Happy birthday Rembrandt! ⁠⁠ ⁠⁠ Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn was born in Leiden on July 15, 1606 and was a student of Dutch artists Jacob van Swanenburgh and Pieter Lastman and achieved fame at an early age.⁠⁠ ⁠⁠ After moving to Amsterdam in late 1631, Rembrandt became the most prominent painter of portraits. He introduced greater subtlety, presence, and animation to the genre and devised innovative group portraits, as seen in LACMA's portrait of Marten Looten.⁠⁠ Rembrandt and the art dealer Henrick Uylenburgh created an "academy," where Rembrandt trained many students to paint in his manner. ⁠⁠ In his later years, Rembrandt created powerful religious subjects of great psychological complexity and monumentality. It was also a period fraught with personal difficulties, including insolvency and the sale of his house and collections in a series of auctions in 1657 and 1658. Rembrandt remained famous until his death in 1669. Although his vigorous, broad brushwork and glowing palette of ...