Comfortable, progressive, prosperous, with an amazingly rich cultural heritage considering its size (twice the area of New Jersey): this is today's Koninkrijk der Nederlanden or Kingdom of the Netherlands (the official name), a.k.a. The Low Countries or Holland -- the latter being, strictly speaking, the name of the nation's westernmost, wealthiest, most populous province.
Holland was in the forefront of the Protestant national war of liberation in the latter 16th century, led by William the Silent of Nassau and the House of Orange, in throwing off the Catholic Hapsburg "Spanish yoke" of Phillip II. In 1579 Holland joined 6 other Protestant northern provinces to form the Republic of the United Netherlands. Over the next century the United Provinces turned to the North Sea and Atlantic as routes to rapidly become a worldwide maritime empire of dazzling wealth, especially in the Dutch East and West Indies. The new affluence fueled a voracious public appetite for private art collecting, painting in particular, circumventing the iconoclastic, sober-minded traditions of a Calvinist society suspicious of church images.. The result was a legendary Golden Age of conspicuous consumption and the brilliant artistry of the Dutch Old Masters whose legacy -- with their modernist successors -- is the focus of the first week.
DAY 01 LEAVE USA
Depart from USA by overnight transatlantic flight to Amsterdam.
DAY 02 AMSTERDAM
Morning arrival at compact "single terminal" Schiphol airport in this capital city of tree-lined canals, museums and mansions, the Dutch Ballet and the renowned Concertgebouw Orchestra. Amsterdam took off economically in the 1590s after the Dutch severed Catholic Antwerp from water transport while the northern city built up 3 great semicircular canals ("grachten") accommodating over 15 miles of quays to service some 4000 ships. By the mid-17th century Amsterdam was northern Europe's leading port, the continent's banking and moneylending center (superseding the Italian and south German magnates) and not least, the cultural and scholarly capital of the United Provinces, attracting the likes of Rembrandt, Ruisdael and Spinoza.
Afternoon city tour begins near Dam Square with Royal Palace built 1648-55 as the new Raadhuis (City Hall) , painter-architect Jacob van Campen's grand, imposingly solid all-stone symbol of the country's independence ratified by Treaty of Westphalia 1648. Next door is the Nieuwe Kerk (New Church), Bilhamer's Oude Kerk (Old Church) and municipal architect Hendrick de Keyser's Westerkerk (West Church). In the latter Rembrandt (1605-1669) is buried -- a quiet spot far removed from the scholarly storms lately provoked by the controversial "de-attributions" in his oeuvre by Amsterdam's formidable Rembrandt Research Project.
Next visit the famous Anne Frank H uis with its haunting photographs and memorabilia; Munt Tower above Singel canal's floating flower market; tranquil Begijnhof, a grassy courtyard with 14th c houses; University Library; and finally, another house -- like Anne's a place of pilgrimage: the Museum Het Rembrandthuis (now somewhat altered) on Jodenbreestraat where he lived, painted and taught during a quarter-century.
DAY 03 AMSTERDAM
Today is devoted to exploring the magnificent museums around the Museumplein. First, riches of the Rijksmuseum: famous Rembrandts (Night Watch, Jewish Bride, Denial of St Peter); Vermeers (Kitchen Maid, Street in Delft , Woman Reading a Letter); Halses (Merry Drinker, Feyntje van Steenkiste) and Ruisdaels (Winter Landscape, View of Haarlem -- showing St Bavo church, to be visited Day 5) and fine canvases by De Hooch, Ter Borch, Jan Steen (subject of a major 1996-97 international exhibit, JS "schilder en verteller" ie painter and storyteller) as well as captivating single works such as Verspronck's charming Girl in a Blue Dress.
