Jan and Jaapgen

In 2023 the Rijksmuseum’s collection was enriched with the long-term loan of two exceptional pendant portraits by Rembrandt from 1635. The oval panels, the smallest formal portraits the master ever made, disappeared from view for almost two centuries, unknown to the public and virtually unmentioned in the art-historical literature.

This richly illustrated publication charts the fascinating quest for the story behind the two rediscovered portraits. Who were this elderly man and woman, and how did they come to be immortalized by the greatest Dutch painter of the seventeenth century? In-depth scholarly and scientific research at the Rijksmuseum has revealed not only the identity of the sitters – Jan Willemsz van der Pluym and Jaapgen Caerlsdr of Leiden – but has also proved that no one but Rembrandt himself could have painted these small, boldly sketchy portraits.