Made in Holland: Old Masters from a private collection in America

Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis, The Hague
November 4, 2010 - January 30, 2011
www.mauritshuis.nl

(The Hague, August 5, 2010) A selection of highlights from the remarkable art collection of Eijk and Rose-Marie de Mol van Otterloo will be on display at the Mauritshuis in The Hague in the Netherlands this autumn. The exhibition Made in Holland: Old Masters from a private collection in America features 44 masterpieces produced by Dutch masters during the Golden Age. Not only are these works of outstanding quality, their subject matter is often intriguing. The selection includes works by Rembrandt, FransHals, Jacob van Ruisdael, Jan Steen and Hendrick Avercamp. One floor of the Mauritshuis will be transformed into the home of Van Otterloos for a period of three months. This will offer a unique opportunity to view these works, which are rarely exhibited in public. Made in Holland opens to the public on November 4, 2010 and will be on view until January 30, 2011 in The Hague. The Dutch showing of this exhibition has been made possible thanks to financial support from the Turing Foundation, NIBC and the Friends of the Mauritshuis. History of a Collection Dutch collectors Eijk and Rose-Marie de Mol van Otterloo, started collecting after their marriage in 1974, initially acquiring antique carriages and English sporting prints. Peter Sutton, current director of the Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Connecticut, suggested that they collect works by seventeenth century Dutch masters. Simon Levie (advisor from 1995), former director of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, and Frits Duparc, former director of the Mauritshuis (who took over from Levie in2009), were closely involved in shaping this exceptionally beautiful collection.

Paintings of extraordinarily high quality continue to be added, such as Rembrandt’s Portrait of Aeltje Uylenburgh (1632) in 2005, which the couple themselves describe as ‘the jewel in our collection’s crown’, and Gerrit Dou’s Still Life with Sleeping Dog (1650): ‘love at first sight’. Masterpieces by Aert van derNeer, Esaias van de Velde, Gabriel Metsu, Salomon de Bray and Pieter Claesz were acquired in 2008and 2009.

All Genres Represented
A pretty, yet insolent young girl, a dog sleeping peacefully, winter landscapes or a summer scenewith shepherds and picturesque mountains: the pictures in Made in Holland illustrate the versatilityof seventeenth-century Dutch painting. In the exhibition, first-rate paintings will be grouped inensembles, with an emphasis on still lifes, landscapes, genre paintings and portraits.

Among the still lifes, a number of rare works by painters from Middelburg, including Balthasar vander Ast, Ambrosius Bosschaert and Adrian Coorte, are of particular interest. These will be shownalongside works by famous still-life painters such as Jan Davidsz de Heem and Willem Heda.The Dutch landscape is well represented with, among others, three works by the leading landscapeartist of the Golden Age, Jacob van Ruisdael. The work of Nicolaes Berchem, Jan Both, Karel du Jardin and Adam Pijnacker focuses on the Italian landscape.

Father and son Willem van de Velde the Elder and Willem van de Velde the Younger depict theDutch Republic as a seafaring nation. Admirers of seascapes like this will also enjoy Jan van deCappelle and Simon de Vlieger’s beautiful paintings.

In the portraits section, masterpieces by Rembrandt and Frans Hals stand out, while everyday life takes centre stage in the work of painters such as Jan Steen, Nicolaes Maes, Adriaen van Ostade and Frans van Mieris the Elder. An unexpected highlight is the history painting Orpheus Charming the Animals (c. 1640), an early work by Aelbert Cuyp.

In 2011, the complete collection of paintings, together with a smaller collection of antique furnitureand objets d’art, will go on display in the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts. Theexhibition will then move to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and finally to the Museum ofFine Arts in Houston.

Private Collectors and the Mauritshuis
Private collectors have always played an important role at the Mauritshuis. The core of the holdingsis made up of the royal collections of the Princes of Orange-Nassau, Willem IV (1711-1751) and Willem V (1748-1806), but since 1822, a large part of the museum’s collection -– has been acquiredvia gifts and bequests. Additionally, long and short-term loans made by individuals over the yearshave boosted the museum’s permanent display. Loans from private individuals also form an essential part of many exhibitions at the Mauritshuis. The Van Otterloos belong to this group of private lenders, which always supports exhibitions both at home and abroad, including those at the Mauritshuis, with great generosity. Since many of the works in the Van Otterloo’s collection were intended for private homes, the exhibition Made in Holland lends itself perfectly to the intimate galleries of the Mauritshuis, itself built in the seventeenth century as a private residence for Count Johan Maurits of Nassau Siegen (1604-1679).

Catalogue
A publication (of around 100 pages) written by Quentin Buvelot, Chief Curator at the Mauritshuis and curator of Made in Holland, will accompany the exhibition. It includes detailed discussions of the works on display and many illustrations. an introduction provides more information about the collectors. The attractive publication is available in Dutch and English.

Holland Art Cities
Art and culture are highlighted in Holland’s four largest cities during the event ‘Holland Art Cities’, which takes place in 2009 and 2010. Ten leading museums, including the Mauritshuis, have joined forces to put together an unprecedented display of art. The exhibition Made in Holland: Old Masters from a private collection in America forms part of the Dutch Masters theme that aims to showcase the work of both old and young Dutch masters in museum collections in the Netherlands.

Mauritshuis
The Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis is situated in the magnificent historical heart of The Hague in the Netherlands.  A 17^th-century city palace designed by Jacob van Campen, The Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis was  named after and commissioned by Count Johan Maurits van Nassau-Siegen. Almost 400 years later,  the Mauritshuis is a museum of international excellence. The renowned collection of seventeenth century  Dutch and Flemish masters, including Vermeer’s “Girl with a Pearl Earring”, attracts more than 200,000 visitors annually from all over the world. www.mauritshuis.nl