Portret van Pythagoras 1615 - 1647

Editor: So, this is a print from between 1615 and 1647, entitled *Portret van Pythagoras*, currently at the Rijksmuseum and created by Jerôme David. It looks austere, scholarly almost. What’s your read on this piece? Curator: Ah, Pythagoras staring back at us through the ages! To me, it's less austere, more…brooding, perhaps? Think about the geometric precision Pythagoras championed, now rendered in the swirling, almost chaotic lines of the engraving. It's like trying to capture the infinite with a finite tool, you know? A real Baroque contradiction! Editor: Contradiction, how so? Curator: The Baroque period loved drama, but also order. David’s portrait seems to wrestle with that tension. There’s Pythagoras, the champion of reason, depicted in a style brimming with emotion, almost… unrestrained in the lines describing his beard. Does that tension come across to you? The geometric versus the…human? Editor: I see what you mean about the Baroque tension. I was so focused on his piercing gaze. It's quite magnetic. Curator: Right? It's like he’s looking straight *through* the picture plane, questioning our own understanding of the universe. A master of numbers, reduced to lines and ink... slightly ironic, don't you think? Editor: Definitely! I wouldn't have thought to connect the mathematical precision of Pythagoras with this very expressive print at first, but now it all makes sense. Thanks! Curator: Anytime! Art's just about seeing things...and then seeing them again from a totally new angle.