Nearby on Paulus Potterstraat is the Rijksmuseum Vincent Van Gogh holding 200 paintings, 550 drawings and 700 letters (the extraordinary correspondence with brother Theo) of this tormented visionary genius. Misunderstood , caricatured as a one-eared madman, van Gogh was deeply spiritual and the first great Dutch modernist. Displaying his evolution from the sombre Potato Eaters to the blazing Sunflower series, the exhibit makes painfully clear the astonishing, tragic fact that the world fame of this archetypal "bohemian" artist -- whose canvases, once unsaleable, are today multimillion dollar commodities -- rests on the frenetic output of a mere three years of poverty and loneliness before his suicide at 37. The building itself (1963-72) is a late design of Gerrit Thomas Rietveld, the leading Dutch modernist architect and charter member of De Stijl (Day 5 features an early Rietveld masterpiece).
Next door on Potterstraat is the Stedelijk Museum collection of Dutch and international art post-1850, esp native abstractionist Piet Mondrian (1872-1944), prime exponent of the art and architecture movement known as De Stijl after the Dutch magazine of the same name; canvases with characteristically bald titles like Composition with Red, Black, Blue, Yellow and Grey exemplify his unswerving commitment to a rigorous art of straight lines, geometric shapes and flat colors in exquisite balance. One of the world's great collections of modern art, the Stedelijk includes such other modern masters as Giacometti, Calder and Chagall as well as more recent accessions like Nam June Paik's intriguing TV Buddha.
Rest of day is free to stroll the mixed working class--bohemian Jordaan quarter with its cozy cafes, take a canal cruise, visit a diamond house or the Heineken Brewery (its American market share dramatically expanded when it came out that this was President Kennedy's personal favorite) or sample other esteemed labels at one of the specialty beer bars like In De Wildeman.
DAY 04 HAARLEM / AMSTERDAM
Short drive this morning due west for a half-day visit to Haarlem, city of Frans Hals (1580/85-1666), one of the greatest portraitists as well as a dazzling virtuoso of paintbrush technique.-- a quality largely unremarked by posterity until his rediscovery by Courbet, Manet and the Impressionists. A former almshouse where the destitute artist spent his final years supported by a municipal stipend, the Frans Hals Museum is a treasure trove of works created over his long career from his first portrait (J. Zaffius) to the large civic group portraits of his middle period (Militia Companies of St Hadrian and St George) to the late octogenarian masterworks (Regents of the Old Men's Home and probably his greatest canvas, Regentesses of the Old Men's Home), this Home being, poignantly, the final residence of Hals himself..
Hals is buried in St Bavokerk, built (1390-1510) on the Grote Markt in a graceful Late Gothic style quite different from the Protestant solidity of De Keyser's Westerkerk in Amsterdam. Other important architectural monuments you will see are Lieven de Key's Town Hall of 1620s (begun 13th c) and his earlier Meat Hall with its strikingly ornamented steep gables.
During the season (March-May 25) stop by the iridescent Keukenhof gardens south of Haarlem on the coast near Lisse: 70 meticulously landscaped acres of some 7 million gorgeous flowering bulbs including daffodils, hyacinths and the world-famous Dutch tulips. Return and overnight Amsterdam.
DAY 05 APELDOORN (HET LOO) / OTTERLO / UTRECHT / AMSTERDAM
Full day tour begins with an hour drive east of Amsterdam to Appeldoorn, site of the 17th century Het Loo Palace of the Royal House of Orange, beautifully restored after it became a State Museum (1971).
Built in 1685 by William II as a Louis XIV-style hunting palace, it served for 3 centuries as the Dutch royal family's favorite summer estate. Het Loo is a splendid repository of tapestries, antique furniture and other decorative arts -- luxuries the sober modern Dutch citizenry seem to approve rather than resent as appurtenances of the House of Orange (in contrast to the sometimes embattled House of Windsor across the channel), thanks in good measure to the perennial popularity of a succession of modest, dignified and effective matriarchal monarchs: Queens Wilhelmina, Juliana and the present Beatrix (her first-born, Prince Willem-Alexander, will in time be the first Dutch king since 1890).
