Museum Hopper

One of the mornings in Amsterdam, I met my dad at the Verzetsmuseum .  In English, the museum name translates to the Dutch Resistance Museum.  It felt like an appropriate activity for Rosh Hashanah.   It was an interesting contrast to Norway's Resistance Museum . It was one of those deceptive museums -- that looks like it is going to be really small and quick to go through.  This one quickly proved me wrong!   It was very interactive and multimedia.  I believe it had recently been renovated and redone.   It walks through what Amsterdam and by extension, the Netherlands experienced during WWII from May 1940 through the end of WWII.  It showed what the Netherlands was like leading up to the raise of Hitler in adjacent Germany.   I found the museum really well laid out.  It had a number of objects and interactivity.  There were videos, first person narratives to listen or read, objects saved from that time period, and ph...

About a month ago, I went to Van Gogh museum with my dad.  He got off the red eye and pretty soon after we showed up at the Van Gogh museum at 10:30.   It was fairly crowded for 10:30 AM on a Sunday.  I would always recommend buying a ticket in advance.  It is pretty easy and they seem to be available even just the day before.   The new entrance is very well designed.  It provides some much needed extra space in the museum.  They have moved the gift shop and the entrance.  It gives so much more breathing room.  It also makes the first floor workable gallery space.   I loved the progression of self portraits on the first floor.  You can see how Van Gogh's style changed throughout the years. Every time I visit the museum, I learn/focus on something new.  This time it was how prolific Van Gogh was in, what really was, a short amount of time.  He went to Paris in 1886 where he was introduced Bernard and Gauguin . ...

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...

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. ...

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. ...

our first stop in amsterdam worth any mention was the van gogh museum !  We got into town, dropped our luggage at the hotel, picked up our bikes and headed to the museum in a downpour!   It was great to be back in the museum.  We had purchased tickets in advance and basically walked up to the front of the line.  The other line waiting to get in was very  long due to the inclement weather.  Due to this, of course, the museum was quite crowded.   We did follow the typical route through the museum and it did open up a bit as we got further into the museum.  I think Jason was quite impressed with the museum as well.  He really enjoyed seeing the Almond Blossom .   I really enjoyed the special exhibits in the museum when we visited.  They had an exhibit on Felix Vallotton, Fire Beneath the Ice .  I loved the similarities to Van Gogh's work.  Some of his paintings were so similar in style and feel, but his woodcuts were s...

my last stop in amsterdam before heading to hamburg was the rijksmuseum .  this is yet another museum under construction with a completion date of sometime in 2013.  the museum is over 200 years old. the rijksmuseum they have whittled down a museum about the size of the louvre into eleven rooms of the masterpieces.  do not worry though, they are still charging full admission for the museum.  on one hand, i think the whittling down is great and therefore they should charge full price.  i could easily find the ten masterpieces that my guidebook recommended.  i was not exhausted after viewing the art.  on the other hand, the museum is usually so large, my guidebook warns "be prepared: this is a difficult museum to get to grips with in a single visit."  it did not even put that warning on the louvre!  how can you charge full price when i am seeing probably less than 10% of the entire collection? so, i guess that is actually a wash....

i decided to quickly hop into coster diamonds before heading into the rijksmuseum, which is just across the street.  coster diamonds has been in the business since 1846 and operates in amsterdam, the diamond capital of the world. inside the museum, it steps you through the process of polishing a diamond, what to look for and points out some of coster diamonds' famous cuts.  coster recently invented (or accomplished) a new cut, the royal 201 .  it is pretty magnificent.  check it out compared to a diamond of the same size and quality of a "brillant" cut. the exhibit was just very informative as someone who knows very little about diamonds.  this chart was particularly helpful! one of their most famous diamonds is in the crown jewels of england.  they have a replica of it in the museum. overall, i gave it a "B," which for most museums would mean "ehh, if you have a lot of extra time, go for it."  in this case, though, it means something...

on the day of the ascention, i went to the museum amstelkring , also known as "our lord in the attic" church.  the church is over 400 years older.  unfortunately, the red light district has encroached on the little church.  it is about half a block away, which is slightly ironic!  the church is undergoing renovations. this museum had no signage, just an audio guide to follow along.  it uses a pretty effective method.  the museum employee set it up to the proper language, point to a special sign in each room, and then listen.  it was also included in the ticket price.  it was in this audio that it was emphasized how "lucky" we were to see the church under renovation.   it was a little annoying.  i do not think so.  they kept mentioning that we could see it in the "original state."  i am not really sure what they meant by this.  this was not like "the original state" when it was under construction.  i...

my next stop in amsterdam was the amsterdams historisch museum .  my guidebook recommended that i go to this museum first to really understand amsterdam.  unfortunately, i could not quite do that, but it still provided some perspective on the city.  this museum has the same mission and objective as the museum of london , but unfortunately, was not as good as that museum. from a logistics and layout perspective, this museum was a mess.  it was hard to find entrance, believe it or not.  i literally walked right past it at one point and did not realize that is where i was supposed to go in.  i tried to do the museum in order since it is supposed to be reviewed chronologically.  unfortunately, that did not happen since it was so difficult to follow the order, so that was frustrating.  i could not figure out where i was half the time in the map that was given in the pamphlet or the one in my guidebook.  i was so lost that to leave the museum, i ...

the only place i bought a ticket in advance was the anne frank house .  the tickets seem to let people in at 20 minute intervals.  one of the girls in the hostel recommended going late afternoon.  she said that there was not a line then.  so, it may be similar to the case of the van gogh museum.  this was one of the few museums that opened at 9 and it seems like getting there then would make sense.  there was a huge difference in the line between 940 when i went in and 1030 when i came out. the museum is a very well guided tour.  basically follow the person in front of you.  the pamphlet you receive when you walk in was very informative.  all notes of the museum were basically in the brochure that they give you when you walk in.  it was difficult to hear the audio at times since they had little headphones with a bunch of languages in each room.  you could hear the audio through the headphones that were not in use.  the museum ...

my first stop in amsterdam was at the van gogh museum .  the museum was literally a half block away from my hostel, conveniently the van gogh hostel .  i went in the late afternoon and it had no line.  every other time i walked by the museum, it had a huge line down the block.  the museum is not large, so i would recommend either checking it out in the afternoon or buying a ticket for a particular time slot.  i felt that the museum was a little expensive for what it was.  the museum cost more than the louvre, which seemed a little silly as far as relative value.  the museum was founded by van gogh's nephew. i was in the museum for a little over an hour, but really could have used about 1.5 hours.  i made it through the main portion of the museum of van gogh's works, but would have liked to see the special exhibits. the first floor, which is really the second floor, has the main collection.  i had not r ealized that van gogh only paint...

phew!  all of the paris posts are finally written!  now moving onto amsterdam !  i spent one full day and two half days in amsterdam.   my first afternoon, i went to the van gogh museum. my full day was started at the anne frank house followed by the amsterdam historical museum.  after the museum, i went to the museum amstelkring, which was a secret catholic church in an attic of the house (well, three actually).   on my short morning, i went to the coster diamond museum and the rijksmuseum. here the posts come!