'A Loving Couple' - In Amsterdam!

This a Picture that I took of a Rembrandt at the Rijks Museum. The painting is titled 'The Jewish Bride (A Loving Couple) ' .

All of us have our own sense of aesthetics. We look at something and we know if it appeals to our sense(s) or not. But, as I wandered around the Rijks Museum last weekend, it dawned on me that no matter how much I had read of art history, I needed to actually SEE a lot of art before i would be able to tell anything just by looking at a painting.

Art requires a lot of knowledge in order to be appreciated in its mulitude of facets. It isn't like music, which, if you are into, you can feel a stirring. It isn't as emotional. Or perhaps, I'm just not as responsive to a visual stimulus. Or it is something acquired with exposure? I'm not sure as yet.

Of one thing I am certain though, I am in awe. As I went through room after room, I wanted my eyes to dilate ten fold so I could catch minute details, about the paintings, that my eyes would not have otherwise caught. The little ridges in the canvas, uneven blobs of stray paint at the edges, everything.

I could just about distinguish a Rembrandt from a Vermeer. And even that, I think had more to do with the fact that I had looked at loads and loads of prints of many of the famous artists in one of my mad fits of interest in art.
Vermeer's (as made famous by the movie 'A Girl With Pearl Earring' - a painting that I wanted to see but looked for in vain ) works , I found, are a lot easier to understand. They have more colour, I think. And the subject matter is usually a scene from real life. For ex. "A Music Lesson" , "A Soldier And A Girl" etc.

Rembrandt's were very interesting as well. I will not venture to say anything about him. I don't know enough. His paintings seemed a lot more intense to me and they were a lot bigger too. I took a picture of this one because it seemed to me the most beautiful, plus it was one of the larger rembrandts. (If you find the picture a little dark , it's because one isn't allowed to use the flash while taking pictures )

The Rijks museum is a tribute to Dutch art . It was the first museum (of three) that we visited in Amsterdam and boy, at the end of it.. I was just so full of enthusiasm and 'joie de vivre' . It hit me over and over again as I walked up and down those halls that I was living my dream and I felt so grateful. If I didn't say a little prayer of gratitude then. I am now.

The Museum sits on a beautiful square called Museumplein ('Plein' as I realised later mean 'square' in dutch) in the vicinity of the Van Gogh Museum (Which I want to write about separately because he was my first love) . Sharing the spotlight in museumplein is also the famous Amsterdam Diamond Cutting District which I didn't really find that impressive. (But it gets a lot of tourists nonetheless. So maybe it was just me.)

Only about ten percent of the exhibited pieces in the museum are by world reknowned artists - Otherwise there is a lot of dutch art through the ages on showcase which is beautiful ofcourse. The renaissance art, I found very interesting.. Although, to be perfectly honest , I didn't know any of the artists except Rembrandt and Vermeer and one or two others.

If you are in Amsterdam, Rijks museum is worth it if you really enjoy art or rather if are willing to enjoy art. If you aren't.. Give it a miss. There are plenty of other things to see in Amsterdam.