The State Bed
 | This articlerelies largely or entirely on asingle source.(May 2023) |
The State Bed(Dutch -Het Ledikant) is a 1646 print byRembrandtinetchinganddrypoint.It is also known asLe Lit à la française(The French-style Bed), a title first given to it inEdme-François Gersaint's 1751Catalogue raisonné de toutes les pièces qui forment l’œuvre de Rembrandt.
It shows a modern couple passionately making love in a four-poster bed, rather than disguising the work with a mythological title. This probably shocked the artist's contemporaries, since he cut his signature from off the printing plate, making impressions from it even rarer than usual. Impressions are held in theRijksmuseum,theBritish Museum,theMorgan Library & Museum,and theBibliothèque nationale de France.