Divine Encounter: Rembrandt's Abraham and the Angels

Explores Rembrandt's unique approach to depicting the nature of divine encounter and the complexities of its representation. Rembrandt took an unusual and dramatic approach to biblical subjects, exploring the nature of divine encounter and the complexities of its representation, making use of the viewer's knowledge of the subject whilst finding ways to bring the familiar to life. Discussions about what we see as opposed to what we know were prevalent in the religious, artistic, scientific, and philosophical thinking of the period. It was left to artists to portray divine encounter in pictorial form. This new, scholarly volume brings together 10 works by Rembrandt which portray biblical episodes, examining these works as a group and considering them in context. AUTHOR: Joanna Sheers Seidenstein is the 2015–17 Anne L. Poulet Curatorial Fellow at The Frick Collection, New York. She is a doctoral candidate at New York University's Institute of Fine Arts, where she is writing a dissertation on Rembrandt's treatments of themes from classical antiquity. SELLING POINTS: . Features a rarely exhibited painting by Rembrandt van Rijn alongside other religious works by the artist and his contemporaries . Helps readers understand what Rembrandt's influences and intentions were in the context of the theological and artistic debates of the 17th-century 31 colour images