The Night Watch by Rembrandt
Rembrandt's The Night Watch
Rembrandt’s Night Watch is one of the world’s most famous paintings, and is the centrepiece of the now refurbished and reopened Rijksmuseum of Amsterdam.
The Night Watch by Rembrandt
The Night Watch - What's in a Name?
In the period when Rembrandt was painting it was not common practice to give paintings names, and although now globally known as “The Night Watch”, that moniker is misleading. The painting is not a night scene; the historical darkness associated with the painting coming about because of layers of varnish. Nor is it a painting of a “Watch”, the civic guards of Rembrandt’s day was a social group rather than a police or militia force.
Perhaps a more accurate name for the Night Watch could come from one of its other names; titles that include The Company of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq and Lieutenant Willem van Ruytenburch preparing to march out, or Militia Company of District II under the Command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq or The Shooting Company of Frans Banninck Cocq.
The Commissioning of The Night Watch
Rembrandt was commissioned to paint the oil on canvas work in 1642 by Captain Frans Banninck Cocq and members of the civic guard. Eighteen members of the civic guard paid Rembrandt 100 guilders each, with Captain Frans Banninck Cocq and Lieutenant Willem van Ruijtenburch probably paying more. This additional fee was right for their social position, and of course they are given prominence in the painting.
The names of the other civic guard members can be discovered by looking at the shield in the background of The Night Watch.
After receiving the finished painting, the civic guard would place The Night Watch in the banquet hall of the Kloveniersdoelen (Musketeers' Meeting Hall).
It is though not just the members of the civic guard who appear in The Night Watch, for amongst the other assembled figures is Rembrandt himself, and the painter also transposed the features of his wife onto that of a little girl
The Size of The Night Watch
There is something to be said about the dimensions of famous paintings. The Mona Lisa is well known for being a small painting, 77 cm × 53 cm (30 in × 21 in), but people don’t tend to realise just how small that makes the painting until they see it first hand.
Likewise, people are aware that The Night Watch is large, but few again will realise how large until they see it; and the actual dimensions of 363 cm × 437 cm (142.9 in × 172.0 in) are had to picture. The painting is so large that Rembrandt had to construct scaffolding at his home to house it.
In truth though, The Night Watch was once larger than it is today. In 1715 The Night Watch was re-housed in the Amsterdam Town Hall, and to make it fit, the painting was trimmed on all sides.
The Night Watch in the Rijksmuseum
Print of The Night Watch
The Night Watch by Rembrandt
Aside from its massive size, The Night Watch is also particularly known for the sense of movement that Rembrandt managed to imbue within it. The painting makes it seem perfectly possible for the civic guard to march forward, straight over the observer; this sense of movement is also helped with the depiction of a musket firing and the drummer boy drumming.
The removal of years of varnish has also established that the Dutch master used light and shadow, and surprising amount of colour when painting his complex masterpiece.
The Rijksmuseum Amsterdam
Viewing The Night Watch
The Night Watch can only really be appreciated in person though, and no photo really does it justice. The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam is open daily from 09:00 through to 17:00, with adult tickets, as of 2015, costing EUR17.50.
