Self-Portrait with Wide-Open Eyes, Rembrandt van Rijn , 1630
Few other artists in the history of western art have painted themselves with the obsessive frequency of Rembrandt (160669). This image, produced when the Flemish painter was 24 years-old, is one of a vast collection of self-portraits, including (from those that survive) some 45 in oil, scores of drawings, and over 30 etchings. These works provide a kind of "pictorial autobiography" of Rembrandt, a record of his intense scrutiny of his own features, from his earliest years in Leiden to his death in Amsterdam in 1669.
