Joseph telling his Dreams

'Behold, I have dreamed a dream more; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me. And he told it to his father, and to his brethren: and his father rebuked him, and said unto him, What is this dream that thou hast dreamed? Shall I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the earth?' (Genesis 37: 9-10)
This small, characterful etching demonstrates Rembrandt’s extraordinary versatility in expressing human emotion. The boy Joseph is depicted in the centre of his gathered family, surrounded by his brothers and sister, his father Jacob seated to his right, and his mother Rachel lying in the curtained bed just behind him. He is recounting his prophetic dream, with his arms lowered to suggest the act of obeisance, unaware of the effect his words are having on his siblings and parents. Rembrandt eloquently evokes these feelings, from the unimpressed disbelief of his father, and his mother’s concern, to the varied expressions of resentment and anger of his brothers. The apparent solipsism of their precocious brother is humorously suggested by the small dog licking its genitals in the foreground.
This print was once in the celebrated collection of Isaac de Bruijn (1872-1953) and his wife Johanna Geertruida de Bruijn-van der Leeuw (d. 1960), parts of which were bequeathed to the Rijksmuseum and the Rembrandthuis in Amsterdam.