Academy of Arts,
London, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
Exh. cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C. 1995: Johannes Vermeer, edited by Arthur K. Wheelock,
Mauritshuis, The Hague, National Gallery of Art, Washington,t D. C.
Exh. cat. The Hague, Washington, D. C. 2005 /06: Frans van Mieris. 1635 – 1681, edited by
Quentin Buvelot, Mauritshuis, The Hague, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D. C.
Exh. cat. Denver, Newark 2001: Art and Home. Dutch Interiors in the Age of Rembrandt, edited by
Mariet Westermann, Denver Art Museum, The Newark Museum
Exh. cat. Dublin, Greenwich 2003: Love Letters. Dutch Genre Paintings in the Age of Vermeer,
edited by Peter C. Sutton, Lisa Vergara, Ann Jensen Adams in collaboration with
Jennifer Kilian and Marjorie E. Wieseman, Bruce Museum of Arts and Science,
Greenwich, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin
Exh. cat. Düsseldorf 1995: Die Galerie der starken Frauen. Die Heldin in der französischen und
italienischen Kunst des 17. Jahrhunderts, edited by Bettina Baumgärtel and Silvia
Neysters, Kunstmuseum Düsseldorf, Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt
Exh. cat. Edinburgh, London 2001: Rembrandt‘s Women, edited by Julia Lloyd Williams,
National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, Royal Academy of Arts London, Munich,
London, New York
Exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M. 1993: Leselust. Niederländische Malerei von Rembrandt bis Vermeer,
edited by Sabine Schulze, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt a. M.
328
Exh. cat. Frankfurt a. M. 1998: Innenleben. Die Kunst des Interieurs. Vermeer bis Kabakov,
Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt a. M.
Exh. cat. Haarlem 1988: Schutters in Holland: Kracht en zenuwen van de stad, edited by
M. Carasso-Kok, J. Levy-van Halm, Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem
Exh. cat. London, The Hague 1999: Rembrandt by Himself, edited by Christopher White,
Quentin Buvelot, National Gallery, London, Royal Cabinet of Paintings, The Hague
Exh. cat. Melbourne, Canberra 1997 – 1998: Rembrandt. A Genius and his Impact, edited by
Albert Blankert, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, National Gallery of Australia,
Canberra
Exh. cat. Minneapolis, Washington, D. C. 1991: Rembrandt’s Lucretias, edited by Arthur K.

