Master Piece: the reconstruction of Rembrandt’s most famous painting
Author: Marc Pos
Foreword: Ronald Giphart
The Secret of The Night Watch by Marc Pos tells the remarkable story behind the full-scale reconstruction of Rembrandt van Rijn’s world-famous painting The Night Watch. The richly illustrated art book was published in English in 2022 and includes a foreword by Dutch author Ronald Giphart.
The book is based on the ambitious project created for the Dutch television programme Het geheim van de Meester, known in English as Masterpiece. In the programme, a team of specialists reconstructs famous works of art using materials, techniques and methods that resemble those of the original artists as closely as possible.
Reconstructing The Night Watch
For this special project, the team faced its greatest challenge yet: recreating The Night Watch at full scale. Rembrandt completed the monumental group portrait in 1642. Its official title is Militia Company of District II under the Command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq, although it is known throughout the world as The Night Watch.
The reconstruction was carried out by artist Lisa Wiersma, paintings conservator Michel van de Laar, materials specialist Thijs Hagendijk and technical art historian Joris Dik. Their work required much more than simply copying what can be seen on the surface. The team investigated Rembrandt’s composition, pigments, underpainting, brushwork and use of light and shadow.
They also examined how the individual members of the civic guard were positioned and how Rembrandt transformed a traditional group portrait into a scene filled with movement, depth and dramatic tension. The project therefore became both a reconstruction and an investigation into Rembrandt’s working process.
The four-part television series followed the team as it tackled technical problems, recruited additional painters and worked towards the public unveiling of the completed reconstruction. Parts of the project were undertaken at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, where Rembrandt’s original painting is displayed. The reconstruction was announced by AVROTROS in 2021 as the programme’s largest challenge to date. AVROTROS and NPO provide further information about the television project.
Ronald Giphart and The Night Watch
Ronald Giphart wrote the foreword to The Secret of The Night Watch. In it, he reflects on his admiration for Rembrandt and the enduring power of the seventeenth-century masterpiece. His literary contribution introduces a book in which art history, craftsmanship, scientific research and television production come together.
Giphart’s foreword makes this publication especially relevant within his bibliography. Although he is best known as a novelist, columnist and essayist, he has contributed forewords and introductory texts to numerous books about literature, culture, society, food and the arts. His contribution to The Secret of The Night Watch demonstrates his broad cultural interests and his fascination with the stories hidden behind celebrated works of art.
About The Secret of The Night Watch
In The Secret of The Night Watch, author and television producer and executive Marc Pos takes you along on a fantastic adventure: the reconstruction of The Night Watch. Thirty different paintings have already been reconstructed for the television program Masterpiece. AII of the knowledge and experience gained from those previous programs is now being used to reconstruct The Night Watch, one of the world’s greatest masterpieces.
The team, consisting of Lisa Wiersma, Michel van de Laar, Thijs Hagendijk and Joris Dik, faces an incredible challenge. It’s only during the process that it becomes clear just how extensive the project really is: extra help is needed with the painting, and the team faces problems with the underpainting. We follow the team in their quest, which eventually leads them to a reconstruction that not only allows them to follow in Rembrandt’s footsteps but also unravels The Night Watch’s secrets for the public.
Contents
- Foreword – Ronald Giphart
- Introduction-Marc Pos
- Meeting Rembrandt
- IN CONVERSATION WITH LISA
- In Rembrandt’s Footsteps
- A Reconstruction
- IN CONVERSATION WITH THIJS
- What You See When You Look at The Night Watch
- IN CONVERSATION WITH JORIS
- Who Are Those People in The Night Watch?
- The Eventful Life of a Painting
- IN CONVERSATION WITH MICHEL
- IN CONVERSATION WITH TACO DIBBITS
- The Reveal
- Glossary
- Looking Back- Marc Pos
- Credits
- Acknowledgements
- Colophon
Publication details
The Secret of The Night Watch was published as an English-language hardcover in 2022. The book was commissioned by AVROTROS and POSVIDEO and published by TERRA Publishing. Its ISBN is 978-90-8989-886-9. The Dutch-language edition, Het geheim van De Nachtwacht, has ISBN 978-90-8989-885-2. The English edition and its bibliographical details are listed by Lannoo Publishers and international art-book distributor ACC Art Books.
© 2022 TERRA Publishing
Terra is part of TerraLannoo Ltd.
