Bearded Old Man with a Brown Cloak

This character study of the head of a bearded man is particularly notable for its refined flesh tones and the subtlety of the colouring. At the end of his Leiden period, Lievens painted a series of head and shoulder or half-length studies of bearded old men. These can be compared to Rembrandt’s paintings from the same period. During the years around 1630, Rembrandt and Lievens were so closely associated, that they seem to have shared the same models.