The Rijksmuseum was founded in the Hague in 1800 and moved to Amsterdam in 1808, where it was first located in the Royal Palace and later in the Trippenhuis. The current main building was designed by Pierre Cuypers and first opened in 1885. On 13 April 2013, after a ten-year renovation which cost € 375 million, the main building was reopened by Queen Beatrix. In 2013 and 2014, it was the most visited museum in the Netherlands with record numbers of 2.2 million and 2.47 million visitors. It is also the largest art museum in the country.
The museum has on display 8,000 objects of art and history, from their total collection of 1 million objects from the years 1200–2000, among which are some masterpieces by Rembrandt, Frans Hals and Johannes Vermeer."
beautiful Statues made of wood and stone
wikipedia says " Rembrandt painted the large painting The Militia Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq between 1640 and 1642. This picture was called De Nachtwacht by the Dutch and The Night Watch by Sir Joshua Reynolds because by the 18th century the picture was so dimmed and defaced that it was almost indistinguishable, and it looked quite like a night scene. After it was cleaned, it was discovered to represent broad day—a party of musketeers stepping from a gloomy courtyard into the blinding sunlight.
The piece was commissioned for the new hall of the Kloveniersdoelen, the musketeer branch of the civic militia. Rembrandt departed from convention, which ordered that such genre pieces should be stately and formal, rather a line-up than an action scene. Instead he showed the militia readying themselves to embark on a mission (what kind of mission, an ordinary patrol or some special event, is a matter of debate).
Contrary to what is often said, the work was hailed as a success from the beginning. Parts of the canvas were cut off (approximately 20% from the left hand side was removed) to make the painting fit its new position when it was moved to Amsterdam town hall in 1715; the Rijksmuseum has a smaller copy of what is thought to be the full original composition; the four figures in the front are at the centre of the canvas. " I was impressed.
Wikipedia says "Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn July 15, 1606 – October 4, 1669) was a Dutch draughtsman, painter and printmaker. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally considered one of the greatest visual artists in the history of art and the most important in Dutch art history. Unlike most Dutch Masters of the 17th century, Rembrandt's works depict a wide range of style and subject matter, from portraits and self-portraits to landscapes, genre scenes, allegorical and historical scenes, biblical and mythological themes as well as animal studies. His contributions to art came in a period of great wealth and cultural achievement that historians call the Dutch Golden Age, when Dutch Art (especiallyDutch painting), although in many ways antithetical to the Baroque style that dominated Europe, was extremely prolific and innovative, and gave rise to important new genres. Like many artists of the Dutch Golden Age, such asJan Vermeer of Delft, Rembrandt was also an avid art collector and dealer.
Rembrandt never went abroad, but he was considerably influenced by the work of the Italian masters dang Netherlandish artists who had studied in Italy, like Pieter Lastman, the Utrecht Caravaggists, and Flemish Baroque Peter Paul Ruebens. Having achieved youthful success as a portrait painter, Rembrandt's later years were marked by personal tragedy and financial hardships. Yet his etchings and paintings were popular throughout his lifetime, his reputation as an artist remained high, and for twenty years he taught many important Dutch painters.
Rembrandt's portraits of his contemporaries, self-portraits and illustrations of scenes from the Bible are regarded as his greatest creative triumphs. His self-portraits form a unique and intimate biography, in which the artist surveyed himself without vanity and with the utmost sincerity. Rembrandt's foremost contribution in the history of printmaking was his transformation of the etching process from a relatively new reproductive technique into a true art form, along with Jacques Callot. His reputation as the greatest etcher n the history of the medium was established in his lifetime and never questioned since. Few of his paintings left the Dutch Republic whilst he lived, but his prints were circulated throughout Europe, and his wider reputation was initially based on them alone.
By Rembrandt - www.rijksmuseum.nl : Home : Info, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=157946.
In his works he exhibited knowledge of classical iconography, which he molded to fit the requirements of his own experience; thus, the depiction of a biblical scene was informed by Rembrandt's knowledge of the specific text, his assimilation of classical composition, and his observations of Amsterdam's Jewish Population. Because of his empathy for the human condition, he has been called "one of the great prophets of civilization". The French sculptor Auguste Rodin said, "Compare me with Rembrandt! What sacrilege! With Rembrandt, the colossus of Art! We should prostrate ourselves before Rembrandt and never compare anyone with him!" Vincent Van Gogh wrote, "Rembrandt goes so deep into the mysterious that he says things for which there are no words in any language. It is with justice that they call Rembrandt—magician—that's no easy occupation." I loved all the Rembrandt's that I saw
Wikipedia says" Johannes VermeerOctober 1632 – December 1675) was a Dutch painter who specialized in domestic interior scenes of middle-class life. He was a moderately successful provincial genre painter in his lifetime but evidently was not wealthy, leaving his wife and children in debt at his death, perhaps because he produced relatively few paintings.
Vermeer worked slowly and with great care, and frequently used very expensive pigments. He is particularly renowned for his masterly treatment and use of light in his work.
