The Apostle Paul

Rembrandt painted this in about 1657, at the lowest point of his life. The year before, drowning in debt, he had been forced to declare insolvency, and around this time his house and his great collection of art and curiosities were being sold off piece by piece. He turned to Paul, the apostle who wrote much of the New Testament, shown here in a shadowy prison cell, hand brought to his head, a sword resting above the open book. The heavy, brooding light is the manner of his late years, when commissions had grown scarce. Look closely at the surface and you can see more than one hand at work, since by now Rembrandt often finished such pictures with help from his workshop.