Rembrandt and the Face of Jesus

Head of Christ, c. 1648-1650
Rembrandt's rethinking of Christ is most startling in a series of utterly human images, small oils on wood panels, that are the centerpieces of the Philadelphia show. Painted in the late 1640s and early 50s, they put aside conventions for depicting a remote and otherwordly Christ. Instead Rembrandt made him unmistakably of this world, a young bearded man with long dark hair and soulful eyes. To make him appear more inward and meditative, he shifted Christ's right eye outward and away from the angle of his left eye.

• J.M.W. Turner at the National Gallery in Washington