Doing 'justice to Rembrandt' (ctd.)
August 28 2014
Picture: Liberation
I said yesterday that for some art historians, such as the Rembrandt expert Ernst van de Wetering, making sure an attribution is right makes you feel as if (as Ernst said) you're seeking 'justice' for an artist. I also said it was the case when an optimistic attribution was manifestly not right, and on cue comes this report from Le Figaro in France, where a museum in Draguignan is persisting in calling the above picture 'a Rembrandt'. The painting was recovered recently amid a blaze of publicity, having been stolen in 1999, and now, says the museum's director, the crowds are flocking to see the newly returned masterpiece (which alas is merely an 18th Century pastiche).
