Dr. Nicholas Tulp in Rembrandt's Studio (recto); Scene from Rembrandt's Life (?) (verso)

Jacobus Ludovicus Cornet · 1846

Medium

Pen and brown ink with brush and gray and brown wash and white gouache, over graphite, with scraping (recto), and pen and brown ink with brush and brown and gray wash, over red chalk and graphite (verso), on ivory laid paper

Original size

23.9 × 19.2 cm (9 7/16 × 7 9/16 in.)

Currently held

Art Institute of Chicago

Movement

Romanticism

This intimate 1846 drawing conjures a quiet moment between two of Dutch Golden Age history's most recognisable figures — the great surgeon Nicolaes Tulp and the painter who immortalised him. Jacobus Ludovicus Cornet was a Belgian artist working in a tradition of historical genre scenes that romanticised the lives of old masters, and this work showcases his considerable draughtsmanship. Executed in layered pen and brown ink, wash, white gouache, and graphite, the composition demonstrates his ability to build depth and atmosphere through accumulated mark-making rather than colour alone. The recto and verso together suggest a working study — evidence of an artist thinking through a scene with care and iteration. Rembrandt's 1632 *Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp* is one of the most studied paintings in Western art history, and Cornet's imagined studio encounter directly references that legacy, placing Tulp back into Rembrandt's world nearly two centuries after the original was made. Our hand-painted oil reproduction translates the tonal richness and narrative intimacy of Cornet's drawing into the warmth of oil on canvas, preserving the contemplative atmosphere that makes this small, meticulous work — held today in the Art Institute of Chicago — far more affecting than its modest dimensions suggest.