The Night Watch - wikipedia The Night Watch This article is about the Rembrandt painting. For other uses, see Night Watch. This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. ( April 2014 ) The Night Watch Dutch : De Nachtwacht Artist Rembrandt van Rijn Year 1642 ( 1642 ) Medium Oil on canvas 363 cm × 437 cm ( 142.9 in × 172.0 in ) Location Amsterdam Museum on permanent loan to the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam Website Amsterdam Collection online Militia Company of District II under the Command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq, also known as The Shooting Company of Frans Banning Cocq and Willem van Ruytenburch, but commonly referred to as The Night Watch ( Dutch : De Nachtwacht ), is a 1642 painting by Rembrandt van Rijn. It is in the collection of the Amsterdam Museum but is prominently displayed in the Rijksmuseum as the best known painting in its collection. The Night Watch is one of the most famous Dutch Golden Age paintings. The painting is famous for three things : its colossal size ( 363 cm × 437 cm ( 11.91 ft × 14.34 ft ) ), the dramatic use of light and shadow ( tenebrism ) and the perception of motion in what would have traditionally been a static military group portrait. The painting was completed in 1642, at the peak of the Dutch Golden Age. It depicts the eponymous company moving out, led by Captain Frans Banning Cocq ( dressed in black, with a red sash ) and his lieutenant, Willem van Ruytenburch ( dressed in yellow, with a white sash ). With effective use of sunlight and shade, Rembrandt leads the eye to the three most important characters among the crowd : the two gentlemen in the centre ( from whom the painting gets its original title ), and the woman in the centre - left background carrying a chicken. Behind them, the company 's colours are carried by the ensign, Jan Visscher Cornelissen. The figures are almost life - size. Rembrandt has displayed the traditional emblem of the arquebusiers in a natural way, with the woman in the background carrying the main symbols. She is a kind of mascot herself ; the claws of a dead chicken on her belt represent the clauweniers ( arquebusiers ), the pistol behind the chicken represents clover and she is holding the militia 's goblet. The man in front of her is wearing a helmet with an oak leaf, a traditional motif of the arquebusiers. The dead chicken is also meant to represent a defeated adversary. The colour yellow is often associated with victory. Contents 1 Alterations to original 2 Commission 3 Location 4 Popular reception 5 Acts of vandalism 6 Cultural legacy 7 New LED illumination 8 Other representations 9 References 10 External links Alterations to original 18th century copy with indication of the areas cut down in 1715. For much of its existence, the painting was coated with a dark varnish, which gave the incorrect impression that it depicted a night scene, leading to the name by which it is now commonly known. This varnish was removed only in the 1940s. In 1715, upon its removal from the Kloveniersdoelen to the Amsterdam Town Hall, the painting was trimmed on all four sides. This was done, presumably, to fit the painting between two columns and was a common practice before the 19th century. This alteration resulted in the loss of two characters on the left side of the painting, the top of the arch, the balustrade, and the edge of the step. This balustrade and step were key visual tools used by Rembrandt to give the painting a forward motion. A 17th - century copy of the painting by Gerrit Lundens at the National Gallery, London shows the original composition. Commission The painting was commissioned ( around 1639 ) by Captain Banning Cocq and seventeen members of his Kloveniers ( civic militia guards ). Eighteen names appear on a shield, painted circa 1715, in the centre right background, as the hired drummer was added to the painting for free. A total of 34 characters appear in the painting. Rembrandt was paid 1,600 guilders for the painting ( each person paid one hundred ), a large sum at the time. This was one of a series of seven similar paintings of the militiamen ( Dutch : Schuttersstuk ) commissioned during that time from various artists. The painting was commissioned to hang in the banquet hall of the