# Frederik Rihel on Horseback [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [REMBRANDT Harmenszoon van Rijn]() - Date: 1601-1650 - Technique: Oil on canvas, 295 x 241 cm ## Commentary <a href="\#" onClick="w=window.open \('/database/glossary/note03.html', 'newWin', 'scrollbars=yes,status=no,dependent=yes,screenX=0,screenY=0,width=300,height=400'\);w.opener=this;w.focus\(\);return false">Catalogue number:</a> Bredius 255. This life-size equestrian portrait of Frederik Rihel \(1621-1681\), an Amsterdam Lutheran merchant, is exceptional in Rembrandt's oeuvre. \(it is one of only two known Dutch painting of the kind.\) The horse and rider in the painting are executing a levade, an exceedingly difficult movement. Paintings of this type would normally have depicted only royalty or high nobility. The great prototype was Titian's portrait of <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/t/tiziano/10/22/06charle.html'\)" href="/html/t/tiziano/10/22/06charle.html">Charles V on horseback</a> in the Prado, which inspired <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/v/velazque/05/0501vela.html'\)" href="/html/v/velazque/05/0501vela.html">Velázquez,</a> <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/r/rubens/41portra/02lerma.html'\)" href="/html/r/rubens/41portra/02lerma.html">Rubens</a> and <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/d/dyck\_van/1portrai/charles5.html'\)" href="/html/d/dyck\_van/1portrai/charles5.html">van Dyck</a> in paintings of Spanish and English kings. The ability to perform a levade not only displayed mastery over the horse, it was also symbolic of the ability to rule. Rihel was a native of Strasbourg who came to Amsterdam as a boy to work in the famous Bartolotti banking house. By the time he was thirty he had advanced to a responsible post in the firm, and after the death of Guillelmo Bartolotti in 1658 he took over the reins on behalf of the widow. ## Related artworks - [A black drummer and commander mounted on mules; riding in profile]() - [A child being taught to walk]() - [A cottage beneath trees]() - [A girl sleeping]() - [A Man Laughing]() - [A man making water]() - [A Peddler Selling Spectacles \(The Allegory of Sight\)]() - [A Polish Nobleman]() - [A Scholar]() - [A two-humped camel]() - [A woman in Zeeland costume, from the back]() - [A woman in Zeeland costume, from the front]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()