We went to the Gallery of Art yesterday. We had prepared to take the Metro, like Adrian wanted, but it started raining so we took the car instead. I dropped everyone off, and parked 15 minutes away.
It is such a lovely place. We all had a good time. Leo liked the boats, Adrian liked Rembrandt's self-portrait and Nora liked the French impressionists colors.
We looked at several Greek and Roman statues, and the boys had various observations to make.
Here is Leo looking at a model of a Dutch "jacht" -- in the back you can see "View of Hoorn".
Yesterday we went to the Vermeer exhibition at the Gallery of Art. There was a 30 minute line for the exhibition. It was probably busy due to the holiday weekend. The boys were getting restless, bored and hungry so I left the line with them, and we had lunch together. It was very cosy with them in the restaurant; we had the sandwiches we brought from home and talked. After lunch we went back upstairs the room with old Dutch art, which was so beautiful. The boys even appreciated it.
Sasha and Nora saw the main exhibition which had works by Vermeer and his contemporaries. After that we met up in the restaurant again, which the boys liked because there would be more food...
A terrific morning together. When we were in the car going home Adrian asked if we were going to have "brood kaas" at home. But no, two lunches was enough.
We went to the National Gallery of Art this afternoon. It was the second visit for Nora and we went to see the modern art section this time. To be honest, I am not a big fan of modern art but Nora liked it a lot. She especially enjoyed watching the mobiles and the large brightly colored paintings.
Afterwards we went back to the West wing of the museum with classical paintings. I always enjoy watching the Dutch masters. We also saw a David-Apollo statue that was on loan from a museum in Florence.
It was a rainy Sunday today and we decided to visit the National Gallery of Art. This was Nora's first visit to a museum and she enjoyed it.
We watched several paintings together and she seemed to like them, especially the Van Gogh ones.
On the picture we are looking at Salomon Van Ruysdael's Rivierlandschap met veerpont. The painting was part of the Goudstikker collection and acquired by the National Gallery in 2008. Until 2005 it was on display in Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum. A beautiful painting.
In the fall of 2004 Sasha, Steven and I went to the Toneelschuur in Haarlem and saw the movie Girl with a Pearl Earring.
A few days later, while I was waiting for my visa to be processed, we saw the painting in the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague. It's a gorgeous little painting, and through the movie it became one of Vermeer's best-known works.
Yesterday the news came out that Girl with the Pearl Earring will be shown in three museums in the United States next year, while the Mauritshuis is being renovated. Very exciting news.
Vermeer's masterpiece "Girl With a Pearl Earring" will be on display in three museums in the United States in 2013, along with 34 other masterpieces from the Dutch Royal Picture Gallery, the Mauritshuis.
The traveling exhibition "Girl With a Pearl Earring: Dutch Paintings From the Mauritshuis,” will start in January 2013 at the De Young museum in San Francisco and then move to the High Museum of Art in Atlanta. In October the show will be scaled down to 10 works and presented as “Vermeer, Rembrandt and Hals: Masterpieces of Dutch Painting from the Mauritshuis” at the Frick Collection in New York City.
The Dutch Maurits House museum will undergo a renovation starting April 2013 and is sending 35 paintings on a two-year tour to the United States and Japan. The tour, a $28 million fundraiser for the renovation of the museum, will include paintings by Vermeer, Rembrandt, Frans Hals, Jan Steen and Jacob van Ruisdael.
A repeat visitor to the United States
The highlight of the exhibition is the world-famous "Girl With a Pearl Earring", painted around 1665. The painting became the subject of a best-selling novel in 1999 and in 2003 of a movie starring Scarlett Johansson and Colin Firth.
The painting appeared at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1984 as part of a five-year traveling show during the Mauritshuis’s previous restoration. It was last seen in the United States in 1995 at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., in a 21-picture exhibition focused solely on Vermeer.
Girl With a Pearl Earring: Dutch Paintings From the Mauritshuis:
- De Young Museum in San Francisco, January 26 to June 2, 2013
- High Museum of Art in Atlanta, June 22 to September 29, 2013
- the Frick Collection in New York City (10 paintings), October 22, 2013 to January 12, 2014.
American filmmaker Michael Bauch fell in love with the Dutch bicycling lifestyle. His movie Riding Bikes with the Dutch, created while he lived in Amsterdam for a while, premieres May 9 at the Bicycle Film Festival in Long Beach, California.