P.O. Box 23202
1100 DS Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Concept and composition: Marc Pos
Text and image editing: Merijn de Leur-van Duyn
Final editing: Barbara Luijken and Marijke Overpelt
Translation: Bas Brinkman
Editing and translation: Textcase, Deventer, The Netherlands
Graphic design: Mijke Wondergem
Layout: Peter Tychon
Lithography: DPS Design & Prepress Studio, www.dpsonline.nl
This publication has been made possible through the mediation of Miranda Bruinzeel, www.bureaubruinzeel.nl and commissioned by AVROTROS and POSVIDEO.
© AVROTROS
First print, 2022
ISBN 978 90 8989 886 9
NUR 64
Foreword by Ronald Giphart – English translation
Foreword
In the autumn of 2021, the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam provided the setting for a remarkable mise-en-scène. While outside the wind swept past the tall stained-glass windows of the majestic museum, inside—in an imposing space known as the Entrance Hall—a painter, a conservator, a materials expert, a historian of science and a museum director stood side by side. Solemnly, they had gathered beside an enormous painting that still carried the delicious scent of hundreds of litres of fresh paint. For several minutes, the group silently admired the beautifully illuminated canvas.
In the camera footage of this moment—the climax of the new season of the television series The Secret of the Master—the five even appeared somewhat overawed. In reality, however, the situation was rather different from what the television images would later suggest.
Although it seemed as though the protagonists were quietly marvelling at the overwhelming work of art, they were in fact surrounded by camera operators, cable hands, grips, gaffers, production staff, museum attendants, editors, broadcasting executives, a floor manager, a producer and several other jubilant guests. Two people operated a towering mobile crane from which a camera was suspended, lighting units had been discreetly positioned here and there, and in one corner members of staff were pouring sparkling wine into flutes. The atmosphere was exuberant.
All in all, it was a lively tableau—one that, surprisingly, bore a certain resemblance in spirit to the centuries-old painting that had brought everyone together that evening: a canvas bearing the rather lengthy title Officers and Other Civic Guardsmen of District II of Amsterdam, under the Command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq and Lieutenant Willem van Ruytenburch. In other words, The Night Watch, the most famous Dutch work of art of all time. Had Rembrandt van Rijn been alive today, he might have painted this cheerful gathering at the Rijksmuseum as a scene every bit as spirited and lifelike as the evocative group portrait he completed on commission for Amsterdam’s civic guard in 1642.
The book you are now holding is the account of an extraordinary project that began in February 2021. After recreating thirty Dutch and international paintings, the illustrious team behind The Secret of the Master was ready for the greatest challenge in the history of the now internationally acclaimed television programme: a detailed and historically accurate reconstruction of Rembrandt’s most famous painting. What an undertaking! What audacity!
The Rijksmuseum, where The Night Watch has hung since 1885, offered the team the most ideal temporary studio imaginable: directly opposite Rembrandt’s original canvas, face to face with the masterpiece itself.
There, Lisa Wiersma, Michel van de Laar, Joris Dik and Thijs Hagendijk could begin the almost impossible task they had set themselves and the rest of their team. Would they succeed in faithfully reconstructing the painting—all 17.1 square metres of it—using historical techniques? Welcome to the world of weaving methods, dead colouring, underpainting, dripping impasto, oiling out and insects ground into powder to produce pigment.
The data gathered during the so-called “Operation Night Watch”, the restoration of the original painting that began in 2019, proved extremely useful in this difficult undertaking. Using every conceivable scientific technique, the canvas was scanned, examined, analysed and investigated millimetre by millimetre. This produced a vast amount of valuable data with which the team from The Secret of the Master could continue its work.
Over the centuries, Rembrandt’s civic guard portrait—his only one—has endured a great deal. There was not only the natural ageing of the paint, pigments, stretched canvas and layers of varnish, but also numerous well-intentioned restorations and instances of both deliberate and accidental damage. Strips were cut from the painting, a hammer fell through the canvas, someone attacked the artwork with a shoemaker’s knife, and another person slashed it as many as twelve times with a utility knife. Acid was thrown over it, and during the war it was rolled up so that it could be stored safely in a cave in Limburg. None of these scars and minor imperfections has diminished its expressive power, the magic of the image or the overwhelming spell with which The Night Watch has entranced viewers for 380 years.
I do not wish to spoil the plot in this foreword or anticipate the chapters that follow, but I can say from personal experience that the phenomenal reconstruction created by Lisa, Michel, Joris, Thijs and all the others who poured their heart and soul into this project has a similarly overwhelming effect.
The End.