Flowers in a Windowsill by Jan Sluijters

 

We came across this painting many years ago (pre-Corona) at a visit to Den Bosch to see a special exhibition of works by Dutch painter Jan Sluijters (1881-1975) in the Brabants Museum. This still life from 1913 may well be the most beautiful painting of flowers I've ever seen.

 

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Lady in an Evening Gown by Charley Toorop

Last month we visited the Museum More in Gorssel, and this beauty was on display as part of their permanent collection. Dutch artist Jan Toorop (1859 - 1928) is relatively well known in the Netherlands, but fewer people have hard of his daughter Charley Toorop (1891 - 1955), who created this stunning portrait in 1923.

 

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Laura by Vilmos Aba-Novák

 

A few years ago I came across this artist I had never heard of before: Vilmos Aba-Novák (1894-1941). This Hungarian master painted frescoes and church murals, but also masterpieces like this 1929 portrait of a flapper girl. 

 

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French landscape by André Lhote

 

Not exactly a household name, but I like to mix it up a bit in the "Paintings" part of the blog. André Lhote (1885 - 1962) was a French Cubist painter of figure subjects, portraits, landscapes and still life. He was also very active and influential as a teacher and writer on art. This painting from 1912 is very representative for his style.

 

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Portrait of Anna Akhmatova by Nathan Altman

 

A name I first encountered a few years ago, when I came across this beautiful portrait from 1914 in a cubism influenced style. The artist is Russian (later Soviet) avant-garde artist Nathan Isaevich Altman (1888 - 1970).

 

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City walls in winter by Willem Schellinks

 

Not my usual fare, but we saw this romantic painting a few years ago in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and it was love at first sight - and it is fitting for a cold winter day. It was painted by Willem Schellinks (1627-1678) just before his death. He took cityscapes like he had seen on his travels to Italy and transposed them to the cold Dutch winter landscape.

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Tiger

 

One of my all-time favourite paintings is Tiger by German expressionist Franz Marc (1880-1916). This masterpiece dates back to 1912, 4 years before his death at the battle of Verdun. I had the privilege to watch the original in the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich, over twenty years ago. An awe inspiring experience, and together with the other expressionist works in that highly recommended museum, one of the main reasons for my switch from impressionism to expressionism as my favourite genre.

 

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The knifegrinder by Kazimir Malevich

 

Kazimir Malevich (1879-1935) was a Russian avant-garde artist, best known for his Kandinsky-like abstracts. Here we have an interesting earlier painting from 1912 in the cubist-futuristic style. 

 
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Composition No. 18 by Jacoba van Heemskerck

 

A souvenir of our visit to the City Museum of The Hague a few years ago. I had never heard of Dutch artist Jacoba van Heemskerck (1876-1923), but several of her paintings were shown in the museum, and I quite liked them. This is my favourite of the lot, made around 1910. 

 
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Summer night, Inger on the beach by Edvard Munch

 

Edvard Munch (1863 - 1944) was a Norwegian painter, who painted in a rather personal style hovering between post-impressionism and expressionism. His best known work, The Scream (1893), has become an iconic image, but I actually prefer many of his others. There are a few themes that are often recurring in Munch's oeuvre - the beach (with or without people) is one of them. This 1889 painting includes a model, Munch's youngest sister. I first came across this image as a CD cover for songs by Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg in the version of Anne Sofie von Otter, soprano, and Bengt Forsberg, piano. 

 

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The rag collector by Marianne von Werefkin

 

 

Russian artist Marianne von Werefkin (1860 - 1938) is one of my favourite expressionists. I first encountered her work on the internet, then we saw a few of her paintings in musea before Corona, and a few weeks ago we saw dozens of her works in a fabulous exhibition in nearby Zwolle.

 

This 1917 work, which was also in the exhibition, is just one example of her style. Could this landscape be more menacing? And to top it, we have the figure of the rag collector upfront, collecting rags from the seashore or lakeshore, likely remains from a boating accident. Morbid.

 

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Bather at Deauville by Kees van Dongen

 

Cornelis Theodorus Maria "Kees" van Dongen (26 January 1877 – 28 May 1968) was a Dutch-French painter who was one of the leading Fauves ("Wild men" = the French equivalent of the German expressionist movement) . Van Dongen's early work was influenced by the Hague School and symbolism and it evolved gradually into a rough pointillist style. From 1905 onward – when he took part at the controversial 1905 Salon d'Automne exhibition – his style became more and more radical in its use of form and colour. Van Dongen gained a reputation for his sensuous portraits of especially women (information from Wikipedia). Based on my personal taste I would rank only van Gogh higher among Dutch painters.

 

A few weeks ago we saw some his work exhibited in the Lalique Museum in Doesburg, and some others in the Singer Museum Laren. When I first came across the 1920 painting Bather at Deauville, I would have never guessed that this is by Kees van Dongen. My wife was right at the first try though. Anyway, it is beautiful.

 

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Young Woman by Leo Gestel

 

 

We saw this beauty a few months ago in Museum De Fundatie in nearby Zwolle. It was one of the things that inspired me to re-start the blog actually. The painter is Dutch artist Leo Gestel (1881 - 1941). Along with Piet Mondrian and Jan Sluyters he was among the leading artists of Dutch modernism. This portrait is from 1914.

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