The Storm on the Sea of Galilee (after the stolen original)

This painting was a special commission. A client asked me to recreate the famous painting The Storm on the Sea of Galilee, which was stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston in 1990.

It proved to be quite a challenge — not just because of its size, but because so little visual information about the original remains. According to Isabella Stewart Gardner’s will, all empty frames must remain in place in the museum. The thieves took only the canvas, and to this day, the original frame still hangs as a haunting reminder of what was lost.

I travelled to Boston myself to visit the site where the painting once hung. Standing before the empty frame was a moving and surreal experience.

The most difficult part was determining the exact colors. While there are reproductions in books, they all differ slightly. Fortunately, I’m very familiar with the typical palette Rembrandt used during that period, which allowed me to reconstruct the painting as faithfully as possible.

The piece I created has exactly the same dimensions as the original. A tribute to a lost masterpiece — and a journey of painting and discovery I will never forget.

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