Watermark: Countermark with letters, CF (?)

Light foxing throughout¹¹Typical of most drawings formerly in the collection of Hofstede de Groot, which at some point during his ownership were stored in unfavourably damp conditions.

…; purchased from Freiherr Egon von Kap-herr (1877-1935), Starnberger See, with one other drawing, by Dr Cornelis Hofstede de Groot (1863-1930), The Hague, 1900;²²Hofstede de Groot notes, KB. by whom donated to the museum, 1906, but kept in usufruct; transferred to the museum (L. 2228), 1930

Object number: RP-T-1930-23

Credit line: Gift of C. Hofstede de Groot, The Hague

When the Wise Men from the East had left Bethlehem, an angel appeared to Joseph in a dream and said: ‘Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him’ (Matthew 2:13). They then departed and remained in Egypt until Herod’s death.

The drawing – one of a large group of drawings of biblical scenes made around 1650 – depicts the moment when the angel appears and, with a gesture, urges Joseph in a dream to flee. Joseph’s head is leant back, his eyes closed, his right arm resting on his baggage and the other tucked inside his coat. Next to Joseph’s right knee is his saddle. Mary and Joseph are sleeping against a straw mattress, and Mary cradles the Child under her mantle. None of the animals in the stable, including the donkey they will use to escape, is depicted. The only indication of a stable interior is the wooden post behind which the angel has appeared. Rembrandt drew the angel’s hand twice and covered the first version with opaque white. The drawing is carried out with fine, irregular pen lines and hatching; the faces, including the barely visible face of the Christ Child, are lightly, but convincingly sketched. As in most of the drawings of biblical scenes, the story is portrayed by the figures only, without much indication of a setting.

The subject was only rarely depicted by Rembrandt and his followers.³³For examples other than those cited in this entry, see Thea Vignau-Wilberg’s entry in T. Vignau-Wilberg, with P. Schatborn, Rembrandt and his Followers: Drawings from Munich, exh. cat. Munich (Staatliche Graphische Sammlung)/Amsterdam (Museum Het Rembrandthuis) 2001-02, no. 80. What is possibly an unusual drawn version of the subject by Rembrandt, set in a domestic interior, in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge (inv. no. PD.42-1961),⁴⁴M. Cormack, Rembrandt and his Circle: An Exhibition of Drawings from the Collection of the Fitzwilliam Museum, exh. cat. Cambridge 1966, no. 107. was signalled by Thea Vignau-Wilberg,⁵⁵See T. Vignau-Wilberg, with P. Schatborn, Rembrandt and his Followers: Drawings from Munich, exh. cat. Munich (Staatliche Graphische Sammlung)/Amsterdam (Museum Het Rembrandthuis) 2001-02. though in that case the messenger was a winged putto rather than an adult angel. There are also a related drawing and painting, both formerly attributed to Rembrandt, in the Kupferstichkabinett in Berlin (inv. no. KdZ 2698)⁶⁶Benesch, no. 879. and the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest (inv. no. 236),⁷⁷Sumowski, Gemälde, I, pp. 13 and 41, repr. (as Rembrandt school). which were probably made by a pupil around 1650. The position of the Virgin’s legs in the Budapest painting seems to have been derived from the figure of Joseph in our drawing. Though a remarkable borrowing, it is a typical trick for a pupil. Other motifs from our drawing appear in a sheet considered to be a copy of a work by Ferdinand Bol, in the Museum August Kestner in Hannover (inv. no. 1909.91).⁸⁸Sumowski, Drawings, I (1979), no. 269x.

Peter Schatborn, 2017

C. Hofstede de Groot, Die Handzeichnungen Rembrandts, Haarlem 1906, no. 1269 (c. 1645); W.R. Valentiner, Rembrandt: Die Meisters Handzeichnungen, 2 vols., Stuttgart and elsewhere 1925-34, I (1925), no. 333 (c. 1650); M.D. Henkel, Catalogus van de Nederlandsche teekeningen in het Rijksmuseum te Amsterdam, I: Teekeningen van Rembrandt en zijn school, coll. cat. The Hague 1942, no. 61 (1650-52); O. Benesch, The Drawings of Rembrandt (rev. edn. by E. Benesch), 6 vols., London 1973 (orig. edn. 1954-57), no. 915 (c. 1652); P. Schatborn, Catalogus van de Nederlandse tekeningen in het Rijksprentenkabinet, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, IV: Tekeningen van Rembrandt, zijn onbekende leerlingen en navolgers/Drawings by Rembrandt, his Anonymous Pupils and Followers, coll. cat. The Hague 1985, no. 39; T. Vignau-Wilberg, with P. Schatborn, Rembrandt and his Followers: Drawings from Munich, exh. cat. Munich (Staatliche Graphische Sammlung)/Amsterdam (Museum Het Rembrandthuis) 2001-02, p. 262, under no. 80, fig. 2; M. Schapelhouman, Rembrandt and the Art of Drawing, Amsterdam 2006, p. 101, fig. 97; R. Verdi, Rembrandt’s Themes: Life into Art, New Haven/London 2014, p. 54, fig. 45; H. Bevers, with a contribution by G.J. Dietz and A. Penz, Zeichnungen der Rembrandtschule im Berliner Kupferstichkabinett, coll. cat. Berlin 2018, p. 240, under no. 125.

P. Schatborn, 2017, 'Rembrandt van Rijn, The Angel Appearing to Joseph in his Dream, Amsterdam, c. 1650', in J. Turner (ed.), Drawings by Rembrandt and his School in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200117988