RKD STUDIES

As Celeste Brusati and others have shown, much of Van Hoogstraten's art demonstrates a conscious effort at self-promotion.¹ The print contributing most directly to that effort is the etched self-portrait published as an authorial frontispiece in the Inleyding, first developed in an oil sketch on panel.² In a gesture that suggests both homage and competition, Van Hoogstraten emulates a self-portrait Rembrandt had etched in 1639 [45]. Based on Renaissance antecedents, the illusionistic half-length format, with the figure leaning his arm over a ledge, was one of Rembrandt's most influential motifs; Ferdinand Bol (1616-1680) and other followers took it up as well.³ The connection would have been recognizable to admirers of both artists, especially to print connoisseurs, but there are meaningful differences. Van Hoogstraten trades Rembrandt's historicizing costume for a fashionable japonse rock and depicts himself with a quill pen that could serve for either drawing or writing, an allusion to his dual career. The figure is surrounded by further allusive motifs, one of which may offer a clue to an unresolved feature of Rembrandt's composition: the lightly sketched form to Rembrandt's right, suggestive of a globe or finial, has become a sculpted Atlas (now on the left) holding up the world, the visible realm that Van Hoogstraten's text seeks to encompass.⁴ Comparison of the five states shows how Van Hoogstraten gradually developed shadow and modelling with dense layers of cross-hatching and touches of drypoint.⁵ He must have witnessed similar working methods in Rembrandt's studio thirty years earlier.

In a laudatory poem inscribed in the lower margin, Joachim Oudaen (1628-1692) praises Van Hoogstraten's artistic and literary endeavours and alludes to his international success. The same verse is handwritten in ink on a proof of the first state of the print now in the British Museum [46]. There are small orthographic discrepancies from the final version, but Van Hoogstraten's dates of birth and death are added (upside down) above. Since the final version was published prior to Van Hoogstraten's death, this makes it difficult to know if the proof presents a preliminary version of the text or just an inaccurate transcription. A more likely alternative is inscribed in ink on an impression of the second state in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam [47]. This eulogy, signed by Carel van Nispen, praises Van Hoogstraten for his facility with both 'penseel en pen' but favours the latter by comparing him with the ancient Greek author, Homer. Perhaps Oudaen's eulogy was chosen because it more evenly balances Van Hoogstraten's dual accomplishments. Both authors were well-acquainted with the artist. Van Hoogstraten had known Van Nispen since at least 1649, when Van Nispen added a Latin poem to a youthful self-portrait drawn by the artist. Oudaen, with whom Van Hoogstraten corresponded about the Inleyding, was also a friend of Samuel’s brother François van Hoogstraten (I) (1632-1696).⁶

Van Hoogstraten must have been working on his illustrations for the Inleyding, etched from his own designs, at the same time as the reproductive portraits for Balen. The difference in linear technique between the two projects intriguingly follows the difference between his early illustrations for Johan van Beverwijck (1594-1647) and his first independent prints. For the reproductive prints, he employs steady pressure, even tonality, and regularized hatching and cross-hatching. For his own compositions, his touch is more varied and spontaneous.

Apart from the self-portrait, the nineteen plates of the Inleyding fall into three categories: title page and sectional frontispieces, anatomical diagrams, and didactic images [48].⁷ No earlier Dutch art treatise had been furnished with such a complex visual programme. The design and iconography of the illustrations and their relation to the text have been thoroughly analyzed by Brusati, Czech, and Blanc.⁸ Details of preparatory drawings and state changes can also be found in RKDimages. In this essay, it suffices to say that these prints represent the culmination of Van Hoogstraten's career as a printmaker, more ambitious in scale and technical complexity than any of his earlier work. As Czech has shown, the content of the allegorical title pages builds on a long tradition of depictions of the muses in ancient literature and in the graphic arts but reinterprets their traditional attributes to suit Van Hoogstraten's focus on artistic training [49]. In our view, insufficient attention has been paid to an example in his immediate milieu: Romeyn de Hooghe's florid title page for Balen's history of Dordrecht (one of many such images Romeyn de Hooghe (1645-1708) designed) offered a worthy model for emulation.

The didactic images model artistic skills and methods that animated Van Hoogstraten's own work, such as light effects and perspectival illusion, including the dramatic 'shadow dance' [50].⁹ For the anatomical diagrams, Van Hoogstraten must have consulted ideal prototypes by Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564), and others.¹⁰ Yet, details such as curly hair, expressive faces, and subtly diverse body types give the figures a touch of realism that recalls Rembrandt's etched nudes of the 1640s. A male nude with a penetrating gaze seems to be drying off after a swim; he and a companion stand before a landscape that harks back to Van Hoogstraten's first dated print [51].¹¹ In 1646, while Rembrandt was making his etchings of the nude male figure, Van Hoogstraten and other students had drawn the same models by his side [52][53].¹² The anatomical plates thus complement the unique blend of Rembrandtesque practical training and classicist theory that characterizes Van Hoogstraten's philosophy of art.¹³

45
Rembrandt
Self portrait leaning on a stone sill, dated 1639
Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, inv./cat.nr. RP-P-OB-38

46
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Self-portrait of Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627-1678), dated 1677
London (England), British Museum, inv./cat.nr. Sheepshanks.7400

47
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Self-portrait of Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627-1678), dated 1677
Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, inv./cat.nr. RP-P-OB-12.783

48
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Title page Inleyding tot de hooge schoole etc, dated 1678
The Hague, RKD – Netherlands Institute for Art History

49
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Clio, the muse of history, before 1678
The Hague, RKD – Netherlands Institute for Art History

50
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Shadow dance, before 1678
The Hague, RKD – Netherlands Institute for Art History

51
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Anatomie van de spieren en de huid, before 1678
The Hague, RKD – Netherlands Institute for Art History