Old Man with a Gold Chain

In 1631 Rembrandt was still in his mid-twenties, working in his home town of Leiden and about to gamble on a move to Amsterdam. This is not a commissioned portrait. It is a tronie, a character head made to sell on the open market, where Dutch buyers were starting to hang a striking face on the wall the way they might a landscape. So the old man is really a model in costume. The steel gorget at his throat, the heavy gold chain, the plumed beret all came from Rembrandt's own prop chest rather than the sitter's wardrobe. For a long time people called him the painter's father. More recent research suggests he may instead have been the keeper of an almshouse in Leiden, a face Rembrandt and his circle painted again and again.