newly built Kloveniersdoelen ( Musketeers ' Meeting Hall ) in Amsterdam. Some have suggested that the occasion for Rembrandt 's commission and the series of other commissions given to other artists was the visit of the French queen, Marie de Medici, in 1638. Even though she was escaping from her exile from France ordered by her son Louis XIII, the queen 's arrival was met with great pageantry. Location The Night Watch as it hung in the Trippenhuis in 1885, by August Jernberg The Night Watch first hung in the Groote Zaal ( Great Hall ) or Amsterdam 's Kloveniersdoelen. This structure currently houses the Doelen Hotel. In 1715, the painting was moved to the Amsterdam Town Hall, for which it was altered. When Napoleon occupied the Netherlands, the Town Hall became the Palace on the Dam and the magistrates moved the painting to the Trippenhuis of the family Trip. Napoleon ordered it returned, but after the occupation ended in 1813, the painting again moved to the Trippenhuis, which now housed the Dutch Academy of Sciences. It remained there until it moved to the new Rijksmuseum when its building was finished in 1885. The Night Watch rolled around a cylinder inside a crate. The canvas would be stored in this condition throughout World War II. The painting was removed from the museum in September 1939, at the onset of World War II. The canvas was detached from its frame and rolled around a cylinder. The rolled painting was stored for four years in a special safe that was built to protect many works of art in the underground caves of Maastricht, Netherlands. After the end of the war, the canvas was re-mounted, restored, and returned to its rightful place in the Rijksmuseum. On 11 December 2003, The Night Watch was moved to a temporary location, due to a major refurbishment of the Rijksmuseum. The painting was detached from its frame, wrapped in stain - free paper, put into a wooden frame which was put into two sleeves, driven on a cart to its new destination, hoisted, and brought into its new home through a special slit. While the refurbishment took place, The Night Watch could be viewed in its temporary location in the Philipsvleugel of the Rijksmuseum. When the refurbishment was finished in April 2013, the painting was returned to its original place in the Nachtwachtzaal ( Room of the Night Watch ). Popular reception This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. ( August 2015 ) A persistent misconception is that Rembrandt 's decline in popularity was the result of negative public reception of the painting. The myth has even made its way into modern advertising ; in 1967, KLM featured the painting in an advertisement that said, `` See Night Watch, Rembrandt 's spectacular ' failure ' ( that caused him to be ) hooted... down the road to bankruptcy. '' The myth has no reasonable origin as there is no record of criticism of the painting in Rembrandt 's lifetime, and Captain Cocq even commissioned a watercolor of it for his personal album. It is more likely that the decline in the artist 's popularity was not the result of reaction to any one painting but to a broader change in taste. During the 1640s, wealthy patrons began to prefer the bright colors and graceful manner that had been initiated by such painters as the Flemish portraitist Anthony van Dyck. Acts of vandalism Play media Newsreel of the restoration in 1975 On 13 January 1911, a man slashed the painting with a shoemaker 's knife. The work was attacked with a bread knife by an unemployed school teacher on 14 September 1975, resulting in several large zig - zagged slashes. It was successfully restored after four years, but some evidence of the damage is still visible up close. The man was never charged and he also committed suicide in April 1976. On 6 April 1990, a man sprayed acid onto the painting with a concealed pump bottle. Security guards intervened and water was quickly sprayed onto the canvas. The acid had only penetrated the varnish layer of the painting and it was fully restored. Cultural legacy Maurice Merleau - Ponty refers to this work in his essay, Eye and Mind. He writes that `` ( t ) he spatiality of the captain lies at the meeting of two lines of sight that are incompossible with one another. Everyone with eyes has at some time or other witnessed