About This Artwork

Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn
Dutch, 1606-1669

Adam and Eve, 1638

Etching on ivory laid paper
162 x 116 mm (plate)
Signed in plate, lower center: "Rembrandt f. 1638"
Gift of Marjorie Blum Kovler Foundation Collection and the Harry and Maribel G. Blum Foundation Collection, 1987.247

White & Boon 28 II/II; Bartsch 28 II/II; Biörklund 38-D II/II; Blanc 1; Boon 140; Claussin 34; Daulby 29; Hind 159 II/II; Munz 177 I/II; Nowell-Usticke B28 I/I; Rovinskii 28 II/II; Seidlitz 28 II/II; White 35; Wilson, Rembrandt 35

Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn's etching of Adam and Eve, depicts the story of the first Man and Woman with descriptive, wiry lines that create an evocative atmosphere. Shown at the moment of temptation, the couple is surrounded by light that seems about to be blotted out by the dark tree branch and leering serpent (the devil) stretching ominously above them. With their fleshy bodies and ordinary faces (so far removed from Dürer's idealized pair), Rembrandt's Adam and Eve are easy to identify with; their confusion, temptation, and choice become ours.

Exhibition, Publication and Ownership Histories

Exhibition History

The Art Institute of Chicago, May 1, 1987-February 9, 1989 (Allerton gallery 209A).

The Art Institute of Chicago, February 14, 2004-May 9, 2004.

Publication History

Daniel Daulby, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Works of Rembrandt (Liverpool, 1796), p. 15, no. 29.

M. le chev. de Claussin, Catalogue raisonné de toutes les estampes qui forment l'œuvre de Rembrandt (Paris, 1824), p. 22, no. 34.

Thomas Wilson, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Prints of Rembrandt (London, 1836), p. 46, no. 35.

Charles Blanc, L'œuvre de Rembrandt (Paris, 1880), pp. 55-57, no. 1.

Woldemar von Seidlitz, Die Radierungen Rembrandts (Leipzig, 1922), pp. 40-41 (ill.).

Arthur M. Hind, A Catalogue of Rembrandt's Etchings, 2 vols. (London, 1923), I:83, II:pl. 159.

Ludwig Münz, Rembrandt's Etchings , 2 vols. (London, 1952), I:pl. 197, II:87, no. 177.

George Biörklund, Rembrandt's Etchings: True and False (Stockholm, 1955), p. 70, no 38D (ill.).

Karel G. Boon, Rembrandt: The Complete Etchings, trans. by Elizabeth Willems-Treeman (New York, 1963), pl. 140.

G. W. Nowell-Usticke, Rembrandt's Etchings: States and Values (Narberth, Pa. 1967), n.p., no. B28 (ill.).

Christopher White, Rembrandt as an Etcher: A Study of the Artist at Work, 2 vols. (London, 1969), II: 248, pl. 35.

Christopher White and Karel G. Boon, Rembrandt's Etchings: An Illustrated Critical Catalogue, 2 vols. (Amsterdam, 1977), I: 13, no. 28, II:17 (ill.).

James N. Wood and Sally Ruth May, The Art Institute of Chicago: The Essential Guide (Chicago, 1993), p. 195 (ill.).

Stephanie S. Dickey (editor), Illustrated Bartsch 50: Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (New York, 1993), p. 18, no. 28 (ill.).

The New Dictionary of the History of Ideas (Charles Scribner's Sons Publishers 2004).

Ownership History

Adolf Schwartz, Amstelveen, Holland [invoice]. Sold by Robert Light, Santa Barbara, Calif., to the Art Institute, 1987.