Dutch Paintings and an indulgent afternoon
March 15th, 2009 by Caroline
We continued our Simply Social tour of the galleries of the Fitzwilliam Museum buy visiting the Dutch Collection. Our wonderfully informative guide Maureen Street introduced us to the gallery by first explaining the historical importance of the collection.
The Founder’s collection of paintings began with the Dutch and Flemish pictures he inherited from his maternal grandfather, Sir Mathew Decker, Bt, an Amsterdam merchant born in 1679. Outside London, the Fitzwilliam boasts the most comprehensive Collection of Dutch paintings in Britain.
The paintings highlight the Dutch golden age of painting. This was a period in Dutch history generally spanning the 17th century, in which Dutch trade, science, and art were among the most acclaimed in the world. The painters of this era have left a profound legacy.
Many genre paintings, which seemingly only depicted everyday life, actually illustrated Dutch proverbs and sayings, or conveyed a moralistic message, the meaning of which is not always easy to decipher in modern times. For instance, a still life might include a skull, an hourglass and a snuffed out candle, symbols which all emphasized mortality. Seasons were often indicated by human activities that were typical for that time of year (skating, sowing, harvesting etc. All walks of life were shown. Today these genre paintings provide many insights into the daily life of 17th century citizens of all classes.
This gallery is well worth a visit. If you wish to hunt for some symbolic clues then I would recommend first looking at the flower painting in the corridor outside the main gallery. At first glance they simply seen ‘pretty’ however, they are full of symbolism – fading flowers, insects and combinations of flowers that seasonally would not be possible.
We followed our visual treat with an indulgent treat. We headed over the road to Hotel du Vin for afternoon tea – delicious. Enormous scones with loads of jam and cream, cakes and a selection of fine teas. All accompanied by lots of laughter as we swapped plans for the subsequent diets that we would soon be on!
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