The Hague, Mauritshuis Museum, and Delft

I experienced no notion how substantially I would like The Hague! It can be a wonderful and peaceful metropolis, crisscrossed with canals, extremely walkable, comprehensive of several superb dining places, and with general public transportation that would make it effortless to get everywhere you go else in Holland. And on top rated of all that charm and livability, it has an incredible globe-course museum suitable in the middle of it, the Mauritshius, which has a assortment of functions by artists like Vermeer, Rubens, Holbein, and Rembrandt! My partner Nowell and I had been very pleased with our conclusion to make The Hague our residence-foundation in Holland.

As we walked to the Mauristhuis museum we stopped for a picture at this gorgeous look at of the Dutch Parliament. The 13th-century Binnenhof is the oldest parliament creating nonetheless in use. The human body of drinking water prior to it is named the Hofvijver which implies “court docket pond”. It really is spectacular to see these kinds of attractiveness in the center of a metropolis… and look at that classic Dutch sky!

The Maurithuis museum was just a 15-moment flat and picturesque stroll from our lodge, so we arrived clean and prepared for an interesting dose of Art! This is a beautiful collection with a number of incredibly famous gems, which include Vermeer’s Female with the Pearl Earring and See of Delft, as properly as Fabritius’ Goldfinch.

I bought some excellent depth pictures showing the cracks and restoration of Girl with the Pearl, the astonishing pointillism and little, exact styles of Check out of Delft, and the luscious brushwork of the Goldfinch.

Woman with the Pearl and Goldfinch were being basically exhibited a few decades ago in San Francisco wherever I live, so incredibly unusually this was my 2nd time seeing each these iconic operates. I did want looking at them in their home in the Mauristhuis, even though. In the San Francisco show Goldfinch was hung in a narrow hallway, and The Pearl was hung in a completely black area with an intense highlight, which was intended to boost the drama of the experience, but as a substitute designed the experience blindingly light-weight. So I was capable to recognize the two is effective improved in this appropriately-lit museum.

How often do you get to admire and compare two Rubens relationship portraits and two Van Dyck marriage portraits all in just one area with each other?

Remaining Rubens’ Peter Van Hack, Claire Fourement and Van Dyck’s Peeter Stevens and Anna Wake (in between them is an amazing “kunstkamer” or “art room” by Willem van Haecht.

I definitely fell in really like with this Van Dyck portrait. As considerably as I admire Rubens as a painter, when it will come to portraiture, Van Dyck has the potential to capture a potent experience of remaining in the existence of a serious person.

The Mauristhuis also has a Rubens oil sketch of the identical matter I observed in the Our Girl cathedral in Antwerp just a few times prior to this, Mary’s assumption to heaven:

Remaining is the ~3-foot tall sketch in the Mauristhuis museum, on the right is the ~15-foot tall painting installed in the Antwerp cathedral.

You can see the stone arch to the correct of Mary was omitted in the remaining, and you can also see the blue coloration is unique: The closing portray employed more highly-priced pigments, together with lapis lazuli for the blues, which at the time was even much more pricey than gold. Listed here are my depth photographs of the sketch:

Additional specifics from paintings by Rubens, Pieter van Anraadt, Pieter Claesz, Gabriël Metsu, Jan van Huysum, Franz Hals, Saloman van Ruisdale, Holbein:

And a great collection of Rembrandts, which includes this small head of a Laughing Man and the famous Anatomy Lesson:

The Hague is a lovely metropolis and also really livable Since it is not mobbed with tourists, most the persons you see are just going about their normal life, selecting up their little ones from college or conference good friends for a consume right after function. It really is a significant city, but there does not look to be a lot of noise or site visitors, likely for the reason that most men and women journey by bicycle, so just walking all over felt calm and stress-free.

You can find also a attractive minor museum devoted to MC Escher, which we really enjoyed.

Delft was a very quick daytrip, simply because we could get there on the neighborhood tram line which experienced a cease suitable exterior the doorway of our lodge and took us to the coronary heart of Delft in about 30 minutes. The Hague’s community transportation was quite easy for a customer, due to the fact you can just obtain the “HTM” application to your cell phone exactly where you can buy one tickets or day-prolonged tickets, and the QRC ticket just appears.

Delft is a beautiful area just to wander close to, and we savored having a slower-paced day, so we did not do any formal excursions, but just admired the scenery (and the food items!).

Back in the Hague:

We experienced excellent meals all in a few blocks of our lodge at Walter Benedict, Bistro Mer and Follia.

We cherished the YAYs hotel we stayed in (address: Koninginnegracht 20, 2514 AB Den Haag), which has apartment suites with kitchenettes, like a cost-free laundry place for guests, for fewer than a single resort room in Amsterdam. It truly is in a excellent small neighborhood with heaps of dining places and a hassle-free tiny grocery retailer, and only a 15 minute walk to the Mauristhuis museum. It was easy to just take the tram from just a handful of steps outdoors the doorway of the hotel to the Holland Spoor prepare station, which is how we visited Amsterdam and the unbelievable Rijksmuseum, which I’ll publish about in my following blog site submit.

This submit is part of a sequence about our latest European tour through Paris, Antwerp, The Hague, Amsterdam, and Vienna. If you have not but, signal up for my e-newsletter so you hardly ever skip a person of my facts-packed website posts. Also, I am at this time performing on a new portray video clip to be unveiled by the stop of this year. “Glazing and Scumbling a Continue to Lifestyle with Roses” will be a observe-up to my initial “Glazing and Scumbling” on the internet system, so I endorse acquiring that if you have not nonetheless, to get the most out of my next launch!