Riding Bikes with the Dutch compares the bicycling culture of Holland with the car-centered lifestyle in Southern California and provides a twist of optimism in the urban seaside location of Long Beach, California. Amsterdam streetscapes and bicycle parking structures; Los Angeles freeways and Long Beach bike paths serve as scenic backdrop for the filmmaker’s dream to create more livable communities here in the United States.
Bike riding was a favorite activity for Michael Bauch, a Long Beach resident and independent filmmaker, who noticed that many of his local errands involved short rides which were less than three miles. After installing a simple basket, Bauch’s bicycle was now equipped for runs to the grocery store, bank and post office, and cross-town meetings. Integrating the bike into his everyday life seemed effortless and often quicker than taking a car, fighting traffic congestion and finding a place to park.
"A bike is the ultimate multi-task tool. Get your local errands done, your exercise, and do your share for the environment all in one fell swoop. I didn't understand why my neighbors weren’t integrating them into their everyday lives," said Michael Bauch. "In the U.S., bicycles are perceived either as high-performance sports machines, toys for children, or a last resort. This cultural perception intrigued me as it was in direct contrast to the values shared by my family living in Europe who use bikes as daily transport—and one of my inspirations for this project."
Living in Amsterdam
An early short documentary entitled Amsterdam: the Bicycling Capital of Europe captivated him to further the endeavor. In the fall of 2007, Bauch together with his wife and 7-month old son exchanged their home in Long Beach, California for a canal-apartment near the Jordaan neighborhood of Amsterdam. The experience allowed the filmmaker to live and film on location in the picturesque bike-filled city.
Bauch: "The first time I stepped off the train in Amsterdam I was literally speechless. As soon as I set foot on the ground I was almost run over by a mob of bikes. I turned to look up and to my amazement there was a 3 level structure dedicated to just parking bicycles. Everyone from three years old to 93 seemed to be tooling around the city on two wheels. This was too much to take in with just my own eyes. I needed to share this with everyone I could and this is why I made my film: Riding Bikes with the Dutch."
On Sunday February 28 there was a reception in the Morgan Library & Museum in New York to celebrate the exposition “Demons and Devotion: The Hours of Catherine of Cleves”. Several presentations provided a background to the historical book and presented the city of Nijmegen.
Thomas de Graaf, Mayor of Nijmegen, attended and he was joined by a large cast of actors who portrayed characters from the book's era. As the Roger Wieck, curator of The Morgan Library said: "The museum has never seen a more well-dressed crowd!"
Thomas de Graaf: "Nijmegen is the oldest city in the Netherlands"
After we wrote about the exhibition earlier, several of our readers stated on our Facebook page that Dordrecht and Maastricht are older than Nijmegen. We asked Mr. de Graaf about the claim that Nijmegen is the oldest city of the Netherlands.
Mr. de Graaf clearly enjoyed the subject and was quite clear: "Well, certainly not Dordrecht. They didn't get city rights until the Middle Ages. Maastricht may have a somewhat better claim, but in fact the city archeologist of Maastricht has proclaimed that indeed Nijmegen is older". An import piece of evidence is the godenpijler, a monument to Roman Emperor Tiberius which was found in Nijmegen. It dated to 8 BCE or 5 CE, and points out the importance of Nijmegen at that time.
"People from Maastricht will challenge us and ask whether Nijmegen been inhabited continuously since then. However, we have archeological proof that indeed it has been, such as cemeteries and other archeological finds."
Actors from Nijmegen
A group of 30 actors from the Netherlands was in the museum to illustrate the costumes people wore at that time. Mr. Pool, one of the actors who helped check in guests, explained that the group of actors has been performing around in Zutphen, Nijmegen and other cities in the Netherlands. In 2005 Nijmegen celebrated its 2000 years of existence.
Mr. Brown and Mr. van der Haargh are court announcers, who were enjoying their work and being in New York. "We arrived yesterday". Mr. van der Haargh explained his shoes -- they are made from leather and have sheep wool to soften them. "The more pointy your shoe's nose, the higher your status". The outside of the shoe is made of linen.
Mrs. Van Thiel, who was portraying Catherine of Cleves, was excited to be in New York City. "Tomorrow we'll do a photo shoot on Times Square, 5th Avenue etc. I've been in the costume for 10 hours already today but Tuesday we'll have some time off; I hope to be able to see Ellis Island".
Speeches
Mr. de Graaf spoke about the history of the city, and its relevance today. "Founded by Romans in the year 5, the Emperor gave us city charter less than 100 years later". "Nijmegen is not only the oldest city in the Netherlands, but also the youngest and most vibrant. The Rolling Stones and Coldplay, when they come to the Netherlands they choose Nijmegen."
