Museum Hopper

We did a day trip to den hague when we were staying in amsterdam.   Haags gemeentemuseum is a little bit outside the downtown and we took a tram to get there! It was a pleasant surprise!  We really ended up enjoying the museum quite  abit.  We get there about ~2 hrs prior to closing.   We first walked through the exhibit, Asian Art and Dutch Taste .  It drew interesting connections of Art to the Asian culture.  I had never noticed the influence of the culture.  I loved how they highlighted the China and how the Dutch made changes and claimed it as their own.  This included jewelry, clothes, furniture, and painting. We had to go to this museum since it had three paintings on 1001 Paintings list.  Two for Piet Mondrian since he is Dutch (who knew?).  One was a traditional classic landscape and the other were the geometric paintings.  We learned quite a bit about the movement and the other players at the time.  I finally will understand a little bit more what I am looking at goin

Jason and I decided to visit this museum, The Rembrandt House , since we were in Amsterdam.  I was hoping that it would be like the Musee Rodin where it is Rodin's house filled with his artwork.  Instead it is more specifically what the house looked like when Rembrandt lived there with very few of his paintings. We got there fairly early in the day just beating a school group.   It was pretty interesting.  They were able to recreate most of what it looked like based on correspondence and sketches that Rembrandt had written at the time.  You could see what were considered items of status back then. I think we liked the "curiosity room" where Rembrandt would keep items for his students to practice drawing.   They did have a number of paintings that Rembrandt used as inspiration.  Rembrandt used his house as a gallery, so there were a number of paintings on the wall.  We would have liked to see more of his works though besides just some sketchings.  They did have on

On our last night in Amsterdam, we went to the Anne Frank house , which has been turned into a museum.  The house was basically across the street from our hotel. It was a great way to end our trip -- it was a reflective pause at the end of the trip. We made reservations about a month in advance, and really had a limited ticket selection.  It worked out for us, but if we had wanted to go during a more normal hour, we should have made reservations even earlier . Jason really enjoyed it.  It was a museum that brought the entire rest of the trip together.   The museum is in the original house.  They have bought a few of the surrounding house as well.  We learned the history of the house and how the Frank family ended up in the annex.  Jason had never read the book and found this to be very interesting... I do think they could spend a little more time elaborating on how she had actually started re-writing her diary in anticipation of publishing it.  I think that makes the story even

On our last night in Amsterdam, we went to the Anne Frank house , which has been turned into a museum.  The house was basically across the street from our hotel. It was a great way to end our trip -- it was a reflective pause at the end of the trip. We made reservations about a month in advance, and really had a limited ticket selection.  It worked out for us, but if we had wanted to go during a more normal hour, we should have made reservations even earlier . Jason really enjoyed it.  It was a museum that brought the entire rest of the trip together.   The museum is in the original house.  They have bought a few of the surrounding house as well.  We learned the history of the house and how the Frank family ended up in the annex.  Jason had never read the book and found this to be very interesting... I do think they could spend a little more time elaborating on how she had actually started re-writing her diary in anticipation of publishing it.  I think that makes the story even

This museum was one of Jason's picks for our visit to the Hague.  We really enjoyed the Escher in Het Paleis .  It was so very interesting.  I find that I have really been enjoying the small museums focused on one artist lately.  They may not be your best bang for the buck, but they sure are a great size and wonderful to see the progression of an artist.  I had no idea that Escher did all of these sketches/paintings. Aren't these so cool?  The tessellations are fascinating.  I remember learning them in middle school, in particular his fish ones.   The museum is also pretty interesting to walk through.  It is a former palace of the Netherlands monarchy.  The former queen used to live in this palace and it is the only one open to the public.   One thing that irritated me a smidge was that they charged you to pictures in the slanted floor room.  Like, we didn't pay to get in... It was interesting to see his transformation from "normal" sketches to hi

We visited the Cathedral of our Lady in Antwerp.  It was a beautiful old Church in the middle of historic downtown Antwerp.  I loved that it was on the main square. " P1010905GroenplaatsAntwerpen " by G.Lanting - Own work . Licensed under CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons . This was on our list to visit in Belgium as it actually has one of the paintings on my list of 1001 paintings !  It was so beautiful by Peter Paul Rubens, his The Raising of the Cross .   The cathedral also has a few others.  The others were quite beautiful.   As this was a Catholic Church, it was more ornate than some of the other churches we saw.  It had a number of old tombs and other sculptures as well.     time in church: 2 hrs times visited: 1 overall: B

We visited the Cathedral of our Lady in Antwerp.  It was a beautiful old Church in the middle of historic downtown Antwerp.  I loved that it was on the main square. " P1010905GroenplaatsAntwerpen " by G.Lanting - Own work . Licensed under CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons . This was on our list to visit in Belgium as it actually has one of the paintings on my list of 1001 paintings !  It was so beautiful by Peter Paul Rubens, his The Raising of the Cross .   The cathedral also has a few others.  The others were quite beautiful.   As this was a Catholic Church, it was more ornate than some of the other churches we saw.  It had a number of old tombs and other sculptures as well.     time in church: 2 hrs times visited: 1 overall: B