Not far off at Otterlo is the National Park De Hoge Veluwe (first and largest of Dutch national parks -- 13,000 acres crisscrossed by many bike paths) and, at its center, the outstanding Kroeller-Mueller Museum with 270 Van Goghs plus Mondrians, Picassos and an attractive sculpture garden of Rodin, Moore and Lipschitz pieces.
From there drive to the old university town of Utrecht, called Trajectum ad Rhenum by the Romans
Visit St Michael's (1254-1674), the University (est 1636) and Cathedral's Domtoren, at 365 feet Holland's highest tower. A special treat is Het Catharijne Convent Museum (winner, European Museum of the Year 1980) with 6 centuries of Dutch Christian art (Rembrandt, Hals, Geertgen tot Sint Jans). In striking contrast is the asymmetrical layout of cubic shapes and stark geometric patterns (reminiscent of a Mondrian painting) of the famous Schroeder House (1924) designed for a woman artist by Gerrit Rietveld (1888-1964), leading De Stijl architect, who here created the movement's purest architectural exemplar among the handful of buildings actually constructed by the group (other members incl founding theorist and Bauhaus teacher Theo van Doesburg and architect J.J.P. Oud). Return and overnight in Amsterdam.
DAY 06 DEN HAAG (THE HAGUE)
Leave Amsterdam in the morning for Den Haag, seat of the government and Dutch Parliament (the Binnenhof), home to the Royal family and location of over 65 diplomatic missions and the Internationsal Court of Justice which meets at the Peace Palace. In contrast to these grand structures is the charming Madurodam, a miniature Dutch city 1/25th actual size proving the adage "small is beautiful." The ongoing investigation of recent atrocities in former Yugoslavia highlight the importance of Den Haag's International War Crimes Tribunal.
Originally Den Haag was the hunting preserve for the Counts of Holland and was called the Count's Hedge, hence its name. To see: elegant Binnenhof and its 13th c Ridderzaal (Knights' Hall) and famous Mauritshuis designed for Count Johan Maurits of Nassau by Jacob van Campen, now an outstanding museum (Vermeer's View of Delft, Head of a Girl a.k.a. Girl with Pearl Earring; Rembrandt's Anatomy Lesson of Dr Tulp, Saul and David; Rubens' Adam and Eve in Paradise). Also visit the extensive Mondrian collection in the Gemeente (Municipal) Museum, then see former Royal Palace and Great Hall of International Justice. Overnight Den Haag.
DAY 07 DELFT / ROTTERDAM
Full day excursion to Delft and Rotterdam just southeast of Den Haag.. Delft is the birthplace and lifelong residence of the uniquely magical, enigmatic artist Johannes Vermeer (1632-75); his career was so closely tied to the city and citizens his art immortalized that "Vermeer of Delft" was a stock phrase much like the reference to his great Humanist compatriot as "Erasmus of Rotterdam." (Yet Delft itself owns not one Vermeer.)
Considered with Hals and Rembrandt to be the great triumvirate of Dutch Baroque artists, Vermeer and his achievement was singled out in spectacular fashion recently by the unprecedented feat of gathering 22 of his extant 35 paintings in the historic 1996 exhibition -- in effect Vermeer's first lifetime retrospective and one-man show -- organized by Washington D.C.'s National Gallery of Art and the Mauritshuis to extraordinary critical acclaim and public response (further dramatized by its temporary suspension when a budget crisis shut down the federal government in the winter of '96).
