Discourse on the media-reflective and metapoetic dimension of Rembrandt's work has largely focused on the artist’s painting practice. What happens when this methodological attention shifts to Rembrandt’s etchings? His extensive graphic oeuvre has typically been examined through the lens of connoisseurship and/or material analysis, with particular emphasis on the numerous reworkings and states.

This panel proposes an approach that is intended to complement the existing method with a focus on the topoi at work in Rembrandt’s etching practice. Etching involves a sequence of interdependent processes: the preparation of a metal plate coated with a resist, the incision of lines with a needle that exposes the surface beneath, and the controlled action of acid that bites into the plate to varying depths. Revisions may further be carried out directly on the plate using tools such as the burin. These stages introduce elements of resistance, delay, and contingency, as the final image emerges through chemical transformation rather than direct application. The resulting prints can be understood as sites of environmental encounter, where perception is mediated through processes that register the intra-action between bodily gestures, material resistance, and natural forces. The artist’s body engages in dynamic exchange with its environment, foregrounding etching as a medium through which human and nonhuman agencies become entangled.

In the spirit of this question, we welcome papers that approach Rembrandt’s etching as a relational technique shaped by human and environmental agencies, and as a site of experienced “Nature” and environment.