Wheelock Jr., George Keyes, The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, National Gallery of Art,
Washington, D. C.
Exh. cat. Münster 1974: Gerard Ter Borch, Zwolle 1617 — Deventer 1681, Landesmuseum Münster
Exh. cat. Nijmegen 1985: Tussen heks en heilige. Het vrouwbeeld op de drempel van de moderne
tijd, 15de / 16de eeuw, edited by Petty Bange, Nijmeegs Museum Commanderie van
Sint-Jan, Nijmegen
Exh. cat. Tokyo, Hamburg 1999: Rhetorik der Leidenschaft: Zur Bildsprache der Kunst im Abendland.
Meisterwerke aus der Graphischen Sammlung Albertina und aus der Portraitsammlung
der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek, edited by Ilsebill Barta Fliedl, Kokuritsu-Seiyo--
Bijutsukan, National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe,
Hamburg
Exh. cat. Washington, D. C., New York 2005: Gerard ter Borch, edited by Arthur K. Wheelock,
National Gallery of Art Washington, D. C., American Federation of Arts, New York
Exh. cat. Vienna 1992: Die Beredsamkeit des Leibes. Zur Körpersprache in der Kunst, edited by
lsebill Barta Fliedl, Christoph Geissmar, Albertina Vienna, Salzburg, Vienna
Exh. cat. Vienna 2004: Rembrandt, edited by Klaus Albrecht Schröder, Marian Bisanz-Prakken
Albertina, Vienna
Collection catalogs
Coll. cat. Munich 2006: Alte Pinakothek. Holländische und deutsche Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts,
text by Marcus Dekiert, edited by Bayrische Staatsgemäldesammlungen Munich
Coll. cat. Washington D. C. 1995: Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century (The Collection of
the National Gallery of Art. Systematic Catalog), edited by Arthur Wheelock, National
Gallery of Art Washington, D. C.
329
Illustrations
S. 161: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait, c. 1657, panel, 49.2 /41 cm, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum
Pl. 1: Rembrandt, Bathsheba, 1654, canvas, 142 /142 cm, Paris, Louvre, bpk Bildarchiv
Preußischer Kulturbesitz
Pl. 2: Rembrandt, A Woman in Bed, c. 1645 – 49, canvas, 81.1 /67.8 cm, Edinburgh, National
Gallery of Scotland, photograph: Antonia Reeve
Pl. 3: Rembrandt, Susanna, 1636, panel, 47.5 /39 cm, The Hague, Mauritshuis, akg-images
Pl. 4: Rembrandt, Diana and her Nymphs Bathing, with Actaeon and Callisto, 1634, canvas,
73.5 /93.5 cm, Anholt, Museum Wasserburg Anholt
Pl. 5: Rembrandt, Lucretia, 1664, canvas, 116/99 cm, Washington, D. C., National Gallery of Art
Pl. 6: Rembrandt, Lucretia, 1666, canvas, 110.17 /92.28 cm, Minneapolis, Institute of Arts,
The William Hood Dunwoody Fund
Pl. 7: Rembrandt, De Staalmeesters (The Syndics), 1662, canvas, 191 /279 cm, Amsterdam,
Rijksmuseum, akg-images
Pl. 8: Rembrandt, Danaë, 1636 and 1643 – 49, canvas, 185 /203 cm, St. Petersburg,
Hermitage, akg-images
Pl. 9: Frans van Mieris, Woman before the Mirror, c. 1670, panel, 43 /31.5 cm, Munich,
Alte Pinakothek, bpk Bildarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz
Pl. 10: Jan Vermeer, Woman Holding a Balance, c. 1664, canvas, 42.5 /38 cm, Washington,
D. C., Widener Collection, National Gallery of Art
Pl. 11: Gabriel Metsu, Woman Reading a Letter, c. 1664 – 67, panel, 52.5 /40.2 cm, Dublin,
National Gallery of Ireland, akg-images
Pl. 12: Jan Vermeer, Woman Reading a Letter at an Open Window, c. 1657, canvas,
83 /64.5 cm, Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, akg-images/Erich Lessing
Pl. 13: Jan Vermeer, Woman in Blue Reading a Letter, c. 1662 – 64, canvas, 46.5 /39 cm,
Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, akg-images
Pl. 14: Samuel van Hoogstraten, The Slippers, 1658 – 60, canvas, 103 /70 cm, Paris, Louvre,
akg-images/Erich Lessing
Fig. 1: Bible Moralisée, David and Bathsheba, 15th century, Paris, Bibl. nat. de France, Ms.
166, fol. 76 v
Fig. 2: Adam Elsheimer, Bathsheba, 1600 – 1610, gouache, 9.1 /8.4 cm, Vienna, Albertina
Fig. 3: Cornelis Cornelisz. van Haarlem, Bathsheba, 1594, canvas, 77.5 /64 cm, Amsterdam,
Rijksmuseum
Fig. 4: Peter Paul Rubens, Bathsheba, drawing, 1613 /14, 19.2 /26.2 cm, Berlin, Staatliche
Museen, Kupferstichkabinett
Fig. 5: Simon Bening, Bathsheba, Hennessy Book of Hours, early 16th century, Brussels,
Bibliothèque Royale, Ms. II, 158
Fig. 6: Peter Paul Rubens, Bathsheba, c. 1635, panel, 175 /126 cm, Dresden, Staatliche
Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 7: Jan Lievens, Bathsheba, c. 1631, canvas, 135 /107 cm, Studio City (Cal.), Coll. Mr. and
Mrs. Cooney
Fig. 8: Willem Drost, Bathsheba, 1654, canvas, 103 /87 cm, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 9: Govert Flinck, Bathsheba, 1659, canvas, 116.8 /88.6 cm, St. Petersburg, Hermitage
330
Fig. 10: Pieter Lastman, Tobias and Sarah, 1611, panel, 41.2 /57.8 cm, Juliana Cheney Edwards
Coll., Boston, Museum of Fine Arts
Fig. 11: Rembrandt, Girl at a Window, 1645, canvas, 81.6 /66 cm, London, Dulwich Picture
Gallery
Fig. 12: Samuel van Hoogstraten, Young Woman at an Open Door, c. 1645, canvas,
102.5 /85.1 cm, Chicago, Art Institute
Fig. 13: Gerrit van Honthorst, The Merry Violinist, 1623, canvas, 108 /89 cm, Amsterdam,
Rijksmuseum
Fig. 14: Rembrandt, The Holy Family, 1646, panel, 46.8 /68.4 cm, Kassel, Schloss
Wilhelmshöhe, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister und Antikensammlung
Fig. 15: Francesco Colonna, Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, Nymph and Satyr, Venice 1499,
woodcut
Fig. 16: Pablo Picasso, Faun Revealing a Sleeping Woman, 1936, lithograph /aquatint,
31.7 /41.7 cm, Canberra, National Gallery of Australia
Fig. 17: Lorenzo Lotto, Susanna and the Elders, 1517, panel, 50 /66 cm, Florence, Uffizi
Fig. 18: Capitoline Venus, Roman copy after Greek original, Rome, Museo Capitolino
Fig. 19: Tintoretto, Susanna and the Elders, c. 1555 – 1557, canvas, 146.5 /193.6 cm, Vienna,
Fig. 20: Govert Flinck, Susanna and the Elders, c. 1640, panel, 47 /35 cm, Berlin, Staatliche
Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 21: Pieter Lastman, Susanna and the Elders, 1614, panel, 47.2 /38.6 cm, Berlin, Staatliche
Fig. 22: Jan Jorisz. van Vliet after Jan Lievens, Susanna and the Elders, c. 1629, etching,
57.4 /45.2 cm
Fig. 23: Jan van Neck, Susanna and the Elders, canvas, 123 /167 cm, Copenhagen, Statens
Museum for Kunst
Fig. 24: Cavaliere d’Arpino, Susanna and the Elders, c. 1607, panel, 53 /37 cm, Siena,
Pinacoteca Nazionale
Fig. 25: Jan van Noordt, Susanna and the Elders, 1670, canvas, 124.5 /89.3 cm, San Francisco,
Fine Arts Museum — Legion of Honor Museum
Fig. 26: Lucas van Leyden, Susanna and the Elders, c. 1508, engraving, 19.9 /14.7 cm,
Fig. 27: Marcantonio Raimondi (after Raphael), Lucretia, c. 1510 /11, engraving, 21.2 /13 cm,
Amsterdam, Rijksmusem
Fig. 28: Joos van Cleve, Lucretia, c. 1520 /25, 76 /54 cm, panel, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum
Fig. 29: Lucas Cranach the Elder, Lucretia, 1533, 37 /24 cm, panel, Berlin, Staatliche Museen,
Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 30: Lucas Cranach the Elder, Venus, 1532, panel, 37.9 /24.6 cm, Frankfurt, Städelsches
Kunstinstitut
Fig. 31: Pieter Coecke van Aelst, Lucretia, first half of the 16th century, panel, 68.6 /50.8 cm,
Lindau, private collection
Fig. 32: Paolo Veronese, Lucretia, c. 1580 – 83, canvas, 109 /90.5 cm, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum
Fig. 33: Caravaggio, David with the Head of Goliath, 1609 /10, canvas, 125 /101 cm, Rome,
Galleria Borghese
Fig. 34: Jan Muller, Lucretia, early 17 th century, engraving, 18.7 /22.8 cm, Dresden, Staatliche
Kunstsammlungen, Kupferstichkabinett
331
Fig. 35: Correggio, Jupiter and Io, 1527 – 31, canvas, 163.5 /74 cm, Vienna,
Fig. 36: Artemisia Gentileschi, Lucretia, c. 1621 – 25, canvas, 100 /77 cm, Genoa, Palazzo
Cattaneo-Adorno
Fig. 37: Rembrandt, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, 1634, etching, 9 /11.4 cm, Paris,
Bibliothèque nationale
Fig. 38: Antonio Tempesta, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1600, engraving, 5.8 /6.7 cm,
London, British Museum
Fig. 39: Paolo Finoglio, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1622 /23, canvas, 231/195 cm,
Cambridge, Fogg Art Museum
Fig. 40: Hans Sebald Beham, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, 1544, engraving, ø 5.2 cm, Paris,
Bibliothèque nationale
Fig. 41: Codex Manesse, Jacob van Warte, c. 1320, Heidelberger Universitätsbibliothek,
Cod. Pal. Germ. 848, fol. 46v
Fig. 42: Wenzel Bible, Bathing scene (title page, detail, book of Joshua), c. 1390, Vienna,
Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Cod. Vindob. 2759 – 2764, vol. 1, fol. 214r
Fig. 43: Fountain of Youth, c. 1430, fresco, Piemont, Manta Castle near Saluzzo
Fig. 44: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait with Gorget, c. 1629, panel, 38 /30.9 cm, Nuremberg,
Germanisches Nationalmuseum
Fig. 45: Circle of Giorgione, Man in Armor, panel, 53.5 /41.5 cm, Edinburgh,
National Gallery of Scotland
Fig. 46: Giorgione, Self-Portrait as David, c. 1500 – 1510, canvas, 52 /43 cm, Braunschweig,
Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum
Fig. 47: Rembrandt, Saskia with a Flower, 1641, panel, 98.5 /82.5 cm, Dresden, Staatliche
Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 48: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait, 1640, canvas, 93 /80 cm, London, National Gallery
Fig. 49: Titian, so-called Ariosto, c. 1510, canvas, 81.2 /66.3 cm, London, National Gallery
Fig. 50: Rembrandt, after Raphael’s portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, drawing, 1639,
16.3 /20.7 cm, Vienna, Graphische Sammlung Albertina
Fig. 51: Albrecht Dürer, Self-Portrait, 1498, panel, 52 /45 cm, Madrid, Prado
Fig. 52: Titian, Flora, c. 1515, canvas, 79.7 /63.5 cm, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi
Fig. 53: Circle of Giorgione, Portrait of a Man, so-called Brocardo, c. 1510, canvas,
72,5 /54 cm, Budapest, Szépművészeti Múzeum
Fig. 54: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait with Saskia, c. 1635, canvas, 161 /131 cm, Dresden,
Staatliche Kunstsammlung, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 55: Rembrandt, A Woman Bathing, 1654, panel, 61.8 /47 cm, London, National Gallery
Fig. 56: Rembrandt, Men Bathing, 1651, etching, 11 /13.7 cm, London, British Museum
Fig. 57: Dirck Jacobsz., Group-Portrait of Seventeen Members of the Kloveniersdoelen, 1529,
panel, 122 /184 cm, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
