Theo Beerendonk was a convinced artist. All his working life he was searching for what for him was the essence of art. The female nude was a main theme in this; thereby he followed a long tradition.Throughout the centuries, artists have been fascinated by the nude. In thedecennia before Beerendonk, colleague-artists such as Hendrik George Breitner,Isaac Israëls and Jan Sluiters, whom Beerendonk was friends with, had freednudity from the classic beauty ideal and turned it into a naturalistic themewhereby they did not hesitate to use a certain amount of eroticism in it. At the beginning of his career, Beerendonk continues down the path they created,filled with bravura. During a long period of time he sticks to figurative art.However, when during the fifties, he discovers freedom in line-work, as Picassohad introduced, he eagerly jumps into that. Printmaking always had hisinterest and he was a big admirer of the old craft of etching.In Rembrandt he saw a great mentor, he was very familiar with his work and was undoubtedly also inspired by the female nude that Rembrandt did not just paint and drew but also captured in a number of etchings. In the late days of his artistic life, in 1966, Beerendonk was appointed curator of the Rembrandthuis and in charge of the elaborate etching-collection. Hereby the museum was ensured of an enthusiastic Rembrandt connoisseur, who was familiar with the etching technique himself and able to demonstrate this with devotion.His ‘Etching at Rembrandt’, where he showed the audience the entire processof creating an etching step-by-step, was highly appreciated by the visitors of the museum. During the course of time, the work of Theo Beerendonk ended up in the margin of the history of Dutch art. However, as this book shows,it deserves a much more prominent place.Janrense BoonstraDirector of the Rembrandthuis museum