An unusual lead compound discovered in Rembrandt’s “Night Watch” that had never before been identified in ancient paintings: it is an absolute first in the field of scientific study of works of art, offering a new perspective on the technique of painting 17th century and the History of the conservation of this famous oil painting on canvas, created in 1642 and now kept in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
The study is published in the international edition of the journal Angewandte Chemie by researchers from the Dutch museum in collaboration with the French National Research Center (CNRS), the European synchrotron ESRF and the Universities of Amsterdam and Antwerp.
Rembrandt’s painting is the focus of a major research and conservation project called “Operation Night Watch”, in which an international and multidisciplinary team of experts is analyzing how the pictorial materials used by the artist chemically evolve over time.
Thanks to a first scan of the canvas with a special X-ray scanner developed by the University of Antwerp, the scientists have identified traces of an unexpected lead compound in areas of the painting where, among other things, lead-based pigments are absent. to lead. The discovery was confirmed by the analysis of some micro samples of work with the strong X-rays of the European Esrf synchrotron in Grenoble and thanks to the Petra III accelerator in Germany.
The study posits that this connection is rapidly disappearing, so it would never have been detected in ancient paintings. The fact that it is still present on Rembrandt’s work may provide valuable clues as to the possibility that the Dutch painter used linseed oil with dissolved lead oxide to improve its drying properties, as well as the effects that restoration treatments have had in the past could .