Affectionately called the "Big Barrel,” Haarlem's great Gothic cathedral St Bavo, loomed over the marketplace, becoming the city's defining landmark. In numerous paintings, such as "The Grote or St Bavokerk in Haarlem,” 1666, Gerrit Berckheyde captured not only the peaceful ambience of the scene, but the textures of brick, stone and wood in the massive structure. Private collection, on long-term loan to the National Gallery of Art.
:The Seventeenth Century really was a Golden Age for the Dutch. After a war of independence against Spain that lasted nearly a century, in 1648 the northern provinces officially became free and formed the Dutch Republic. During this tumultuous period the breakaway provinces flourished economically, culturally, architecturally and artistically. As early as 1611, people recognized that they were entering a special time, as an economic boom, fueled by international maritime commerce, launched a lively market for art.
Dutchmen of this era were extraordinarily proud of the histories and appearance of their cities. The plethora of canals, bridges and causeways that crisscrossed major communities, plus omnipotent churches, windmills and fortifications, added to their charm and posed intriguing challenges to architects, city planners and artists.
The burst of artistic creativity spawned by this civic pride is documented in a beautiful exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, "Pride of Place: Dutch Cityscapes of the Golden Age," on view through May 3. It utilizes 48 paintings and 23 atlases, maps and illustrated books to document the enduring appeal and aesthetic achievements of Seventeenth Century Dutch cityscape artists. Co-curated by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr, the gallery's curator of northern baroque painting, and Ariane van Suchtelen, curator of the Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis in The Hague, the show includes images of The Hague, Haarlem, Delft, Dordrecht, Hoorn, Middleburg, Utrecht, Nijmegen, Rhenen and Amsterdam.
Measuring a whopping 68½ by 181 1/8 inches, Jan van Goyen's panoramic "View of The Hague from the Southeast,” circa 1650–51, commissioned by the city fathers, is one of the most comprehensive cityscapes of the Golden Age. While the Great Church dominates the skyline, other buildings are recognizable (including the artist's), as well as people, animals, boats and the surrounding countryside. Haags Historisch Museum, The Hague.
People who have visited the Netherlands will understand curator Wheelock's comment that they will have a "comforting feeling" walking into the exhibition, because they will sense they have seen these places before. Indeed, those who have been in Holland probably have; a visit to a half dozen of the featured cities last December confirmed that a remarkable number of the views recorded here in paint are still recognizable on the ground in the Twenty-First Century.
Holland's international outlook and maritime history stimulated a cartographic tradition, which inspired meticulously accurate domestic maps that profiled distinctive urban skylines featuring church steeples and soaring town halls, while bird's-eye views and city plans delineated buildings, streets, squares and canals.
Allegorical images helped artists make political points via "lion maps," such as a colored engraving of 1648 that superimposes a map on the back of a lion (traditional heraldic symbol of the country) flanked by profile views of a dozen cities in the new Dutch Republic.
Population growth, particularly in Amsterdam, where a quarter of Holland's urban dwellers lived, can be traced through a series of eye-popping aerial maps, notably Jan Micker's "A Bird's-Eye View of Amsterdam," circa 1652, a large oil painting that not only records major structures, individual residences, town squares, canals and the outer harbor, but ships and barges carrying goods that contributed to the city's thriving mercantile life.
