12. Rembrandt

Rembrandt, one of the greatest artists of all time, was born in Leyden in the Netherlands. His family ground its own grain in a windmill on the city's wall. As a child he liked to sketch the sun coming in through a tiny window and making a streak of light on the inside of the windmill. He carried this interest in light and shadow through life. His paintings often show one hand of a person in the light and one in the dark.

Many artists travelled to faraway lands. Rembrandt always stayed within 50 miles (80km) of his home, although he lived to be 63.

Much of his life was spent in Amsterdam, then the richest town in Europe. In some of Rembrandt's paintings we see the rich clothes and jewels worn by people of that time in Amsterdam.

During the first ten years of his career he was a famous and fashionable painter. Then something happened which ruined him. He became so poor that he had to sell all his furniture and even his rich velvet clothes. To make matters worse, his wealthy wife died, and her parents took the money she had left to him.

This was what happened to ruin the sale of his paintings: the Amsterdam Civic Guard had paid him to paint a picture of them. Since he liked light and shadow, he painted the men as they were leaving the armoury at noon to go on duty. The men still inside were in such deep shadow that their faces could not be recognised. These men were very angry. The men in the sunlight of course showed Well. But their satisfaction did not make up for the anger of the others. The picture is one of Rembrandt's best. It is called "The Night Watch", although it was painted at noon.

Even poverty did not keep Rembrandt from painting. He married a girl who had been a nurse to his son. They had a daughter. Since Rembrandt was too poor to hire models, he painted his wife, his daughter, and, with the help of a mirror, himself. He painted the poor, the lame, the blind, and the sick. He dressed them in Biblical costumes, as was often done in his time.

Other Dutch artists of the time painted cloth of lovely texture, dishes, tiles, and other such things simply because they were beautiful. They painted pictures of rooms with handsomely dressed people in them. Rembrandt was greater because he painted people so that we can tell how they felt and thought. He painted their personalities, not just their clothes.

Rembrandt worked hard all his life, becoming a better and better artist. The world stopped paying him. The people of his time stopped honouring him. But he was far greater than they. He was a great artist working on art problems ahead of his time.