Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–1669), Portrait of Philips Lucasz., 1635. Oil on oak, 79.5 × 58.9 cm. The National Gallery, London
Painted in 1635, this portrait belongs to the years when Rembrandt had only recently established himself in Amsterdam and was beginning to attract the patronage of the city’s mercantile elite. The sitter, Philips Lucasz, a naval officer in the service of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), had married Petronella Buys earlier that year. Through her family he was connected to Jacques Specx, the former governor of Batavia (the Dutch East Indies) and one of Rembrandt’s most important early patrons. It is almost certain that Specx arranged the commission, which comprised this portrait and the pendant of Petronella (now in the Leiden Collection, New York).
The portrait shows Lucasz in dark dress with a lace collar and the heavy gold chain awarded by the VOC, a badge of service that marked his authority at sea. The surface has puzzled scholars: the collar is painted as a dense block of white lead with its patterns scratched in, the chain as yellow strokes placed directly on the tunic. X-radiographs reveal that Rembrandt at first included the sitter’s left hand, resting on the chain, but it was later painted out. These peculiarities have prompted debate as to whether the work was hurried, perhaps to ensure its completion before Lucasz embarked once more for the East.
The sense of urgency is borne out by the sitter’s life. Not long after this likeness was made he returned to command in dangerous waters, and in 1641 he died at sea. The portrait then stood as his final image, a record preserved for the family and for the wife he left behind. Petronella, still young, remarried in 1645 to Cornelis de Graeff, one of the most powerful regents of Amsterdam. Yet the two portraits of 1635, Philips and Petronella side by side, mark the beginning of her first marriage, a moment of optimism shadowed by the perils of maritime service.
For Rembrandt, the commission was significant. Through Specx he entered the circle of those whose fortunes were tied to global trade and colonial expansion, men who lived under the constant threat of loss at sea. The portrait of Philips Lucasz, painted with a swiftness that seems to anticipate departure, is not only a likeness of an individual but a document of a world where wealth and honour were bought at the risk of sudden death.