Woman with a Pink, early 1660s
Rembrandt (Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn) (Dutch, 16061669)
Oil on canvas; 36 1/4 x 29 3/8 in. (92.1 x 74.6 cm)
Bequest of Benjamin Altman, 1913 (14.40.622)
Rembrandt (Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn) (Dutch, 16061669)
Oil on canvas; 36 1/4 x 29 3/8 in. (92.1 x 74.6 cm)
Bequest of Benjamin Altman, 1913 (14.40.622)
The unidentified woman in this warm but somber portrait offers a pink (or carnation), symbolic of marriage, to her husband in Man with a Magnifying Glass (14.40.621). Rembrandt's style in these canvases is similar to that in The Jewish Bride (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam) and other works of the early to mid-1660s. In a portrait by Jan Victors dated 1651, the same woman wears contemporary attire, which however reveals the predilection for jewelry that is suggested here. The gesture and to some extent the costume and expression in the present picture recall Rembrandt's Flora of about 1654 (26.101.10).














