Rembrandt and Amsterdam Portraiture 1590-1670

Focused on Rembrandt's activities as a portraitist, a genre in which the most important Dutch painter of the 17th century also reached the highest level, the exhibition and this, its accompanying publication, presents around twenty of his portraits, along major examples by other artists active alongside him in Amsterdam during the Dutch Golden Age, with a total of 80 paintings and 16 prints.

When Rembrandt arrived in Amsterdam in the early 1630s the city already counted on portraitists such as Thomas de Keyser and Frans Hals - resident in the nearby city of Haarlem but with clients in the capital - who responded to a significant market demand for such works. Others continued to arrive after Rembrandt, such as Bartholomeus van der Helst, attracted by the possibility of securing commissions.

The exhibition, curated by Norbert E. Middelkoop, curator at the Amsterdam Museum, and this publication accompanying the exhibition, reveals the variety and quality of these works and will present the stories behind the sitters in them: married couples, craftsmen at work, children, scholars, businessmen, the artists themselves and important group portraits.