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Kostverloren Castle in Decay

A work made of pen and brown ink, with brush and brown wash, heightened with touches of opaque white watercolor, on cream laid paper.
CC0 Public Domain Designation

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  • A work made of pen and brown ink, with brush and brown wash, heightened with touches of opaque white watercolor, on cream laid paper.

Date:

c. 1652

Artist:

Rembrandt van Rijn
Dutch, 1606-1669

About this artwork

Rembrandt and his contemporaries shared a fascination with the Kostverloren estate, in part because of the successive misfortunes that its owners seemed to endure. Already by Rembrandt’s time it had taken on its name, which translates as “lost expenses” or, more colloquially, “money pit.” The site faced another setback when much of the castle was destroyed in a fire. After this damage—and before its eventual repair—Rembrandt entered the grounds of the castle and recorded its diminished state. His emphasis on decay is made clear by the felled tree in foreground; its strident horizontality sets off the faded majesty of the castle’s once-grand structures.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Prints and Drawings

Artist

Rembrandt van Rijn

Title

Kostverloren Castle in Decay

Place

Holland (Artist's nationality:)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

1647–1657

Medium

Pen and brown ink, with brush and brown wash, heightened with touches of opaque white watercolor, on cream laid paper

Dimensions

10.9 × 17.5 cm (4 5/16 × 6 15/16 in.)

Credit Line

Clarence Buckingham Collection

Reference Number

1961.49

IIIF Manifest  The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.

https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/12909/manifest.json

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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