Fig. 58: Werner van den Valckert, Regents of the Groot Kramergild, 1622, panel, 132 /185.5 cm,
Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 59: Bartholomeus van der Helst, The Four Governors of the Archers’ Civic Guard,
1653 – 57, canvas, 183 /268 cm, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
Fig. 60: Rembrandt, Portrait of Cornelis Claesz. Anslo and his wife Aeltje Gerritsdr. Schouten,
1641, canvas, 176 /210 cm, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie.
Fig. 61: Cornelis Anthoninsz., Banquet of Members of Amsterdam‘s Crossbow Civic Guard,
1533, panel, 130 /206.5 cm, Amsterdam, Historical Museum
332
Fig. 62: Master of Frankfurt, Guards Festival, second half of the 15th century, panel,
142 /176 cm, Antwerp, Museum voor Schone Kunsten
Fig. 63: Govert Flinck, The Steadfastness of Consul Marcus Curius Dentatus, 1656, canvas,
485 /377 cm, Amsterdam, Royal Palace Foundation
Fig. 64: Johannes Eyssenhuth, Danaë, Defensorium inviolatae Mariae of Franciscus de Retza,
1471, woodcut, Regensburg
Fig. 65: Master L. D. (Leon Davent), after Primaticcio, Danaë, c. 1540 – 50, engraving,
21.7 /29.5 cm, Vienna, Albertina
Fig. 66: Titian, Danaë, 1553 /54, canvas, 129 /180 cm, Madrid, Prado
Fig. 67: Orazio Gentileschi, Danaë, c. 1621 /22, canvas, 162 /228.5 cm, Cleveland,
The Cleveland Museum of Art
Fig. 68: Giulio Bonasone, Danaë, engraving, 16.5 /11 cm, Vienna, Albertina
Fig. 69: I Modi, woodcut after engraving from Marcantonio Raimondi from 1527 (after
drawings by Giulio Romano)
Fig. 70: Gian Giacomo Caraglio (after Perino del Vaga), Merkur and Herse, from: Love of the
Gods, 1527, engraving, 21.7 /13.5 cm, Hamburg, Kunsthalle
Fig. 71: Gian Giacomo Caraglio, Pan and Diana, from: Love of the Gods, 1527, engraving,
21.7 /13.5 cm
Fig. 72: Coitus, fresco, Pompeii, Casa del Centenario IX, 8, 3 (Cubiculum 43), 1st century AD,
Pompeii
Fig. 73: Rembrandt, Ledikant, 1646, etching, 12.5 /22.4 cm, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale
Fig. 74: Rembrandt, The Monk in a Cornfield, c. 1646, etching, 4.8 /6.5 cm, Paris, Bibliothèque
nationale
Fig. 75: Rembrandt, Jupiter and Antiope, 1631, etching, 8.4 /11.4 cm, London, British Museum
Fig. 76: Rembrandt, Jupiter and Antiope, 1659, etching, 13.8 /20.5 cm, Cambridge, Fitzwilliam
Museum
Fig. 77: Correggio, Jupiter and Antiope, c. 1528, canvas, 188.5 /125.5 cm, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 78: Heinrich Aldegrever, Monk and Nun in a Cornfield, early 16th century, engraving,
11 /8 cm, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
Fig. 79: Rembrandt, The Flute Player, 1642, etching, 11.6 /14.3 cm, London, British Museum
Fig. 80: Gerrit Dou, Lady at Dressing Table, 1667, panel, 75.5 /58 cm, Rotterdam, Museum
Boijmans van Beuningen
Fig. 81: Jan Vermeer, The Music Lesson, c. 1662 – 64, canvas, 74 /64.5 cm, London, The Royal
Collection Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II
Fig. 82: Hieronymus Bosch, Superbia (detail from the Table with the seven Deadly Sins),
c. 1485, panel, Madrid, Prado
Fig. 83: Paulus Moreelse, Young Lady with a Mirror, 1627, canvas, 105.4 /82.2 cm, Cambridge,
Fitzwilliam Museum
Fig. 84: Leonardo da Vinci, Mona Lisa, 1503 – 05, panel, 77 /53 cm, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 85: Edouard Manet, Un bar aux Folies-Bergère, 1881 /82, canvas, 96 /130 cm, London,
Courtauld Institute Galleries
