Rembrandt's Amsterdam

During the 17th century, Amsterdam became one of the leading economic centres in Europe. The city and its population grew rapidly, trade and art flourished. The influential bourgeoisie shaped the fortunes of the city and confidently celebrated itself in magnificent group portraits by the city’s leading artists, first and foremost Rembrandt.

More than in any other city, the group portrait developed in Amsterdam as a mirror of a powerful social elite, especially the members of the marksmen’s guilds and the regents of social institutions. And yet their good fortune had its price, for the roots of the city’s Golden Age lay in a colonialist trading policy and a rigid social order. This volume shows both sides of the coin, with images and stories of a plural society telling of wealth and inequality, good fortune and ruin, power and impotence.