Saskia en Flore

Rembrandt painted his wife Saskia as Flora, the Roman goddess of spring and flowers, three times across their marriage, and this Dresden picture from 1641 was the last. By now the elaborate costume and props are gone. She wears plain clothes and simply holds out a single bloom, turning to look at the man painting her. The date carries a weight it could not have had at the time. That September Saskia gave birth to their son Titus, the only one of their children to survive infancy. The following June she was dead, not yet thirty, worn down by illness and repeated pregnancies. Titus, the baby of that autumn, grew up to become a painter like his father. The flower she holds here is a carnation, in Rembrandt's day a token of love and marriage.