Dutch Golden Age Paintings
Vermeer and Rembrandt: the two great painters of the seventeenth-century Dutch Republic, reproduced whole from the Rijksmuseum and Mauritshuis scans.
13 prints · printed to order on heavyweight matte paper · framed or unframed
A republic of painters
For most of the seventeenth century the Dutch Republic was the richest society in Europe, and its merchants, not its churches or princes, bought the pictures. The result was a painting of ordinary life at extraordinary quality: interiors, portraits, townscapes and still lifes made for the walls of houses. Rembrandt van Rijn worked in Amsterdam from 1631 until his death in 1669; Johannes Vermeer painted perhaps thirty-five pictures in Delft and was forgotten for two centuries after his death in 1675.
The works in this collection
Vermeer: Girl with a Pearl Earring, The Milkmaid, View of Delft, The Astronomer, Woman in Blue Reading a Letter, Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window and The Art of Painting. Rembrandt: The Night Watch, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp, The Jewish Bride, The Storm on the Sea of Galilee, The Return of the Prodigal Son and the self-portrait of 1659.
Hanging Dutch painting
These are quiet, warmly lit pictures that suit a study, a dining room or a hallway, and they take a dark wall well. The Vermeer interiors are small in the original and read beautifully at 16×24; The Night Watch and The Jewish Bride are wide and want the landscape 24×16 or 36×24.