Rijksmuseum

“ RIJKS MUSEUM, AMSTERDAM
feels the bigness in nature everywhere about us. For compare The Mill near Wyk-by-Duurstede, Ruisdael’s masterpiece in the Rijks Museum. Familiar enough in Holland are the ingredients of this scene: gray water, gray lowering sky, olive-green, brown, and pale-buff ground and trees, a gleam of light on the body of the mill; yet with what a majesty of conception they are clothed! ”

“ The museums and picture galleries of Amsterdam are of great interest. The Ryks Museum, or state museum, is the first in Holland. It is a large, handsome and finely situated building designed by Dr P. J. H. Cuyper in the Dutch Renaissance style, and erected in 1876–1885. The exterior is decorated with sculptures and tile-work, and internally it is divided, broadly speaking, into a museum of general antiquities below, and the large gallery of pictures of the Dutch and Flemish schools above. ”

“ Many of the small towns have a collection of local antiquities, which are, as a rule, attractively displayed; for the members of the numerous Dutch antiquarian societies take great pride in the history of their country. Sometimes, as in the case of the “Museum van Kunstnyverheid” in Haarlem, the collection embraces the artistic industries of ancient and modern times. This museum contains a particularly fine collection of kitchen utensils and other articles and furniture familiar to us in the pictures of Jan Steen, Maes and other Dutch masters. ”

“ The municipal collections of art are deposited in the museum and picture gallery in the Palais des Beaux Arts, formerly the vice-regal residence of the Austrian governors. In one wing of the building, called the Palais d’Industrie, are deposited models of machinery, agricultural instruments, and inventions of all kinds applicable to manufactures. The collection is [201] costly and extensive, and cannot fail to exercise a beneficial influence in the education of mechanics. The main galleries of the palace are filled with the national pictures, which amount to between three and four hundred. ”

“ There are one or two other churches of fragmentary value, the unique museum made out of the old dwelling and printing-office of Christopher Plantin, with its stores of mediæval and Renaissance industrial art, and the Royal Museum where there are more admirable examples of the painting of Flanders, Brabant, and the Netherlands than are to be found gathered together in any other one place. ”

“ In Antwerp there are scores of streets and squares, and even quays, named after its artists. There are also fine statues to Rubens, Van Dyck, David Teniers, Jordaens, Quinten Matsys, and Hendrik Leys, and other memorials to the brothers Van Eyck, to Memling, Wappers, Frans Hals, Van der Heyden, De Keyser, and Verboekhoven. In private and public collections the people have jealously kept possession of the masterpieces of their fellow countrymen. The Royal Museum of Fine Arts, on the Place du Musée, is as much a treasure-house of Flemish art as the Rijks Museum at Amsterdam is of Dutch art. ”

“ In the National Gallery one finds a throng of nursery-maids, and men just come from their work; true, they make a great deal of noise thronging to and fro on the uncarpeted floors in their thick boots, and noise from which, when penetrated by the atmosphere of Art, men in the thickest boots would know how to refrain; still I felt that the sight of such objects must be gradually doing them a great deal of good. The British Museum would, in itself, be an education for a man who should go there once a week, and think and read at his leisure moments about what he saw. ”

“ Around this street great numbers of celebrated buildings are erected, from the close of the seventeenth century up to the present, including the School of Arts and Sciences, royal stables, universities and palaces of Kaiser Wilhelm I; the old Museum, a beautiful building in Greek style, all abounding in collections of choice antiques, art, in the way of frescos, bronzes, gems, vases, pictures, stationery, and everything on earth to delight the eye of the connoisseur as well as to tire it; so that royalty and its environs lose half their interest when forced to gorge oneself day in and day out. ”

“ One thought leads to another. It is impossible also to remain long in the great Hals’ room of the Museum without meditating a little upon the difference between these arquebusiers and the Dutch of the present day. Passing among these people, once so mighty and ambitious, so great in government and colonisation, in seamanship and painting, and seeing them now so material and self-centred, so bound within their own small limits, so careless of literature and art, so intent upon the profits of the day and the pleasures of next Sunday, one has a vision of what perhaps may be our own lot. ”

