The Parable of the Prodigal Son Between Words and Pictures: Formal Analysis of Rembrandt’s Painting

Abstract

In the article the author explores how the Bible could be hermeneutically “read” in biblical paintings. In the past, there has been a lot of research in relation to that problem, however, most of it is art historical in nature, and most interpretations focus on interpreting and understanding iconographic nature of biblical artworks. Namely, over the centuries a lexicon of standardised iconographic symbols has formed that serves as the hermeneutical standard for interpreting biblical art. However, symbolic iconographic reading is only one possible way in interpreting biblical artworks. The other way is to understand formally how the biblical subject matter is articulated by an artist as a complex art composition on different levels of visual language – that is in colour, shape, composition and space. Therefore, the article investigates the problem of formal analytical understanding of interaction between the Bible and visual arts. How the Bible could be “read” in biblical painting not through images and standardized symbols alone but through shapes and their compositional and spatial relations? And how such formal relations can inform the semantic potential of articulated biblical subject matter? – In the article the author explores the stated hermeneutical problem by comparatively analysing the Biblical Parable of the Prodigal Son and one of the most renowned artworks on that subject, Rembrandt’s painting The Return of the Prodigal Son. The author shows that the true complexity of Rembrandt’s painting can only be appreciated by analysing formal aspects of Rembrandt’s artistic articulation and not only by understanding how he used standardised iconographic symbols. In the main focus of the analysis are the two formal means of expression, i.e. position and orientation, that Rembrandt has been a true master of. These two means have immense semantic potential to express different aspects of biblical subject. Consequently, the exemplified hermeneutic reading of Rembrandt’s painting can be understood as an exemplification of how such interpretative approach could be relevant for all art that is based on literary subjects and not just for Biblical art.