The other art capital of Holland Hague

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This article was published 06/09/2003 (8078 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

THE HAGUE — Normally, when one thinks of art in Holland, the first place that springs to mind is Amsterdam.

That city’s massive Rijksmuseum has more than 5,000 paintings, including a superb array of 17th-century Dutch masters, capped by Rembrandt’s Night Watch. The nearby Van Gogh Museum has the world’s largest collection of paintings by the unhappy Impressionist who killed himself in 1890, then went on to posthumously achieve greater fame than he’d ever dreamt of in life.

But the Rijksmuseum is closing later this year for five years for cleaning and modernization (although 200 of its best works will remain on display in one wing of the building) and the Van Gogh Museum is so popular that, especially in the summer, the lineup to enter often stretches down the street; the galleries feel like being in a shopping mall on Saturday.

The Hague, with a population of about 450,000, doesn’t have much in the way of Van Goghs. But it more than holds its own in other art areas. And here, unlike Amsterdam, when you get tired of staring at pictures in a gallery you can always go to the beach. (Well, from mid-June to early September, anyway.)

The Hague’s centre lacks the charm of Amsterdam’s inner canals neighbourhood, but also most of the crowds. It’s a lovely green place with plenty of good shops and restaurants, thanks to its status as the Dutch seat of government — home to embassies, multi-national corporations and the United Nations’ International Court of Justice. Those folks coming with hefty expense accounts are catered to.

The blazing diamond in The Hague’s art crown is its Mauritshuis, a 17th-century mansion with a lake-sized pond for a back yard. It stands next to the Binnenhof, a courtyard collection of old buildings that for centuries was where the government sat. The Dutch prime minister’s office is still here, beside the Mauritshuis — if he’s in you’ll see his car parked outside.

The Mauritshuis isn’t a large gallery, but its collection is one of Europe’s finest.

The house specialty is Dutch and Flemish masters of the 15th to 18th centuries, those exemplars of how to turn daubs of thick oil paint into canvases of flashing light, deep perspective and perfectly realized detail.

Wandering through these rooms is like having the run of someone’s big house. Even if you’re not an art connoisseur, there are pictures here that you will know — at the very least, Vermeer’s haunting Girl With a Pearl Earring (1665), the inspiration for Tracy Chevalier’s best-selling 1999 novel, which will be released as a film starring Scarlett Johansson and Colin Firth in December 2003.

But there are also famous Rembrandts, including his Anatomy Lesson of Doctor Nicolaes Tulp (1632) and Self-Portrait (1669) and well-known works by the wonderful Jan Steen and Franz Hals, plus another outstanding Vermeer, his View of Delft (1660-61). Most are exquisitely well-preserved, the colours so fresh you think you can still smell the paint.

A three-minute walk from the Mauritshuis is a new museum dedicated to M.C. Escher (1898-1972) in a former royal palace on Lange Voorhout, a leafy square ringed by 17th- and 18th-century mansions.

The Escher Museum has two floors of the Dutch artist’s painstakingly precise lithographs, sketches and woodcuts. The lower level is mainly his early work — portraits, stamps designs and town scenes. (He was especially fond of Italian villages on hillsides overlooking valleys or the sea.)

Most of what he became famous for — transformations and impossible 3-D fantasy worlds — is upstairs. Here is Metamorphose II (1939-40), a long panel where squares melt into lizards, then beehives, bees and so on until finally a chessboard breaks back down into squares to bring things full circle. Also on display are the well-known works Relativity (1953), with stairs going everywhere, and Waterfall (1961), in which water from the base of a falls zigzags up a channel to the top of those self-same falls. Small wonder Escher was so popular with the counterculture in the late 1960s.

The endlessly segueing art of Escher makes a nice bridge between the representational works of the Mauritshuis and Dutch artist Piet Mondrian’s abstracts at The Hague’s Gemeentemuseum, a 10-minute tram ride from the Binnenhof.

The Gemeentemuseum (or Municipal Museum) has the world’s largest collection of works by Mondrian (1872-1944), including what’s widely regarded as his masterpiece, Victory Boogie Woogie (1942-44). Mondrian takes a bit of work. While paintings at the Mauritshuis can be understood by anyone and the fantastic drawings of Escher are, in literal terms, incomprehensible to all, the creations of Mondrian only make sense once the right framework is provided.

None is needed for his early canvases, when he was still painting dour landscapes, or even for his Cubist days with their clear reference to Picasso, but some background is handy when you come to the Neo-Plasticism for which he’s best-known.