“ There are few more characteristic and inspiring sights in Europe than that which greets the eye in a walk on a sunny afternoon in winter from the palace of Kaiser Wilhelm I. through the Operahaus Platz and the Zeughaus Platz, across the Schloss Brücke and the Lustgarten, to the peerless building of the Old Museum,—with the grand equipages, the brilliant uniforms, and the busy but not overcrowded life which throng the vast spaces of these handsome thoroughfares. The Old Museum is not so rich in masterpieces as some other and older art galleries, but there are many fine original works. ”

“ To descant on the many treasures displayed in the museums or picture-galleries would carry one too far. The tourist will “do” the Rijks Museum, and content himself with a glance at Rembrandt's great painting, erroneously styled “The Night Watch,” at Paul Potter's “Bull,” in the Mauritshuis at The Hague, where is also to be seen Rembrandt's “Lesson of Anatomy,” or, again, at Franz Hals' “Jolly Toper” and “Buffoon,” likewise in the great museum of Amsterdam. But the lover of art will do more. ”

“ Everything is groaning under heavy military paint—teak doors, beautiful brass fittings and beamed ceilings—and about a mile away, shut up in a small ugly museum room, are the Rightful Inhabitants—the proper belongings of these long rooms: the oak tables, the big chairs, which once held the old Dutch Governors, the glass they used, the huge silver spittoons, their swords, the flowered panniers of their wives' dresses, fire-irons, brasses, china, the old flags, someone's sedan-chair—all bundled together in grotesque array. ”

“ Far be it from me to criticize the freaks of female fashion. I never know what they are until after they are past due. But if the Dutch [61] hobble ever reaches the American side of the Atlantic it will be time for the mere men to organize.
The greatest art gallery in Europe is here, The Rijks Museum. I went to see it—once. I do not get the proper thrills from seeing a thousand pictures in thirty minutes. They make me tired. But Rembrandt’s Night Watch, or nearly anything a good Dutch artist has painted, is a real pleasure. ”

“ A similar fate would have attended his magnificent collection of pictures, but the Dutch government wisely redeemed this treasure, and, in imitation of their sister republic, founded a national gallery. Since its foundation in ninety-seven, to November, eighteen hundred, three thousand one hundred and twenty tickets of admission only had been issued; a proof that much taste for the fine arts does not exist in Holland, or that few strangers have resorted to the Hague. ”

“ When it happens that the spirit of the Earl meets his rank and his duties, we have the best examples.... These are the men who make England that strong-box and Museum it is; who gather and protect works of art, dragged from amidst burning cities and revolutionary countries, and brought hither, out of all the world.... When I saw that, besides deer and pheasants, these men have preserved Arundel Marbles, Townley Galleries, Howard and Spencer Libraries, Warwick and Portland Vases, Saxon Manuscripts, Monastic Architectures, and Millenial Trees, I pardoned their high park-fences.’ ”

“ On one side of the Picture Gallery is the Natural History Museum, and on the other, collections of ancient tapestry, enamels, cabinets, and furniture. In a separate saloon is the faïence, consisting chiefly of plates. In the second storey is the MUSEE DE FABRIQUE. In the centre of the room are models of the ribbon-looms, and round the walls, under glass, specimens of the ribbons, which, from their small size and arrangement, do not show to advantage. Even the portraits, although most remarkable specimens of silk-weaving, are apt to be passed by, as simply very good engravings. ”

“ The house, built like half the letter H, is of red brick with stone finishings, and in the Elizabethan style, with Dutch gardens of a later date. Much of the old-time decorations and furniture remains. The library, a long gallery, forms the eastern wing, and contains a valuable collection, including many manuscripts and autographs. There are fine pictures and sculptures, with old clocks, vases, cabinets, and carvings, and also a celebrated collection of miniatures. For over two centuries it was the favorite resort of wits and beauties, painters and poets, scholars, philosophers, and statesmen. ”