Fig. 86: Frans van Mieris, The Cloth Shop, 1660, panel, 55 /43 cm, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum
Fig. 87: Petrus Christus, S. Eligius, 1449, panel, 98 /85 cm, New York, Metropolitan Museum
of Art
Fig. 88: Quinten Massys, The Pawnbroker and his Wife, c. 1514, panel, Paris, Louvre
Fig. 89: Pieter de Hooch, Woman Weighing Gold, c. 1664, canvas, 61 /53 cm, Berlin, Staatliche
333
Fig. 90: Jan Vermeer, Woman with a Perl Necklace, c. 1664, canvas, 51.2 /45.1 cm, Berlin,
Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 91: Jan Vermeer, The Milkmaid, 1658 – 60, canvas, 46 /41 cm, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
Fig. 92: Frans Francken II, Last Judgement, 1606, copper, 67 /51 cm, formerly Brussels,
F. Franco Gallery
Fig. 93: Pieter Aertsen, Christ at the House of Martha and Mary, 1552, panel, 60 /101.5 cm,
Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
Fig. 94: Diego Velazquez, Still Life with Christ in the House of Martha and Mary, c. 1618,
canvas, 60 /103.5 cm, London, National Gallery
Fig. 95: Jan Vermeer, A Lady Standing at the Virginal, c. 1672 /73, canvas, 51.8 /45.2 cm,
London, National Gallery
Fig. 96: Jan Vermeer, The Girl with the Wineglass, c. 1659 /60, canvas, 77.5 /66.7 cm,
Braunschweig, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum
Fig. 97: Jan Vermeer, The Art of Painting, c. 1666 /68, canvas, 120 /100 cm, Vienna,
Fig. 98: Thomas de Keyser, Portrait of Constantijn Huygens and a Messenger, 1627, panel,
92.4 /69.3 cm, London, National Gallery
Fig. 99: Jan Harmensz. Krul, Amor Presents a Letter to a Woman, emblem from Pampiere
wereld, Amsterdam 1644, Amsterdam, Universiteitsbibliotheek
Fig. 100: Dirck Hals, Woman Tearing a Letter, 1631, panel, 45 /55 cm, Mainz, Mittelrheinisches
Landesmuseum
Fig. 101: Dirck Hals, Seated Woman with a Letter, 1633, panel, 34.2 /28.3 cm, Philadelphia,
Museum of Art
Fig. 102: Vermeer, The Love Letter, c. 1669–72, canvas, 44/38.5 cm, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
Fig. 103: Jan Harmensz. Krul, emblem from Minne-beelden, Amsterdam 1640
Fig. 104: Heerman Witmont, Ships in a Storm, pen on wood, 39 /51 cm, private collection
Fig. 105: Book of Kells, Chi Rho, c. 800, 33/25 cm, Dublin, Trinity College Library, Ms. 58, fol. 34r
Fig. 106: Drogo Sacramentary, Te Igitur, Metz, c. 823 – 855, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de
France, Cod. lat. 9428, fol. 15v
Fig. 107: Folkunge Psalter, Annunciation, Northern England, second half of the 12th century,
Copenhagen, Kongelige Bibliotek, Ms. Thott 143, fol. 8
Fig. 108: Moralia in Job of S. Gregory, title page of the Engelberg codex 20, c. 1143 – 78,
Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art
Fig. 109: Trajan’s Column, detail, Rome, AD c. 117
Fig. 110: Hans Memling, The Passion of Christ, end of 15th century, panel, 56.7 /92.2 cm, Turin,
Galleria Sabauda
Fig. 111: After the Master of the Turin-Milan Hours (Jan van Eyck?), Christ Carrying the Cross,
16th century, panel, 97.5 /130.6 cm, Budapest, Szépműveszéti Múzeum
Fig. 112: Caravaggio, The Calling of St. Matthew, 1600, canvas, 322 /340 cm, Rome, San Luigi
dei Francesi, Contarelli Chapel
Fig. 113: Master E. S., Figure Alphabet, c. 1466, engraving, 14.4 /11 cm, Washington, D. C.,
Fig. 114: El Lissitzky, Figure Alphabet, design for a children’s book, calculating: 1 worker + 1
farmer + 1 soldier in the red army = 3 comrades, 1928, watercolor, Sophie Lissitzky-
Küppers Collection
