Reijkmuseum
Sick of spending too much time despising the Dutch, today I threw myself into the cultural life of Amsterdam and started hitting the museums.
Amsterdam has a lot of museums. This is possibly because the Dutch value education and knowledge, but it's probably more to do with their autism-level obsessiveness. Of course there are the expected museums of windmills, tulips, clogs and Anne Franks, but there are also museums of pipes, canals, toilets, funerals, sex, clocks, handbags, diamonds, pianolas, ships in bottles, houseboats… basically if you can obsess about something to the point of being socially awkward, the Dutch have already erected a building to facilitate that.
I started my cultural journey in the Reijkmuseum, the sprawling edifice housing Holland’s vast national collection of pretty much everything. I spent five hours patiently trying to see all of the fine art and sculpture, only to discover a huge gallery full of priceless jewelry, porcelain, glassware and weaponry in the basement on the way out. D'oh!
Occasionally, between sitting to massage my aching feet or leaning against a wall while bemoaning my interest in the finer things, I took a moment to helpfully rename some art.
The Last Supper, Featuring That One Disciple Who Always Focused on the ‘Supper’ Part, Artist Unknown, 1520
Madonna With Child and Seriously Like Her Fifth Mimosa, Artist Unknown, 1350
The Christ Child Three Months After Getting an AbBlaster for Christmas, Jan Cornelisz Vermeyen, 1528
Okay, Who the Hell Ordered Cow Face?, Jan Cornelisz Vermeyen, 1530
Bossie, Suspicious of This Whole Jesus Thing, Pieter Aertsen, 1560
Portrait of Clara Billows, Inventor of Farting and Blaming it on The Dog, With Research Assistant, Therese Schwartze, 1879
The Fat White Bastards Who Rule the World and Don’t Care Who Knows It, Govert Flinck, 1645
Portrait of Esmerelda van Lemonsukker, Inventor of Resting Bitch Face, Daniel Vertangen, 1660
Amsterdam has a lot of museums. This is possibly because the Dutch value education and knowledge, but it's probably more to do with their autism-level obsessiveness. Of course there are the expected museums of windmills, tulips, clogs and Anne Franks, but there are also museums of pipes, canals, toilets, funerals, sex, clocks, handbags, diamonds, pianolas, ships in bottles, houseboats… basically if you can obsess about something to the point of being socially awkward, the Dutch have already erected a building to facilitate that.
I started my cultural journey in the Reijkmuseum, the sprawling edifice housing Holland’s vast national collection of pretty much everything. I spent five hours patiently trying to see all of the fine art and sculpture, only to discover a huge gallery full of priceless jewelry, porcelain, glassware and weaponry in the basement on the way out. D'oh!
Occasionally, between sitting to massage my aching feet or leaning against a wall while bemoaning my interest in the finer things, I took a moment to helpfully rename some art.
The Last Supper, Featuring That One Disciple Who Always Focused on the ‘Supper’ Part, Artist Unknown, 1520
Madonna With Child and Seriously Like Her Fifth Mimosa, Artist Unknown, 1350
The Christ Child Three Months After Getting an AbBlaster for Christmas, Jan Cornelisz Vermeyen, 1528
Okay, Who the Hell Ordered Cow Face?, Jan Cornelisz Vermeyen, 1530
Bossie, Suspicious of This Whole Jesus Thing, Pieter Aertsen, 1560
Portrait of Clara Billows, Inventor of Farting and Blaming it on The Dog, With Research Assistant, Therese Schwartze, 1879
The Fat White Bastards Who Rule the World and Don’t Care Who Knows It, Govert Flinck, 1645
Portrait of Esmerelda van Lemonsukker, Inventor of Resting Bitch Face, Daniel Vertangen, 1660
posted by Blandwagon at 11:30 PM
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