“ In the chief countries of the Continent of Europe—on the other hand—great national Museums have, commonly, had their origin in the liberality and wise foresight either of some sovereign or other, or of some powerful minister whose mind was large enough to combine with the cares of State a care for Learning. In Britain, our chief public collection of literature and of science originated simply in the public spirit of private persons. ”

“ Ary Scheffer might have made an excellent tea-dealer.
The museum at Dordrecht only showed in excess an aspect of displayed art which is in some degree common to all museums. For there is no museum which is not a place of desolation. Indeed, I remember to have seen only one collection of pictures, public or private, in which every item was a cause of joy—that of Mr. Widener, near Philadelphia. Perhaps the most wonderful thing in the tourist’s Holland is the fact that the small museum at Haarlem, with its prodigious renown, does not disappoint. ”

“ The British Museum was founded precisely at that period of our history when the distinctively national, or governmental, care for the interests of literature and of science was at its lowest, or almost its lowest, point. As regards the monarchs, it would be hard to fix on any, since the dawn of the Revival of Learning, who evinced less concern for the progress and diffusion of learning than did the first and second princes of the House of Hanover. ”

“ When a gate has to be moved, or a hinge is no longer used, or a lock or even a key from these early times goes out of commission, we would consider it almost a sacrilege to throw it away; it is transported to the museum--not alone because of its value as an antique but, as a rule, also because of its charm as a work of art. When a bench-end is no longer needed it, too, finds its way into the museum. ”

“ The searches which have taken place in different parts of the departement, and especially in the roman theatre at Lillebonne, have produced the greater number of antiquities. A great many others are through the generosity of private individuals. This museum contains statues, busts, bas-reliefs, fragments of architecture, sarcophagi, urns of marble and stone; vases of bronze, glass and baked earth; gallic and roman medals, pieces of french coins, seals of the middle ages, stained glass, arms, pieces of furniture, utensils and ornaments of different ages. ”

“ In planning, therefore, the division of space in a museum, the committee should always arrange for exhibits of interest to the local industries. In addition there must, of course, be a collection for cultural purposes, which should mean material covering the history of art in all periods and all countries. A collection of reproductions is of inestimable value in the teaching of the history of art. Few museums can hope to possess fine examples of Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Gothic and Renaissance sculpture. ”

“ By the side of the great Flemish cities, Brussels, Antwerp, Ghent and Bruges, those vast and incomparable living museums which have been watchfully preserved by a whole people, a people above all others attached to its traditions, they formed a constellation of little towns, delightful and hospitable, too little known to travellers. ”

“ Opposite page 40 I have reproduced his portrait of a lady in the Ryks Museum at Amsterdam, which amongst so many fine pictures one may perhaps at the outset treat Page 47with too little ceremony, but which undoubtedly will assert itself. It is a picture that, as we say, grows on one: the Unknown Lady becomes more and more mischievous, more and more necessary.
The little Archiepiscopal Museum at Utrecht is as small—or as large—as a museum should be: one can see it comfortably. It has many treasures, all ecclesiastical, and seventy different kinds of lace ”

“ The public galleries of a museum, whether of natural history, antiquities or art, should not contain the bulk of the collection, but only special things, carefully selected, and equally carefully placed in case or on wall, with artistic judgment as to space-bordering and colour of background, and with scientific perfection of illumination, so as to produce the "just" impression on the leisurely visitor. ”

“ The New Museum, connected by a colonnade with the Old, is not, like it, remarkable for architectural beauty; but its vast collections, especially in marble, already need and [106] are to have a new building. The masterpieces of ancient sculpture gathered at Munich, Vienna, Paris, Rome, Naples, and elsewhere, are here reproduced in casts, making up a collection said to be, in its way, unrivalled in the world. The collection of originals in Renaissance sculpture is also extensive and valuable. ”