The U.S. 82nd Airborn Division and paratroopers liberated Nijmegen in World War II in what Mr. de Graaf called "one of the most heroic operations of the war". He also mentioned the connection with Albany, NY, which helped Nijmegen during and after the war.
Ruud Priem, Curator of Museum Het Valkhof, Nijmegen, explained why the book of Cleves is so popular. The three main reasons are the elaborate stories in the book, the attention to detail of every day level scenes ("baby Jezus with a wooden walker") and the book's inventiveness -- it's very creative and has lovely minute details. Mr. Priem explained that the exhibition shows nearly a hundred of the 150 pages of the book; after the show the pages will be rebound.
Roger Wieck, Curator of The Morgan Library & Museum, was very excited about the exhibition. "Our collection is the finest in the country, and this is one of the collection's finest works."
The exhibition will be on display for several more weeks.
Demons and Devotion: The Hours of Catherine of Cleves Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY
January 22 through May 2, 2010
Mr. de Graaf, Mayor of Nijmegen, the Netherlands.
Mr. Priem, Curator of Museum Het Valkhof, Nijmegen.
Mr. Wieck, curator of The Morgan Library & Museum.
Mrs. Van Thiel, making an entrance as Catherine of Cleves.
The Washington Post writes today about an exhibition by Dutch designers Tejo Remy and René Veenhuizen in the Industry Gallery in Washington DC.
This is the first American solo exhibition for Mr. Remy, 20 years after he launched the radical idea of recycling-as-fine-design. Since 2000, all of Remy's works have been done in collaboration with Mr. Veenhuizen.
The Washington Post:
People often use words like "whimsical," "comic" or "witty" to describe the works of Remy and Veenhuizen, but the laughter they provoke is usually nervous, more like a response to Lenny Bruce than to Mickey Mouse. "For us, it's dead serious," Veenhuizen says, smiling. "It's not humor for humor's sake," says Remy, more soberly. "Good humor is very intellectual."
Almost all of us still associate design with "comfort" -- if not physical, then at least intellectual or aesthetic. Even if a Bauhaus armchair in chrome and leather may not be easy on the bottom, it is easy on the eyes and has such a get-able gestalt that we can learn to be at ease with it. Even most avant-garde designers have come up with new models for comfort and ease -- turning away from Victorian velvet-on-oak, for instance, to embrace Bauhaus, then Danish modern. What few designers have done is work to abolish comfort itself as a design principle, in favor of objects that disconcert. That's the Remy and Veenhuizen model.
We went to the Gallery of Art yesterday. We had prepared to take the Metro, like Adrian wanted, but it started raining so we took the car instead. I dropped everyone off, and parked 15 minutes away. 
The new Google Arts & Culture app has a feature to compare a selfie with works of art. 
Yesterday we went to the Vermeer exhibition at the Gallery of Art. There was a 30 minute line for the exhibition. It was probably busy due to the holiday weekend. The boys were getting restless, bored and hungry so I left the line with them, and we had lunch together. It was very cosy with them in the restaurant; we had the sandwiches we brought from home and talked. After lunch we went back upstairs the room with old Dutch art, which was so beautiful. The boys even appreciated it. 
We went to the National Gallery of Art this afternoon. It was the second visit for Nora and we went to see the modern art section this time. To be honest, I am not a big fan of modern art but Nora liked it a lot. She especially enjoyed watching the mobiles and the large brightly colored paintings.
It was a rainy Sunday today and we decided to visit the National Gallery of Art. This was Nora's first visit to a museum and she enjoyed it. 
In the fall of 2004 Sasha, Steven and I went to the Toneelschuur in Haarlem and saw the movie 
American filmmaker Michael Bauch fell in love with the Dutch bicycling lifestyle. His movie Riding Bikes with the Dutch, created while he lived in Amsterdam for a while, premieres May 9 at the Bicycle Film Festival in Long Beach, California.
An early short documentary entitled Amsterdam: the Bicycling Capital of Europe captivated him to further the endeavor. In the fall of 2007, Bauch together with his wife and 7-month old son exchanged their home in Long Beach, California for a canal-apartment near the Jordaan neighborhood of Amsterdam. The experience allowed the filmmaker to live and film on location in the picturesque bike-filled city. 
On Sunday February 28 there was a reception in the Morgan Library & Museum in New York to celebrate the exposition 
"People from Maastricht will challenge us and ask whether Nijmegen been inhabited continuously since then. However, we have archeological proof that indeed it has been, such as cemeteries and other archeological finds."
The Washington Post 