Student at a Table by Candlelight

This compact, rectangular composition is a delightful and very concentrated study of chiaroscuro and of darkness in an enclosed space. The figure seated at the desk is not identifiable but the open book on the table and the pose of the man, with the hand resting on his temple as if in contemplation, let us assume he is a scholar or a student. An oil lamp emits a feeble flame, the only source of light within this room, barely illuminating the upper body and hands of the man, the table, two books and a curtain. The rest of the room and the objects in it vanish into darkness. Together with the contemporaneous Saint Jerome in a dark Chamber (Christie's, London, 7 December 2023, lot 32), this is one of Rembrandt's earliest depictions of extreme darkness. How little light is needed, Rembrandt seems to have thought, to see and depict anything at all? This pursuit in rendering almost total darkness would lead him to his most extreme experiments in printmaking, such as the very tonal impression of The Entombment in this catalogue (see lot 50).

In the present Student at a Table by Candlelight he is however still in meticulous control of the printing process, and early impressions such as the present one are astonishing displays of virtuosity, given how difficult it must have been to etch the finest gradations of darkness by varying the density of lines, and to then ink up the plate so carefully without drowning out the nuances, so that it would print evenly and clearly. In later impressions, the fine lines and dense crosshatching lose definition and depth, and the image begins to look flat and uneven, with an irregular pitted effect appearing in the darkest areas.

It is worth considering how far the so-called Utrecht Caravaggisti, who specialised in the depiction of candle light and other light-sources in dark spaces in painting, challenged and inspired Rembrandt to explore this phenomenon in print.