Copyright by Laura Mareike Sager 2006 - The University of Texas at ...

worn, and the hair shorter, thinner and more gray than in other self portraits from
the same period or later.
According to H. Perry Chapman, this painting “allow[s] us greater insight
into [Rembrandt’s] character” (95) since he no longer represents himself in
costumes that indicate his social status. Moreover, the painting represents a
reformulation of a Dutch self portrait tradition based on Leonardo da Vinci, in
which the painter represented himself in refined clothes so as to proclaim the
intellectual dignity of his work. For Chapman, Rembrandt’s working clothes and
cap demonstrate the artist’s defiance and reformulation of that tradition,
“replacing it with an original and independent image of the artist as craftsman”
(96). In so doing, he asserts his “natural inborn talent” as opposed to the learned
Humanist painter (97). However, I think just as Rembrandt had previously
cultivated his self image through costumes and social roles, so does he now
disseminate the image of the independent, autonomous artist and the social and
artistic rebel, thus continuing to shape the way he wants to be seen. Especially in
light of the fact that Rembrandt has significantly altered this painting (like most
others, as the catalog Rembrandt by Himself shows), such as the beret, his pose
and the position of his left hand, it becomes clear that Rembrandt consciously
emphasizes both his independence from and his reformulation of the artistic
tradition of self-portraiture.
The Self Portrait as Zeuxis (c. 1662, Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum)
is another, more obvious instance of such a deliberate shaping of Rembrandt’s
artistic role. It is now widely accepted as representing Rembrandt in the role of
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