Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Portrait of Dirck Jansz. Pesser

Working quickly and decisively, Rembrandt deftly captured the sitter’s resolute character in this early portrait of Dirck Jansz. Pesser, a prominent member of the conservative Protestant Remonstrant community in Rotterdam. Diffuse light falls gently and evenly across Pesser’s face, where the combination of textures and warm tones lends an accessible quality to the likeness. The strikingly free handling—visible in the thickly applied pigment around the eyes, the lively broken strokes of the mustache, and the sinuous edges of the ruff—reveals a more relaxed manner than that of A Bearded Man in a Wide-Brimmed Hat (no. 11), painted the previous year. Rembrandt executed this likeness in 1634, along with the portraits of Pesser’s wife, Haesje Jacobsdr. van Cleyburg (now in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam), and Pesser’s mother at the age of eighty-three, Aechje Claesdr (now in the National Gallery, London).