In Ways of Seeing, John Berger discusses Rembrandt’s self portrait painting when he was aged 58 and contrasts this with an earlier self portrait painting when he was 28 – thirty years apart, explaining that the latter portrait only reveals ‘an advertisement for the sitter’s good fortune, prestige and wealth’. It was painted in 1634, in the year of Rembrandt’s first marriage. He is flamboyantly showing off his bride, not knowing that withing six years she will be dead. The painting is cited to sum up the happy period of his life. It was also during this period of history that oil painting was betoken to be ‘a celebration of…