Vermeer painted mostly domestic interior scenes. "Almost all his paintings are apparently set in two smallish rooms in his house in Delft; they show the same furniture and decorations in various arrangements and they often portray the same people, mostly women."
He was recognized during his lifetime in Delft and The Hague, but his modest celebrity gave way to obscurity after his death. He was barely mentioned in Arnold Houbraken's major source book on 17th-century Dutch painting (Grand Theatre of Dutch Painters and Women Artists), and was thus omitted from subsequent surveys of Dutch art for nearly two centuries. In the 19th century, Vermeer was rediscovered by Gustav Friedrich Waagen and Theophi Thore-Burger, who published an essay attributing 66 pictures to him, although only 34 paintings are universally attributed to him today. Since that time, Vermeer's reputation has grown, and he is now acknowledged as one of the greatest painters of the Dutch Golden Age, Like some major Dutch Golden Age artists such as Frans Hals and Rembrandt, Vermeer never went abroad. And like Rembrandt, he was an avid art collector and dealer.
there were lots of fantastically detailed paintings of fruit and flowers and dead birds on tables in kitchens and dinning rooms. Margie bought a print of a flower one which is gorgeous.
there were other great dutch masters who painted landscapes and city scenes. all were wonderful to see.
we had a lovely tasty lunch at the museum and talked about all that we had seen. a morning well spent.
We then went to the gift shop and proceeded to pick up a few souvenirs from amongst the great variety there. so much to buy so little money.
we then went back outside the museum to the big field and walked down to the Van Gogh Museum
Wikipedia says "the Van Gogh Museum is an art museum dedicated to the works of Vincent Van Gogh and his contemporaries in Amsterdam in the Netherlands
The museum opened on 2 June 1973. It is located in buildings designed by Gerrit Rietveld and Kisho Kurokawa. The museum's collection is the largest collection of Van Gogh's paintings and drawings in the world.
In 2017, the museum had 2.3 million visitors, and was the most visited museum in the Netherlands and the 23rd most visited art museum in the world." Well all I know is that it was pretty crowded when we went. you get your time to go in and do not be late.
We started in the second floor and saw so many of his self portraits. Margie said is that all he painted? where were the sunflowers? then we realized that we were in the self portrait room. Van Gogh did not have a lot of money so painted himself a lot. the original selfies were done by poor painters.
Van Gogh story is such a sad one. the mystery is though did he really try to kill himself or was he shpt by accident by someone unknown. (and the ear of course)
the next floor was more of his landscape and outdoor art
Margie released there were a few of his paintings that she actually did like. I like lots of his work and was thrilled to be able to see so much of it. although I was hoping to see more his art is so spread out over the world now that getting to see so much all together is a real treat.
We went back through the gift a shop and once again spent a bit more of our money on important things like coasters and bags for friends back home. back to the hotel to drop things off and away we go again.
Trolley back to the red light district.
I wanted to find the street that you always see on postcards and jigsaw puzzles of the houses right on the water and so we walked and walked.
Crossing more bridges, checking the map every few blocks but we never found the right place.
We did find a lovely toy shop, We did find another pub, actually we passed lots of pubs, where we had a coffee and a lovely sit down for a bit.
No matter how we read the map we could not figure out how to get to the tourist attraction that I wanted to see maybe we should have gone on the tour. Hindsight is always 100%. I loved the architecture of a lot of the buildings. so interesting and detailed
the little streets of Amsterdam are quiet away from the tourist areas. Narrow and clean. I did notice that they were clean which was nice.
There were lots of flowers everywhere. Window boxes and decorated little balconies. Daffodils and tulips and flowers I had not seen before.
Some of the houses and balconies had some rather unique decorations. probably so that they would stand out on the street. You could give directions to your house easily if you said I am the house with the flowers on it next to the house the with the cats and dogs hanging all over the balcony.
The crooked houses were here also, some more crooked than others. I wondered how long they had been crooked and how they kept them from literally falling into each other.
We did find this rather interesting bridge with a crane on it and at that point we gave up and headed back to where we could catch a trolley. It was a little disappointing not finding that area which seemed to be clearly marked on the map but that seemed to not actually be there for us. but it just gives me another reason to come back to Amsterdam.
We came across a little park with a statue of a mother and child. Although Amsterdam has lots of flowers everywhere in pots and small gardens beside buildings, we had seen that many parks so it was nice to see a little green space with a bench and some art.
Along one street was either a river, or a very wide canal, and we found a large green space for strolling and picnicing and with a concrete playground. I do not recall ever having seen a concrete slide for kids before. There were several children playing in this park with their parents dutifully keeping an eye on them. I wondered if this river was where those houses were. Oh well, we were getting very tired of walking around by this time so decided to head back to the hotel
Our trolley back to the hotel, was good and again our stop was a few blocks past our hotel so we had to walk back a bit but we did find a statue of Ghandi in a long green space on a wide boulevard in between the roads with lanes for bicycles, cars and trolleys in front of some apartment buildings on both sides. there were a few other statues but Ghandi is the one that caught our eye.
