For Memory and Decoration—Group Portraits as Placemakers in Early Modern Amsterdam

Rembrandt’s Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp, Nightwatch, and Syndics are rightfully considered masterpieces of seventeenth-century Dutch painting. Few museum visitors realize they are among over one hundred corporate group portraits commissioned in Amsterdam during that period by the civic guard, charitable institutions, and the craft guilds. Such paintings were the result of the collective desire of a group of people to be represented and immortalized during their execution of the jointly shared responsibilities on which the urban society was built. Corporate group portraits were commissioned and produced to occupy wall spaces in semi-public buildings, reinforcing the missions of both the institutions and the sitters. Their meaning changed fundamentally after they started to leave their original locations and found their way into the direct custody of the city. Some of the paintings were acknowledged as masterpieces and, with the focus firmly on their artistic value, their historical function became neglected.