Briefly, Neo-Plasticism allows only rectangles, vertical and horizontal lines and a very limited number of colours. This stems from Mondrian’s belief that art shouldn’t concern itself with images of actual things, but focus on the “universal absolutes” underlying reality. Neo-Plastic ideas influenced not just 20th-century painting, but architecture, design and graphic arts, too. If there’s a ruler-straight skyscraper or chair you don’t like, you could blame Mondrian.

His Victory Boogie Woogie can be contemplated for its Superman-costume colours and, as the museum describes it, “the way smaller and larger elements of the composition interlock, creating startling syncopations in the often driving visual rhythms.” Or you can look at it and wonder about the economics of art: This picture was purchased in 1998 for $40 million US from American magazine magnate S.I. Newhouse. He had bought it in 1987 for $11 million US.

A visit to the three museums will easily fill a day.

To round things out in an aesthetically appealing way, take the tram to The Hague’s port, Schreveningen, and buy an evening ticket to the Kuur Thermen Vitalizee. This beachside spa, opened in 1997, is just west of the landmark Steigenberger Kurhaus Hotel, which dates from Schreveningen’s late 19th-century heyday as a watering hole for high society.

For 15 Euros, about $22.50 Cdn, you get the use of all the spa’s facilities from 7 p.m. to closing at 11:30 p.m. That includes a swimming pool, whirlpool baths, herbal baths, saunas, a steam room, a cold plunge pool and an ice room. There’s also a restaurant/lounge where bathrobes are the only permitted attire, which is more than you’ll be wearing in the rest of the spa.

In the Dutch tradition, swimsuits are not allowed and the entire facility, including showers and change room, is co-ed. Very trim people, the Dutch.

John Masters is a member of the Vancouver-based Meridian Writers’ Group.

Visiting The Hague

Getting there

From Amsterdam, there is frequent train service to The Hague. Travel time is 45 minutes. For information on The Hague visit www.denhaag.com. For information on travel in Holland visit the Netherlands Board of Tourism at www.holland.com.

Galleries and exhibitions

* The Mauritshuis, Korte Vijverberg 8, is open Tuesday to Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Adult admission is 15 Euros ($22.50 Cdn) For more information call (011-31-70) 302 34 35 or visit www.mauritshuis.nl/english. The Holbein exhibition runs until Nov. 16 at the Mauritshuis. Adult admission, including an audio guide, is 12.50 Euros, about $18.75 Cdn. During the exhibition, the museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; www.hansholbein.nl or www.mauritshuis.nl/english.

* The Escher Museum (Escher in Het Paleis), Lange Voorhout 74, is open Tuesday to Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Adult admission is 7.50 Euros ($11.25 Cdn) For more information call (011-31-70) 427 77 30 or visit www.escherinhetpaleis.nl.

* The Gemeentemuseum, Stadhouderslaan 41, is open Tuesday to Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Adult admission is 7.50 Euros ($11.25 Cdn). From the Binnenhof, take tram No.17. For more information call (011-31-70) 338 11 11 or visit www.gemeentemuseum.com.

* Prince Willem V Gallery, 35 Buitenhof. Sort of a Mauritshuis annex of lesser-known classical works collected by Prince Willem (1748-1806). A walk around the pond from the Mauritshuis brings you to it, in an 18th-century house. Admission is included with a Mauritshuis ticket, or available separately for 1.50 Euros ($2.25 Cdn). Open Tuesday to Sunday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

* Bredius Museum, Lange Vijverberg 14. The personal collection of Abraham Bredius, a Rembrandt expert and former director of the Mauritshuis. The museum is halfway round the pond between the Mauritshuis and the Prince Willem V Gallery. Adult admission is 4.50 Euros ($6.75 Cdn). Open Tuesday to Sunday from noon to 5 p.m.

Other attractions

* Grote Kerk, Ronde de Grote Kerk 12. The Hague’s Great Church, finished in 1425, is handsome, large and sparsely decorated. No longer used as a church, it’s now home to special modern-art exhibitions. The church is a five-minute walk west of the Binnenhof.

* The Kuur Thermen Vitalizee, Strandweg 13f, Schreveningen, is open daily from 10 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. All-day use of the facilities costs 21.50 Euros ($32.25 Cdn). The evening rate (after 7 p.m.) is 15 Euros ($22.50 Cdn). You may bring your own bathrobe and towel or rent them for 4.50 Euros ($6.75 Cdn) each. Spa treatments are available at extra charge. From the Binnenhof, take tram No.8. For more information call (011-31-70) 416 65 00 or visit www.vitalizee.nl (only in Dutch).