The Mill - digital restoration

The Mill (ca. 1645-1648) by Rembrandt van Rijn

87.6 x 105.6 cm (34 1/2 x 41 9/16 in.)

2 month digital restauration project

First, some history:

the mill restauration rembrandt old master painting 17th Century digital restauration

The Mill before the 1977 restoration

Treatment was carried out in 1977–1979 to consolidate flaking paint, remove the old lining and replace it, and remove discolored varnish and retouching.

The painting was treated again in 2001, at which time the 1979 varnish was removed because it was no longer saturating the dark paint.

present state of the painting National Gallery of Art, Washington

"The changes that occur after a painting has been cleaned are often dramatic. In this instance, they carried even added weight. Few paintings have been revered in the way that The Mill has for qualities that were derived from darkened varnish. Many feared that the impact this painting created would be destroyed if the varnish were removed, that it somehow could lose its sense of mystery. Fortunately, that fear was groundless, and the painting continues to impress the viewer with the profundity of its conception. The drama is still present, only it is richer, more varied, and less somber. The appearance is now quite comparable to that found in early nineteenth-century copies and variants of The Mill, although it is probable that viewers then were able to see even more detail in the landscape than is presently possible. These areas of relatively thin paint may well have darkened over time as a result of linings that affected the color and texture of the support and ground."

Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., National Gallery of Art, Washington

All seemed fine and dandy.

Then ...

In 2018, Suzie Creamcheese thought to herself:

"Gee, that's a magnificent painting! Shame that it has cracks all over the place and that the genius of its composition is muddled by the faded colors. Let's do something about it... "

(It took a while)

(for non-blinking final version, see below )

I worked in Photoshop on a 24.5 x 20.3 thousand pixel patched bitmap of the painting.

Besides removing cracks and stains that I believed to be of later date than the creation of the painting, I added a selective color layer, to counter some of the color fading. That's it.

I took a quite conservative approach, taking care not to remove faded patches that might have been there from the beginning. (due to Rembrandt's characteristically loose painting style, some areas seem barely covered with paint)