An Old Man in an Armchair

In 17th-century Holland a signature did not settle who had painted a picture. Pupils worked in their teacher's manner and could not sign while still training, so a master sometimes signed their best efforts himself. This canvas carries what seems to be Rembrandt's signature and the date 1652, and the National Gallery calls it probably by Rembrandt. It is a study of a character type, an old man slumped in a wooden chair, one hand at his temple. Only the head, the hands and the fur collar are worked closely. A sleeve is laid in with about six broad strokes. Some scholars read that roughness as a pupil's clumsiness, and the Gallery now leans towards the painter himself, trying out early the loose handling of his last years. The picture came to the nation from the Dukes of Devonshire in 1957.