The painting, titled “Saul and David,” and attributed to Rembrandt van Rijn, was purchased by the Hague museum’s director, Abraham Bredius and put on display at the Mauritshuis Royal Picture Gallery in 1898. There it hung until 1969, when German-Dutch art historian and Rembrandt expert Horst Gerson cast doubt in the art world on its origins.
In Gerson’s reference book, “Rembrandt. The Complete Edition of the Paintings,” he wrote that the work had to be by one of Rembrandt’s pupils, because “the painterly execution is superficial and inconsistent” and he didn’t “recognize Rembrandt’s touch in it.”
Just one year before his 1969 claim, in a hotly-contested revision of Bredius’ Rembrandt-catalogue, and written in 1968, Gerson reduced the works of the master from 639 to 419, or even fewer.
According to some art historians, the accusations caused quite a storm in art circles and was soon picked up by others. But even with all the hullabaloo created by Gerson’s comments, his editor, Gary Schwartz, an American Rembrandt scholar, and founder of Codart, an online resource for Dutch and Flemish paintings, still had his doubts about the painting not being a real Rembrandt.
Needless to say, the museum bowed to Horst Gerson and changed the wall label next to the painting to read, “Rembrandt and/or Studio.” There it remained until finally, the rightful painter was acknowledged.
The restoration begins
The painting, titled Saul and David, was created in two stages starting around 1645. It depicts the young hero David, playing a harp for the elderly King Saul. Moved by the music, we see the king using a curtain to wipe the tears from his eyes.
It wasn’t until 2007 that the Mauritshuis started its own investigation, led by head conservator Petria Noble, who is now chief conservator at the Rijksmuseum. Emilie Gordenker, the director of the Mauritshuis, said: “The painting looked awful. The varnish had gotten very yellow, and it was very hard to read.”
Fox News reports that Restorer Carol Pottasch says she can understand why Gerson thought the painting wasn’t a Rembrandt because previous restorations had completely covered the original artwork. “I guess that was the biggest problem that he faced. He couldn’t see a painting by Rembrandt because there was no painting to see,” she said Tuesday. “And now we’ve taken off all these layers, and now you can actually see the original paint again and then there’s no doubt.”
Using real-life crime scene investigative techniques, the restorers had to deal with the “victim” who had suffered the abuse. Besides fading over the years, the victim had been cut into two parts, perhaps to sell as two separate paintings. Then there was evidence an attempt was made to reconstruct it back into one whole work of art, and the attempt was poorly handled.
Added to all the suffering created, the victim had been painted over extensively, totally masking the master’s work. “Before the painting was treated, before it was cleaned, it became clear that the painting had been overpainted a number of times, that the painting had discolored, that its original dimensions had been changed in the past,” said Joris Dik of Delft Technical University, whose high-tech scans helped establish the painting’s authenticity and guide restorers. “It’s been really treated brutally, this painting, in multiple past restoration campaigns.”
Gordenker says analysis showed the painting was made up of 15 different pieces of canvas. The three main parts, “the Saul, the David, and an insert of a copy of an old painting in the upper right corner plus strips all around the edges. So it’s a real patchwork,” she said.
The outcome was revealed on Tuesday, two days before the museum opens an exhibition, “Rembrandt? The Case of Saul and David.” The show is devoted to this one work by Rembrandt, and in keeping with the CSI-tech used in its restoration, the Mauritshuis commissioned a “3-D printed version of the painting in its original size that visitors can touch to get a true feel for the Dutch master’s brush strokes,” say Gordenker.
