Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn

Ex coll. Paul Citroen, 1930s

Thence by descent

Bartsch, Hollstein 159; New Hollstein 247

Rembrandt made very few still lifes during his career, and this, the conus marmoreus or ‘marbled cone’, is his only etched still life. Given that this motif is unique in Rembrandt’s oeuvre, it is highly likely that the artist was aware of Wenseslaus Hollar’s (1607-1677) etched series of 39 shells executed four years before The Shell in 1646 [i]. Rembrandt was undoubtedly rising to a challenge and seeking to rival, in a spirit of aemulatio, Hollar’s series, in which the finely etched shells are presented as beautifully observed illustrations, floating against the white of the paper, with no shadows to ground them. It was once even thought that Rembrandt’s Shell was a freehand copy of Hollar’s Conus imperialis. Another contemporary of Rembrandt, Bartholomeus Asteyn (1607- circa 1667), made a black chalk and watercolour study of two shells, including the marbled cone shell, inscribing the sheet (now in the Fondation Custodia) - with the name by which the shell was known at the time – Herts Horen or ‘stag’s horn’.

In the first state, Rembrandt’s Shell, with its cast shadow, already projects out sculpturally from the white background. The present impression is an impression of the second state which transforms the print into a still life composition, as the Shell now emerges from the dark, mysterious depths of a niche, while luminous highlights, glancing off its shadowy, densely etched surface, convey that the light source is emanating from the right. In the third, final state, the artist re-worked the centre of the cone of the shell which had started to wear, to make it appear more pointed.

Shell collecting was very popular in the Netherlands during the 17^th century, and a group of shells were included in the inventory made of Rembrandt’s studio in 1656, the year in which he was made bankrupt. This very conus marmoreus immortalises the ‘large quantity of conches and marine inhabitants’ in Rembrandt’s cabinet [ii]. Rembrandt probably drew the shell directly from life onto the etching plate, which explains the fact that the natural clockwise, or destral spiral of the shell is sinistral or anticlockwise in the artist’s rendition. The shell has been depicted life size; but the low horizon, together with the sculptural quality of the shell, create an illusion of monumentality. The Shell has a weighty, mesmerizing presence; as Ger Luijten put it: ‘The atmosphere created by the elaboration of the plate gives the print a certain tension and even a slightly meditative ambience’ [iii]. There is probably a nod, too, to Fibonacci (c. 1170-c. 1240) and the Golden Ratio, a mathematically constructed, snail like spiral within a grid demonstrating the visual proportions most pleasing to the eye, in which the focus of a work of art is often found at the centre of the spiral.

The elevated treatment of the shell serves to heighten the rarity and desirability of such shells in the 17^th century, which were transported on ships from the Dutch East India company and incorporated into collections of art and natural objects known as Kunstkammer and Wunderkammer (chambers of art and natural wonders). In Sebastian Stoskopff’s (1597-1657) Still life painted around the same time as The Shell in circa 1650-57, objects of art or artificalia - including statuary, a miniature, a medallion, book and print – are depicted together with shells including two conus marmoreus, representing naturalia. As Philibert van Borselen put it in 1614, these were ‘Not fashioned or shaped by an artful hand / but as Nature’s boon despatched to Man.’ The wonders of Nature glorified, too, the bounty and diversity of God’s creation.

This print is exceptionally rare. In public collections, only around 33 impressions are recorded in the present, second state, five examples in the first state (when the background is still white), and one impression in the third state.

The stature of The Shell is such that it has inspired generations of artists following him to pay homage to it, notably in the 20^th century by Giorgio Morandi’s delicate etching, Conchiglia, of 1921. The Shell has become a timeless icon in the canon of western art.

[i] E. Hinterding, G. Luijten and M. Royalton-Kisch, Rembrandt the Printmaker, the British Museum Press and Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, cat no. 62

[ii] Strauss & Van der Meulen 1979, 1656/12, no. 179; on Rembrandt's collections, see also Scheller 1969) in Hinterding et al (see bibliography)

[iii] E. Hinterding, G. Luijten and M. Royalton-Kisch, Rembrandt the Printmaker, the British Museum Press and Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, cat no. 62