The Golden Age

De Gouden Eeuw, The Golden Age

The 17th Century in the Netherlands is known as the Golden Age.  Trade was booming and the city was rapidly expanding with riches coming and going to and from ports from all over the world. During this period, merchants had enough money to commission paintings of and for themselves.  Previously, patronage of the brush was almost exclusively of the Church. Collecting paintings became the rage and a sign of wealth.  The new wealth was a crucible for creativity in a country full of artists and wealthy patrons.  To say it succinctly, it was the perfect storm. In my opinion (only to stop anyone suggesting otherwise), the Dutch per head were the most prolific painters of masterpieces for the age.

We had not been to the Rijksmuseum in over 15 years so it was time to take another look.  The museum had had some major renovations since our past visits.  The entire courtyard of the museum had been converted into an atrium complete with a bigger gift shop (duh) and restaurant.  The museum had a free app download featuring the highlights of the collection.  The museum had decided to display its best works in the Great Hall.  Apparently everyone had downloaded the same free app. I could see the same information on everyone's phone. Together with the tours, we constantly ran into traffic jams as people went from the same paintings to the next.

I can understand why these particular paintings were in the same hall but it had some irony.  The celebrated master painter Vermeer had fallen out of fashion before being re-discovered with the invention of the camera.  Some of his works were attributed to Jan Steen even though Vermeer's signature was clearly visible on the canvas. Many of Steen's works hang next to Vermeers' masterpieces.  You can compare and contrast the artist kis but it still feels a bit odd to an art nerd to see Vermeer's work plagiarized.  If you know nothing about Vermeer, consider this.  He had enough children to have his own cable reality show and he sold paintings in exchange for bread.  How the man had time, peace, or even money for supplies is a mystery.  He had so many kids, we don't know all their names.  Ok, so I think they know 10 of 12 or so.  Vermeer is thought to have painted about 40 pictures.  We have quite a few in the US--as many as 13.  (Some are disputed, one is sadly missing.)  I often feel like the world's paintings should be redistributed to their homes.  Vermeer often falls into the category.  No picture can capture the brilliance of the Milk Maiden.  The yellow is intensely lemon and the blue is so pure, the kind rarely seen on the Virgin Mary.  The details of cracks on the walls and tiles only adds to the mesmerizing view.  It appears Vermeer may have taken a shortcut with his works.  There was an early version of the camera that captured images.  Imagine a master tracer and master painter creating a masterpiece.  All is forgiven.  She is worth the ordeal of flying KLM or maybe Ryanair.

Vermeer's The Love Letter

Also in the Great Hall is Rembrandt. Unlike many artists, he was popular in his day.  At the end of the great hall is his finest work, The Nightwatch. It is massive.  In fact, it was so big they chopped the end off to make it fit.  Fortunately? there is a maquette on the planned piece next to the finished work.  Paintings like this were commissioned to show everyone how rich you were with pomp and circumstance as honorary members of the city guard.  These were all posers, pun intended.  Many of the patrons--the people footing the bill were pissed off annoyed they were not prominently visible. The painting was not considered 'very good' and was relegated to a less desirable location.

What the hell were they thinking?  You know instantly this is one of the greatest paintings ever done. The lighting is dazzling, the composition looks like it is marching towards you. The colors come alive.  To be honest (blasphemy coming), I'm not a big fan of Rembrandt but it is virtually impossible to cast any doubt on this painting.  By itself, it is also worth a trip to Amsterdam.

Once you are done with the Great Hall, you can look around at the rest of the 'lesser works'  (HAH!).  There are recreations of boats and many examples of Delftware of glassware but my favorite curiosity are the doll houses.  Money was no object for some of these children.  Girls could play for hours on rainy days (about 217 per year!).  They are embarrassingly detailed snapshots of wealth.  In addition to the endless details, are ephemeral objects that no longer exist. Malibu Barbie never had it this good.

On a final note, The Netherlands is the densest country in Europe.  During the Protestant Reformation,  the country went cray.  People destroyed Catholic images.  It became illegal to be Papist so hidden churches were created from common houses (They are cool, seek them out.) in the city.  When the Spanish came to town, it was a balancing act to be Protestant yet not with too much enthusiasm.  Basically, they have lived through a holy war.  You can imagine why the people are tolerant today.

Die, Picture of a rich person pretending to be the image of a holy person during the Iconoclasm.