this play of shadows, or something like it, and has been made by it to see a space and the things included therein. '' The work has inspired musical works in both the classical and rock traditions, including the second movement of Gustav Mahler 's 7th Symphony and Ayreon 's `` The Shooting Company of Captain Frans B. Cocq '' from Universal Migrator Part 1 : The Dream Sequencer. In King Crimson 's song `` The Night Watch '', from the band 's 1974 album Starless and Bible Black, lyricist Richard Palmer - James muses on the painting to capture a key period in Dutch history, when, after a long period of `` Spanish Wars '', the merchants and other members of the bourgeoisie can turn their lives inward and focus on the tangible results of their lives ' efforts. The song adopts a number of perspectives, including the primary subjects, the artist himself, and a modern viewer of the painting, and paints a mini-portrait of the emergence of the modern upper - middle class and the consumerist culture. However, the song presents this portrait with a deft touch, and while not fully approving, is sympathetic in tone. Alexander Korda 's 1936 biographical film Rembrandt depicts the painting, shown in error in its truncated form, as a failure at its completion, perceived as lampooning its outraged subjects. In Jean - Luc Godard 's 1982 film, Passion, The Night Watch is reenacted with live actors in an opening shot. Godard explicitly compares his film to Rembrandt 's painting, describing them both as `` full of holes and badly - filled spaces ''. He instructs the viewer not to focus on the overall composition, but to approach his film as one would a Rembrandt and `` focus on the faces ''. The Night Watch is a major plot device in the eponymous 1995 film, Night Watch, which focuses on the painting 's theft. The Night Watch is parodied on the British cover of Terry Pratchett 's 2002 book by the same name. The cover illustrator, Paul Kidby, pays tribute to his predecessor Josh Kirby by placing him in the picture, in the position where Rembrandt is said to have painted himself. A copy of the original painting appears on the back cover of the book. The Night Watch is the subject of a 2007 film by director Peter Greenaway called Nightwatching, in which the film posits a conspiracy within the musketeer regiment of Frans Banning Cocq and Willem van Ruytenburch, and suggests that Rembrandt may have immortalized a conspiracy theory using subtle allegory in his group portrait of the regiment, subverting what was to have been a highly prestigious commission for both painter and subject. His 2008 film Rembrandt 's J'Accuse is a sequel or follow - on, and covers the same idea, using extremely detailed analysis of the compositional elements in the painting ; in this Greenaway describes The Night Watch as ( currently ) the fourth most famous painting in the Western world, after the Mona Lisa, the Last Supper and the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. In 2006. The Night Watch inspired the literary work A Ronda da Noite by the famous Portuguese writer Agustina Bessa Luís. The painting appears in episode 3 of season 2 of Netflix 's Sense8. New LED illumination On 26 October 2011, the Rijksmuseum unveiled new, sustainable LED lighting for The Night Watch. With new technology, it is the first time LED lighting has been able to render the fine nuances of the painting 's complex color palette. The new illumination uses LED lights with a color temperature of 3,200 kelvin, similar to warm - white light sources like tungsten halogen. It has a color rendering index of over 90, which makes it suitable for the illumination of artifacts such as The Night Watch. Using the new LED lighting, the museum saves 80 % on energy and offers the painting a safer environment because of the absence of UV radiation and heat. Other representations The sculptures of The Night Watch in 3D at the Rembrandtplein in Amsterdam in 2006 -- 2009 Russian artist Alexander Taratynov created a bronze - cast representation of the famous painting that was displayed in Amsterdam 's Rembrandtplein from 2006 through 2009. After displays in other locations, the sculptures returned in 2012 and are now permanently installed in front of Louis Royer 's 1852 cast iron statue of Rembrandt. The