Fig. 115: Simias of Rhodes, visual poetry, 300 BC (reconstruction by G. Wojacek 1969)
Fig. 116: Visual poetry, Cygnus, 14th century, abbey of Göttweig, Ms. 7
Fig. 117: Johann Leonhard Frisch, Berlin Bear, 1700
334
Fig. 118: Guillaume Apollinaire, Horse, 1917
Fig. 119: Claus Bremer, Pigeon, 1968
Fig. 120: Paul Klee, Legend from the Nile, 1937, pastel on cotton and jute, 69 /61 cm, Bern,
Kunstmuseum
Fig. 121: Rembrandt, Portrait of Mennonite Preacher Cornelis Claesz. Anslo, 1641, etching,
18.7 /15.8 cm
Fig. 122: Rembrandt, Portrait of Mennonite Preacher Cornelis Claesz. Anslo and his Wife Aeltje
Gerritsdr. Schouten, 1641, canvas, 176/210 cm, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 123: Gerard Ter Borch, Officer Writing a Letter with a Trumpeter, c. 1658 /59, canvas,
56.8 /43.8 cm, Philadelphia, Museum of Art
Fig. 124: Gerard Ter Borch, Officer Reading a Letter with a Trumpeter, c. 1657 /58, canvas,
37.5 /28.5 cm, Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 125: Caspar Netscher, Man Writing a Letter, 1664, panel, 27 /18.5 cm, Dresden, Staatliche
Kunstsammlung, Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 126: Gerard Ter Borch, Woman Sealing a Letter with a Maidservant, 1658 /59, canvas,
56.5 /43.8 cm, New York, private collection
Fig. 127: Gabriel Metsu, Man Writing a Letter, 1665 – 67, panel, 52.5 /40.2 cm, Dublin, National
Gallery of Ireland
Fig. 128: Title page from Jean Puget de La Serre’s Secretaris d’A le Mode door de Heer van der
Serre, Amsterdam 1652, The Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek
Fig. 129 = 100: Dirck Hals, Woman Tearing a Letter, 1631, panel, 45 /55 cm, Mainz,
Mittelrheinisches Landesmuseum
Fig. 130 = 101: Dirck Hals, Seated Woman with a Letter, 1633, panel, 34.2 /28.3 cm,
Philadelphia, Museum of Art
Fig. 131: Rembrandt, Haman Recognizes his Fate, c. 1665, canvas, 127 /117 cm, St. Petersburg,
Hermitage
Fig. 132: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait with a Cap and Eyes Wide Open, 1630, etching, 5.1 /4.5 cm,
Vienna, Albertina
Fig. 133: Rembrandt, Self-Portrait, c. 1657, panel, 49.2 /41 cm, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum
Fig. 134: Rembrandt, Judas Returning the Pieces of Silver, 1629, panel, 79 /102.3 cm, England,
private collection
Fig. 135: Gerard Ter Borch, Curiosity, c. 1660, canvas, 76.2 /62.2 cm, New York,
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Fig. 136: Jan Vermeer, Woman Reading a Letter at an Open Window (x-ray photograph),
c. 1657, canvas, 83 /64.5 cm, Dresden, Staatliche Gemäldegalerie
Fig. 137: Gerard Ter Borch, The Gallant Conversation (‘The Paternal Admonition’), c. 1654,
canvas, 71 /73 cm, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
Fig. 138: Caspar Netscher, Woman Reading a Letter (paraphrase after Ter Borch), after 1655,
location unknown
Fig. 139: Samuel van Hoogstraten, The Slippers, detail, c. 1658 – 60, Paris, Louvre
(see Pl. 14)
Fig. 140: Pieter Codde, A Woman Seated at a Virginal with a Letter, panel, early 1630s,
40.3 /31.7 cm, Boston, private collection
Fig. 141: Willem Duyster, Woman with a Letter and a Man, early 1630s, panel, 58 /45 cm,
Copenhagen, Statens Museum for Kunst
Fig. 142: Charles Le Brun, Conférence sur l’expression générale et particulière des passions, 1687
335
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337
Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat
Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat is professor emeritus for the