In Delft visit the Paul Tetar van Elven House, a painter's studio typical of Vermeer's time, and spots associated with the great artist's life: birthplace at 25 Voldersgracht; Nieuwe Kerk (the sunlit spire in his View of Delft) where he was baptised near the famous tomb and marble death bed effigy of William of Orange c 1618 by architect-sculptor Hendrick de Keyser ; the Oude Kerk where Vermeer is buried with 3 children and his wife under a simple tombstone installed for the tricentenaray of his death. Time permitting, visit the Royal Poceleyne Fles where the world-famous blue and white Delft china is made
In the afternoon, tour Rotterdam -- so named when the river Rotte was separated by a dam from the New Maas in the 13th c -- where this city's most famous son Erasmus, author of the risible Latin classic "Moriae Encomium" (In Praise of Folly) was born in 1465. (His 1618 bronze statue by Hendrick de Keyser is the sole civic statuary produced during the Republic.) In the 16th c the city became famous for cloth and carpet weaving. Modern Rotterdam has the world's largest and busiest port, having successfully rebuilt since its near total annihilation by Stuka divebombers in the 1940 Nazi blitzkrieg. Visit the outstanding Boymans-Van Beuningen Museum with excellent works of Rembrandt (Titus, portrait of his 14 year old), Carel Fabritius (Self Portrait by this brilliant, short lived Rembrandt pupil), Bosch (Prodigal Son), Emanuel de Witte (serene Interior of a Church ) and others from Bruegel and Rubens to Picasso and Karel Appel. Overnight in Den Haag.
The tour continues through a country even smaller than the Netherlands, Belgium. Though only the size of Maryland and overwhelmingly (97%) Catholic, Belgium is split linguistically, historically and culturally between the country's French-speaking Walloons of the industrial south and the Flemish of the agricultural north whose written language is Dutch (their spoken dialect varies from the Netherlands) while capital Brussels is officially bilingual. Hence the country's dual names: Koninkrijk van Belgie or Royaume de Belgique.
Belgium lies at a strategic and cultural crossroads of old Europe from Caesar down to Charlemagne and later domination by France, Burgundy, Hapsburg Spain and Austria. Three of the crucial, costliest modern battles bloodied Belgian soil: Watterloo (1815), Ypres (actually 4 battles, World War I) and Bastogne/ Ardennes (Battle of the Bulge 1944-45). Yet the region has also prospered, ever since the rise of the medieval wool industry brought wealth and power to cities like Ghent and Bruges. The legacy of all this ranges from renowned Belgian lace, linen and tapestries to superb cuisine (including delicious chocolates and some of the world's most distinctive beers) and, above all, precious urban cathedrals and museums boasting priceless works by such native artists as the Northern Renaissance masters and the Baroque giant Rubens, to say nothing of idiosyncratic modern figures like Magritte and Ensor.
DAY 08 DEN HAAG / ANTWERP
Visit Kinderdijk region of windmills in a typical Dutch green landscape. After lunch depart for short drive south across the Belgian border to Antwerp (Antwerpen/Anvers) on the Scheldt river, culturally Belgium's most important city and home of the cosmopolitan, energetic, brilliant and hugely successful Baroque artist-ambassador Sir Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640). When the Dutch closed the Scheldt (see Day 2) it undercut Antwerp economically in the 17th century, yet during the second third of the century its wealth and the powerful patronage of the Catholic Church and the State under the Spanish regent in Flanders was still sufficient to make the city a great center of the arts. Today Antwerp is a powerhouse commercial city with much impressive state-of-the-art engineering projects around the modern port; it is also the world's greatest diamond cutting center and diamond market around Pelikaanstraat and at Diamond Land.
Afternoon tour of the largest church in Belgium or Holland, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwe kathedraal (Cathedral of Our Lady), built 1352-1521 in Brabant gothic style with 306 ft tower and later graced with an epic triptych (Raising of Cross, Descent from Cross, Assumption) by young Rubens; Grote Markt (Main Square) with its landmark Brabo fountain and Italian Cinquecento Renaissance style Stadhuis (Town Hall), the masterpiece (1561-65) of Cornelis Floris. Also early 17th c Jesuit Baroque St. Carolus Borromeuskerk, House of Rubens patron burgomaster Nicholas Rockox and St Jacobskerk (paintings of Rubens, Jordaens, Van Dyck; and Rubens Chapel with the artist's tombstone). Near the river is story-book Castle Steen, Antwerp's oldest structure, now a maritime museum and the Vleeshuis (Butchers' Guild House). Lastly, the small, excellent Mayer van den Bergh Museum (major Brueghels like Dulle Griet, Twelve Proverbs; Bouts, Metsys and others).
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