St. Francis Beneath a Tree Praying

1657

Rembrandt van Rijn

(Dutch, 1606–1669)

Culture

Netherlands

Medium

drypoint and etching

Measurements

Sheet: 18.1 x 24.5 cm (7 1/8 x 9 5/8 in.)

Credit Line

Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund 2024.64

Catalogue raisonné

Bartsch 107; White/Boon second (final) state; Hind 292; New Hollstein 299 second (final) state

You can copy, modify, and distribute this work, all without asking permission. Learn more about CMA's Open Access Initiative.

Location

Not on view

Did You Know?

Always experimental, Rembrandt created this print by first sketching in the composition with drypoint and then adding etching in a second stage, which reversed his typical process.

Description

One of Rembrandt’s most spiritually moving works, this drypoint and etching depicts a hermit saint sequestered in the wilderness and praying to a crucifix. A second figure on the right, a monk in bare outline, helps to identify the saint as Francis, who traveled with a friar named Brother Leo. Rembrandt focused on the lush, moody landscape surrounding the crucifix, creating space to the right of the composition by portraying a distant hill and structure. These compositional strategies reveal his knowledge of Venetian landscapes by Titian and others, which he had studied through prints and drawings. But while Rembrandt certainly looked to Italian art for inspiration and ideation, he always transformed what he saw into something distinctive and undeniably of his own invention, infused with the emotion and humanity that we see, for example, on the saint’s active face.