history of art at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna.
She was born in Caracas 1946, studied art history and archaeology at the Universities of
Bern and Vienna and wrote her doctoral thesis on Hieronymus Bosch under Otto Pächt.
She has taught at the Universities of Vienna, Salzburg, Basel, Oldenburg and Frankfurt
and is one of the pioneers in establishing gender studies in German-speaking academia.
Hammer-Tugendhat is on the supervisory board of the International Research Center for
Cultural Studies in Vienna (IFK) and on the editorial board of the Zeitschrift für Kulturwissen
schaften. She was elected as a reviewer for the European Research Council Advanced grant;
in 2010 she received the Gabriele Possanner State Prize. Her research on the methodology
of art history as Kulturwissenschaft is focused on Early Modern painting, specifically from
the Netherlands, ranging from the representational politics of text and image to gender
studies and the representation of emotions in the arts.

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The Visible and The Invisible

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The Visible

Book Series of the

Edited by Gerald Bast, Rector

Translated from German by

Translation from German language edition:

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data

Bibliographic information published by the German National Library

© 2015 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin / Munich / Boston

Translation from German into English:

Coverimage: Samuel van Hoogstraten, The Slippers

Image page 5: Rembrandt, A Woman in Bed

Layout: Martina Gaigg, Vienna, Austria

Part I Visible becomes Invisible

An alternative to traditional patterns of femininity? — Bathsheba 15

3 Asymmetry. Gender Relations in the Field of Sexuality 135

1 Mirror, Mirror on the Wall …

The Final Judgment as the norm? 194

3 Farewell to Lessing’s Laocoon: Leaving behind a Methodological Dispute

4 The Gender of Letters 251

5 Affect / Emotion / Imagination 259

Affects: Dirck Hals 262

Publisher’s note: 4 Plates 1 – 8: 163 – 171 Plates 9 – 14: 301 – 307

My interest lies in the subversive potential of visual art; in alternative, albeit

Rembrandt’s portrayals of women have become some of the most famous

The iconography of Rembrandt’s Bathsheba is a combination of traditional

The letter is part of the iconography of message transmission and thus of an

Rembrandt’s forgoing of any exterior moment of action is radical. He even avoids

What is exceptional about Rembrandt’s Bathsheba is indeed the pairing of

One of the most consistent observations about the painting is

127 On the meaning of faces in Rembrandt’s work,

as an individual who is experiencing her own subjectivity and with whom

Though deficient in beauty, the head of Bathsheba is not wanting in

Contemporary Dutch painting in the 17 th century also included depictions of

However, the reason the body is twisted in an anatomically incorrect pose is an

First I would like to take a closer look at another painting by Rembrandt to

Reversals —Woman in Bed (plate 2)35

135 National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, oil on canvas,

Fig. 11: Rembrandt,

Fig. 13: Gerrit

Similar to Bathsheba, Rembrandt pairs signs of individuality and subjectivity with

154 Linda Hentschel, Pornotopische Techniken des Be-

How unusual are the aforementioned visual representations of positively connoted

It is astonishing how art historians interpreting visual art tend to almost

[…] Oh prince of love, full of hostility / you torture tender women /

Equally as important as contextualizing visual art in its contemporary discourses

Dangerous gazes — Susanna

In 17 th century Dutch art, all three variations of Susanna iconography were

Fig. 25: Jan van

187 Otto Pächt, Rembrandt, Munich 1991, p. 126 ff., 155, 171 f.,

Let us return to Rembrandt’s Susanna. Speaking in terms of reception aesthetics,

The most striking detail and the most

The manic laughter definitely thwarts any traditional interpretations of moralizing

Where have all the men gone?

On the discourse of rape —Lucretia

His [Salutati’s] description of the process and consequences of rape

In Salutati’s Declamatio, these feelings of guilt are linked to possible feelings of

Sources and their re-interpretations

and Greek versions, see Galinsky 1932, p. 13; Follak

The relationship between Rembrandt and Shakespeare runs deeper. In Shakes

In order to assess gender-specific differentiation in the field of sexuality and re-