...and male potency and art or producing art. Tonight for some reason or the other ;) - this issue became all of a sudden very dominant to me. There are three women, Saskia, Geertje and Hendrikje and they all do resemble aspects of potency and especially potency to create. The first mentioning of potency is though the male prerogrative of boasting how little time it takes for them to create - a child. 10 seconds or 5 who is faster... An important issue to the creative artist indeed.
Yet Saskia is the one who will bear the child, so the relationship is in every aspect a fruitful and fulfilling one (but behold the daughters who have died on them!), potency and commerce married to each other, the perfect match, yet she dies. Interesting that when she is buried, Rembrandt gets into the water up to his loins, I couldn't help but notice and of course it had an instant sexual annotation.
And Geertje is the barren one, no child, no creativity, simply sex for sex' sake, something pornographic, check Umberto Eco's wonderful insights into porn movie. The potency is so utterly wasted on her and turns into something self-destructive.
But behold there is the angel, somebody always present in Rembrandt's darkest moments, somebody he will disclose his deepest secret to and somebody he knows he could entrust it with, Hendrikje. She will bear him till the end, as he will bear her, the potency in every aspect returns.
But are the women as the driving or destructive force not superior to the vain men?!
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