17th-Century Dutch and Flemish Paintings Debuts at PEM

Get out your passports, because this month the Peabody Essex Museum is transitioning from China to the Netherlands.  The incredible Forbidden Palace exhibition, which closed in January, brought thousands to Salem and to the museum. As sad as we were to see it leave for New York, we always knew it was a seasonal romance, and that we would have to say goodbye after the holidays.

Still Life with Roses in a Glass Vase, c. 1619

Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder (1573-1621)
Oil on copper
11 x 9 inches (28 x 23 cm)
The Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo Collection
Image courtesy Peabody Essex Museum

And say goodbye we did.  And then it snowed.  And it snowed some more.  And it the temperatures dropped to downright frigid levels.  Our focus turned to shovels and ice melt.  But spring is coming!  And it is being heralded by tulips. Fabulous Dutch tulips!

On February 26, the PEM will open the world premiere exhibition of the complete Van Otterloo Collection of Dutch and Flemish Masterworks.  This is one of the world's best private collections of 17th-century Dutch and Flemish paintings, and includes masterworks by Rembrandt, Frans Hals, Gerrit Dou, Jan Steen and others.

The PEM describes the exhibit, Golden: Dutch and Flemish Masterworks from the Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo Collection, as a collection of paintings, furniture and decorative arts exceptional for their quality, superb condition, and impeccable provenance.  As exemplars of the Dutch Golden Age, the works are distinguished not only for the glowing quality of light achieved by the most talented artists of the time, but also for their place in an unsurpassed period of artistic, cultural, scientific, and commercial accomplishments in the Netherlands.


You can read the entire release on PEM.org. 

Golden opens on February 26 and runs through June 19.

Portrait of Aeltje Uylenburgh, 1632.

Rembrandt (Harmensz.) van Rijn (1606–1669)
Oil on panel
The Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo Collection
Image courtesy of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston