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"Rembrandt’s Damaged Masterpiece Is Whole Again, With A.I.’s Help"

quote Sections of “The Night Watch” were cut off in the 18th century and lost. Now, new technology lets viewers imagine how the original work might have looked.

quote AMSTERDAM — Rembrandt’s “The Night Watch” has been a national icon in the Netherlands ever since it was painted in 1642, but even that didn’t protect it. In 1715, the monumental canvas was cut down on all four sides to fit onto a wall between two doors in Amsterdam’s Town Hall. The snipped pieces were lost. Since the 19th century, the trimmed painting has been housed in the Rijksmuseum, where it is displayed as the museum’s centerpiece, at the focal point of its Gallery of Honor. Now, from Wednesday — for the first time in more than three centuries — it will be possible for the public to see the painting “nearly as it was intended,” said the museum’s director, Taco Dibbits. Using new high-tech methods, including scanning technologies and artificial intelligence, the museum has reconstructed those severed parts and hung them next to the original, to give an idea of “The Night Watch” as Rembrandt intended it. . . .

quote Temporarily restoring these parts will give visitors a glimpse of what had been lost: three figures on the left-hand side--two men and a boy--and, more important, a feel for Rembrandt’s meticulous construction in the work’s composition. With the missing pieces, the original dynamism of the masterpiece is stirred back to life. . . .

Nina Siegal for the New York Times; June 23, 2021.
https://www.nytimes.com/202...al-intelligence.html

quote In 1715, the monumental canvas was cut down on all four sides to fit onto a wall between two doors in Amsterdam’s Town Hall.

Ah, the one constant in Government: excruciatingly stupid decisions.

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