only full - sized replica in the Western world is displayed by the Canajoharie Library & Art Gallery, in Canajoharie, New York, donated to the library in the early 20th century by the library 's founder, Bartlett Arkell. The Rijksmuseum 's flashmob ' Our Heroes are Back ' recreated The Night Watch in an unsuspecting shopping mall in Breda, Netherlands -- published on 1 April 2013 on YouTube References Jump up ^ Militia Company of District II under the Command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq at rijksmuseum.nl. The original Dutch : Schutters van wijk II onder leiding van kapitein Frans Banninck Cocq Jump up ^ `` The Company of Captain Banning Cocq ( ' The Nightwatch ' ) ''. Nationalgallery.org.uk. Retrieved 2013 - 02 - 19. Jump up ^ D.C. Meijer Jr `` De Amsterdamsche Schutters - stukken in en buiten het nieuwe Rijksmuseum, '' In : Oud Holland 2, no. 4 ( 1886 ) : 198 -- 21 Translated in English by Tom van der Molen ( 1 ) Jump up ^ `` Rembrandt 's Night Watch Unravelled : Identity of All the Militiamen Are Finally Revealed ''. ArtDaily. 14 March 2009. Retrieved 2013 - 02 - 19. Jump up ^ Maastricht Underground https://www.maastrichtunderground.nl/eng/for_groups/tours_for_groups. Missing or empty title = ( help ) Jump up ^ `` Rembrandt 's ' Night Watch ' Painting Vandalized ''. Los Angeles Times. LATimes.com. Associated Press. 6 April 1990. Retrieved 2013 - 02 - 19. Jump up ^ Night Watch ( Terry Pratchett ) Easter Egg -- Night Watch Cover Jump up ^ BBC -- h2g2 -- Paul Kidby -- Discworld Illustrator Jump up ^ Book : Night Watch -- Discworld & Terry Pratchett Wiki Jump up ^ McHenry, Jackson. `` The Sense8 Season - Two Trailer Is an Action - Packed Lecture on Rembrandt ''. Vulture. Retrieved 2017 - 05 - 06. Jump up ^ `` About NW3D ''. Niveau. nightwatch3d.com. Spring 2004. Retrieved 2013 - 02 - 19. Jump up ^ `` Onze helden zijn terug ! ''. Rijksmuseum. youtube.com. 1 Apr 2013. Retrieved 2013 - 04 - 07. External links Wikimedia Commons has media related to The Night Watch. `` The Night Watch '' in high - resolution -- Google Art Project The Night Watch at the WebMuseum Night Watch at the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam Rembrandt and the Night Watch The Night Watch by Rembrandt van Rijn Putting Names to the Famous Faces in Rembrandt 's ' Night Watch ' Discussion of the work by Janina Ramirez : Art Detective Podcast, 01 May 2017 Rembrandt List of works : drawings, etchings, and paintings ( including self - portraits ) Paintings The Senses ( 1624 -- 25 ) The Stoning of Saint Stephen ( 1625 ) History Painting ( 1626 ) Balaam and the Ass ( 1626 ) The Baptism of the Eunuch ( 1626 ) The Flight into Egypt ( 1627 ) The Artist in his Studio ( 1628 ) Self - portrait with dishevelled hair ( 1628 ) Self - Portrait ( 1629 ) The Raising of Lazarus Andromeda Chained to the Rocks ( 1631 ) The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp ( 1631 ) Old Man with a Gold Chain ( c. 1631 ) Jacob de Gheyn III ( 1632 ) Philosopher in Meditation ( 1632 ) The Abduction of Europa ( 1632 ) Portrait of a Man ( 1632 ) Portrait of a Woman ( 1632 ) Aeltje Pietersdr Uylenburgh ( 1632 ) Portrait of a Man Rising from His Chair ( 1633 ) Oval Portrait of a Woman ( 1633 ) The Shipbuilder and his Wife The Storm on the Sea of Galilee ( 1633 ) Descent from the Cross ( 1633 ) Portrait of Marten Soolmans ( 1634 ) Portrait of Oopjen Coppit ( 1634 ) Diana Bathing with her Nymphs with Actaeon and Callisto ( 1634 ) Flora ( 1634 ) Artemisia ( 1634 ) Pendant portraits of Maerten Soolmans and Oopjen Coppit ( 1634 ) Descent from the Cross ( 1634 ) Self - Portrait Wearing a White Feathered Bonnet ( 1635 ) Belshazzar 's Feast ( 1635 ) The Prodigal Son in the Brothel ( c. 1635 ) Portrait of Petronella Buys ( 1635 ) The Abduction of Ganymede ( 1635 ) Danaë ( 1636 ) The Blinding of Samson ( 1636 ) A Polish Nobleman ( 1637 ) The Stone Bridge ( 1637 ) Portrait of Maria Trip ( 1639 ) The Night Watch ( 1642 ) Boaz and Ruth ( 1643 ) The Woman Taken in Adultery ( 1644 ) The Mill ( 1645 -- 48 ) The Holy Family with Angels ( 1645 ) Susanna and the Elders ( 1647 ) Head of Christ ( 1648 ) The Kitchen Maid ( 1651 ) Descent from the Cross ( 1650 -- 52 ) Self - Portrait ( 1652 ) Aristotle with a Bust of Homer ( 1653 ) Bathsheba at Her Bath ( 1654 ) Virgin and Child with a Cat ( 1654 ) Portrait of Jan Six ( 1654 ) The Polish Rider ( 1655 ) Slaughtered Ox ( 1655 ) The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Deijman ( 1656 ) Portrait of Catharina Hooghsaet ( 1657 ) Portrait of a Man ( 1657 ) Portrait of a Man with Arms Akimbo ( 1658 ) Self - Portrait ( 1658 ) Moses Breaking the Tablets of the Law ( 1659 ) Self - Portrait with Beret and Turned - Up Collar ( 1659 ) Self - Portrait ( 1660 ) Ahasuerus and Haman at the Feast of Esther ( 1660 ) The Denial of Saint Peter ( 1660 ) Titus as a Monk ( 1660 ) The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis ( 1661 ) St. Matthew and the Angel ( 1661 ) Self - Portrait as the Apostle Paul ( 1662 ) Portrait of Dirck van Os ( circa 1662 ) Self - Portrait as Zeuxis Laughing ( 1662 ) Syndics of the Drapers ' Guild ( 1662 ) The Jewish Bride ( 1664 ) Lucretia ( 1664 ) Self - Portrait with Two Circles ( 1665 -- 69 ) Portrait of Gerard de Lairesse ( 1665 - 67 ) The Return of the Prodigal Son ( 1662 -- 69 ) Lucretia ( 1666 ) Drawings and prints ( etchings ) Goldweigher 's Field Hundred Guilder Print Joseph and Potiphar 's Wife The Three Crosses Virgin and Child with a Cat General topics Dutch Golden Age painting Dutch School ( painting ) Netherlandish art Netherlandish Baroque art ( including Flemish Baroque art and the Art of the Dutch Golden Age ) Rembrandt lighting Tronie Naturalism ( art ) Old master print Utrecht Caravaggism Caravaggisti Chiaroscuro Rembrandt studies Connoisseurship Rembrandt Research Project Rembrandt catalogues raisonnés 1908 1935 1968 1986 Notable connoisseurs and scholars Otto Benesch Wilhelm von Bode Kenneth Clark Stephanie Dickey Cornelis Hofstede de Groot Julius Held Samuel van Hoogstraten Arnold Houbraken Constantijn Huygens Nigel Konstam Jakob Rosenberg Joachim von Sandrart Simon Schama Gary Schwartz Eric Jan Sluijter Seymour Slive Christian Tümpel Wilhelm Valentiner Ernst van de Wetering Related people Saskia van Uylenburgh ( wife and model ) Titus van Rijn ( son and model ) Geertje Dircx ( mistress and model ) Hendrickje Stoffels ( mistress and model ) Jacob Isaacsz. van Swanenburg ( teacher ) Pieter Lastman ( teacher ) Jan Lievens ( colleague and friend ) Pupils and followers Hendrick van Uylenburgh ( art dealer and patron ) Jan Six ( art collector and patron ) Henry Clay Frick ( art collector ) Thomas Kaplan ( art collector ) Notable collections and exhibitions Rembrandt House Museum Rijksmuseum Amsterdam Mauritshuis Kupferstichkabinett Berlin British Museum Metropolitan Museum of Art Frick Collection Rembrandt : ein Genie auf der Suche / Rembrandt : The Quest of a Genius ( 2006 exhibition ) Rembrandt in Southern California ( 2008 virtual exhibition ) Rembrandt : The Late Works ( 2014 -- 2015 exhibition by National Gallery London ) Cultural depictions Works about Rembrandt Rembrandt ( 1936 film ) Rembrandt ( 1940 film ) Rembrandt ( 1942 film ) Rembrandt : A Self - Portrait ( 1954 documentary film ) The Anatomy Lesson ( 1995 novel ) Rembrandt ( 1999 film ) Rembrandt 's Whore ( 2003 novel ) Stealing Rembrandt ( 2003 film ) Nightwatching ( 2007 film ) Rembrandt 's J'Accuse ( 2008 documentary ) I Am Rembrandt 's Daughter ( 2008 novel ) The Rembrandt Affair ( 2010 novel ) The Rembrandt Secret / The Other Rembrandt ( 2011 novel ) The Anatomy Lesson ( 2014 novel ) Rembrandt 's Mirror ( 2015 novel ) Named after Rembrandtplein Rembrandtpark Rembrandt ( crater ) Rembrandt ( train ) Contested Long - lost Wikiquote Wikimedia Commons VIAF : 177124540 LCCN : n98096977 GND : 4445488 - 0 SUDOC : 078527813 BNF : cb14541384b ( data ) Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Night_Watch&oldid=837024542 '' Categories : 1642 paintings Collections of the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam Paintings by Rembrandt Militia group portraits Vandalized works of art Amsterdam Museum Dogs in art Musical instruments in art Hidden categories : Pages with citations lacking titles Pages with citations having bare URLs Articles needing additional references from April 2014 All articles needing additional references Articles containing Dutch - 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Question: who painted the famous dutch golden age painting the night watch
Answer: Rembrandt van Rijn