Art History: A Soap Opera. Bathsheba at her Bath

Rembrandt

Oil on Canvas

1654

Bathsheba was the queen of Israel, according to the bible.The king of Israel, a good Jewish boy aptly named David, spotted her taking a bath one day. He proceeded to seduce and impregnate her. At this point, Bathsheba was already married to a guy named Uriah the Hittite- is it any wonder his wife strayed with a name like that?

She trapped her lover, the King, with a pregnancy, got him to off her hubby, then got him to marry her. She named her son Solomon, and he became the king of Israel after David (as sons of kings do).

The most famous depiction of Bathsheba is by Rembrandt, fittingly called “Bathsheba at her Bath”. Rembrandt was creative enough to be famous for his paintings during his lifetime, so I feel like he could have been a bit more creative with the name of this painting. Like, if you’re going to be creative, be creative with your titles! What about like … “Jewish King Takes Advantage of Exhibitionist” … or whatever.

This painting is a kind of BBW POV shot of when David first sees Bathsheba getting her clean on. Rembrandt painted her with broad, thick brush strokes and vibrant colours, resulting in a pretty arousing painting. When the adjectives used to describe a painting are the most common adjectives in Fifty Shades of Grey: The Plus Size Years, I think it’s safe to say the painting is sexy.
This particular painting of Bathsheba is special because in all other paintings she is part of a larger landscape, but in this painting, she is the large landscape.