Self-portrait leaning on a stone sill

One of Rembrandt’s most admired self-portraits reflect his direct inspiration by Italian 16th-century portrait painting: Raphael’s Baldassare Castiglione (1514-1515) and Titian’s Portrait of a Man, who was long believed to be the poet Ludovico Ariosto (c. 1510). In the late 1630s, both works were in the Amsterdam collection of the merchant Alfonso López, and were well known to Rembrandt. The artist depicted himself in the same position as „Ariosto“; however, apart from the similar proud countenance, Rembrandt’s self-portrait features aspects of deeper introspection. The choice of this type of composition tends to be interpreted as an aemulatio – artists’ competition of sorts with their great predecessor in an attempt to demonstrate their outstanding artistic qualities.