Tuesday July 1, 2014

We did go to the The Hague to visit the Mauritshuis and Gemeentemuseum.  We had seen all of the paintings on our 1001 list on the last visit, but the Mauritshuis was closed then for remodeling.  The attached photo albums are just paintings from both museums, so if you aren’t interested don’t bother.  The photos aren’t great, it is a camera phone, the Mauritshuis was small and crowded, and my dog ate the homework (or any excuse you would like).  Probably the only thing more annoying in an art museum than people like me taking bad photos of the art are the folks with the recorded tour guide that stand right in front of the painting to listen to the entire message.  At least they annoy me, and that is all that counts in my book!  The Mauritshuis is where you go to see Dutch and Flemish painting from the Golden Era.  At that time painters were more craftsmen than artists.  Many painters specialized in specific genres as you can tell from the Mauritshuis photos.  In addition to religious paintings other themes were: landscapes, seascapes, still life’s divided into plants, food and game, church interiors and exteriors, mythology, moral lessons and domestic scenes (think of Vermeer).  Some of these painters produced hundreds of paintings, it was there job after all.  And many painters made many similar copies of popular works.  The Golden Age was the growth of the middle class that enabled people to purchase art, so the painters created art to meet the demand.  It wasn’t quite a free market however, you usually had to be in a local Guild, damn those big government regulations.

Most of the paintings from the Gemeentemusem are modern and contemporary works.  There are three paintings from the 1001 list here and we’ve seen two of them.  The third work by Piet Mondriaan (Dutch) has been in storage on both visits, and they can’t/won’t arrange a special visit to see it in storage.  What really frosts my chestnuts is that there is a special exhibit of Mondriaan’s work going on right now.  And they didn’t include this painting!  I’m tempted to write them (I already phoned without luck) a scathing email, except that they never answered the four emails I’ve already sent.  Oh well, it does give me something else to complain about, like I need help with that.  Today we are recovering from all the walking and staying up late to watch USA vs Belgium.  We turned off the game when it became 2-nil in extra time.  We may go out for a beer later.

July 1, 2014 Amsterdam & Mauritshuis 

July 1, 2014 Amsterdam & Gemeentemuseum