Homenews

Delft Blue: the whole world knows this iconic earthenware for our country. However, some of the absolute masterpieces are located abroad and are rarely, if ever, seen in our country. This spring, Kunstmuseum The Hague will change this by bringing together special masterpieces for the first time. The exhibition Royal Blue is organized in conjunction with Het Loo Palace and will bring together the very best showpieces from the Rijksmuseum, Museum Prinsenhof Delft and numerous European collections, such as Hampton Court Palace and the V&A in London. In this way, the public can become acquainted with the time when the famous royal couple William and Mary had the most beautiful Delft blue ever made: Royal Blue.

William and Mary were known for their splendid collection of Delftware with which they decorated their palaces in the Netherlands and England. From pyramid-shaped tulip vases many meters tall to flowerpots and serving dishes for preserves: in the late seventeenth century the most beautiful and technically refined earthenware was created for them by the potteries in Delft.

The flowering period of Delftware coincides with the reigns of William III (1650-1702) and Mary II Stuart (1662-1695). In addition to Chinese porcelain, they also collected beautiful, refined ceramics from Delft. In fact, they were key patrons. Mary in particular was regarded as a true ambassador for Delftware and she commissioned objects at De Grieksche A factory. The exhibition focuses on the period 1689-1702, in which stadtholder William III and Mary II Stuart are also king and queen of England, Scotland and Ireland. Royal Blue introduces visitors to the cultural wealth that ensued from this Dutch-British alliance in the seventeenth century.

On the occasion of 400 years of Delftware and as an ode to the British-Dutch friendship, Kunstmuseum The Hague presents this spring a story about Orange on blue and white, about fragile diplomacy and glorious grandeur. Royal Blue shows how an English queen of the seventeenth century still colors the Dutch identity. The exhibition will be on view from 01 June 2020 till 22 November 2020.

The Amsterdam Museum opened as a history museum in 1926 in the Waag, one of Amsterdam’s fifteenth-century city gates. Since 1975, the museum has been located in a monumental building on the Kalverstraat. The current building once housed the Saint Lucien’s Monastery in the Middle Ages, and in 1578 the City Orphanage. The orphanage was home to thousands of children between 1580 and 1960, many of whom had lost their parents to the plague. The children also received an education here; the older boys attended school elsewhere in the city, while the girls received instruction within the orphanage and were trained in domestic skills. In honor of the history of the orphanage, the Regents’ Room and orphans’ cupboards in the inner courtyard have been left intact.

The Amsterdam Museum houses a collection of objects related to the history of Amsterdam, from the Middle Ages to the present time. Approximately half of the objects are preserved by the city itself, while the other half comes from donations and legacies. The collection has grown since the sixteenth century when the city council first placed paintings and other objects in the town hall on Dam Square. Over time, many collections of urban institutions have been added, such as the military pieces, the regents’ portraits and the guild silver collection. In the nineteenth century, various Amsterdam citizens left their art collections to the city.

The Amsterdam Museum also houses a varied collection of objects: from paintings, drawings, books and prints to furniture, textiles, glass and ceramics. Delftware is also represented, both seventeenth-century objects and eighteenth-century objects. Besides many plates and vases, the collection includes objects for the table, such as butter tubs, salt cellars, teapots and tea canisters. A very rare blue and white spice box, marked for Adrianus Kocx is also part of the collection. Other unique objects in the collection include cuspidors, candlesticks, plaques and models of shoes and cows. An absolute highlight is a late seventeenth-century blue and white flower vase of approximately 73 cm. (28.7 in.)  with both chinoiserie and western style decoration.

The Lobkowicz Palace is located inside the Prague Castle in the Czech capital. The Lobkowicz family is among the oldest and most distinguished Bohemian noble families and has played a prominent role in Central European history for over six hundred years. Successive generations have held the highest of noble titles, including Princes of the Holy Roman Empire, High Chancellors of Bohemia, Dukes of Sagan and of Roudnice, and Knights of the Order of the Golden Fleece.

On a scale unimaginable today, they commissioned magnificent architectural projects and ground-breaking music and collected paintings, manuscripts, books, musical instruments and decorative arts that enhanced their numerous residences and increased their prestige in the courts and circles in which they moved and exerted power.

Being the oldest and largest privately owned art collection in the Czech Republic, The Lobkowicz Collections draws its significance from its comprehensive nature, which reflects the cultural, social, political and economic life of Central Europe for over seven centuries. The collection comprises approximately 1,500 paintings, including iconic images by Bruegel the Elder, Canaletto, Veronese, Velázquez, Rubens, and Cranach. It also houses an impressive display of family and royal portraits; fine porcelain, ceramics and rare decorative arts dating from the 13th to 20th centuries; an extensive collection of military and sporting rifles from the 16th to 18th centuries; and musical instruments and original scores and manuscripts by Beethoven and Mozart.

The ceramics collection comprises an exceptional Delftware dinner service marked for Lambertus Cleffius, who was the owner of De Metaale Pot (The Metal Pot) factory from 1679 to 1691. This is one of the largest and most important earthenware dinner services with over 150 pieces, consisting of plates, chargers, candlesticks, tea canisters, salt cellars, sugar casters and a set of sweetmeat dishes. It was commissioned by Count Wenzel Ferdinand Lobkowicz of Bílina (1656-1697) which is why many pieces are decorated with intricate overlapping letters of his initials WL and the coronet.

In 1883, twenty-five citizens of Minneapolis founded the Minneapolis Society of Fine Arts, committing them to bringing the arts into the life of their community. More than a century later, the museum they created, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, stands as a monument to a remarkable history of civic involvement and cultural achievement.

Designed by the preeminent New York architectural firm McKim, Mead and White, the original building opened its doors in 1915. A neoclassical landmark in the Twin Cities, the museum expanded in 1974 with an addition designed by the late Japanese architect Kenzo Tange. In June 2006, the museum unveiled a new wing designed by architect Michael Graves.

The museum’s permanent collection has grown from 800 works of art to more than 89,000 objects. The collection includes world-famous works that embody the highest levels of artistic achievement, spanning about 20,000 years and representing the world’s diverse cultures across six continents. The museum has seven curatorial areas: Arts of Africa & the Americas; Contemporary Art; Asian Art; Paintings; Photography and New Media; Prints and Drawings; and Decorative Arts, Textiles and Sculpture.

The Decorative Arts collection comprises several Dutch Delftware objects, such as an early eighteenth-century reeded cashmere palette five-piece garniture. The highlight of the collection is, however, a large baluster-shaped flower vase, attributed to De Witte Ster (The White Star) factory from circa 1700. The multitiered vase, which stands 117 cm (46.1 in) tall, shows wonderful blooms: borders of scrolling lotuses, chrysanthemums, ruyi (scepter heads) and the Chinese character for longevity.

Lytes Cary Manor is a small medieval manor house located in Somerset, England. The house was originally occupied by the Lyte family who settled in the area in the thirteenth century. The Lyte family lived here for over six generations and gradually expanded the house. 

The founder of that family was William le Lyte, who was a feudal tenant of the estate as early as 1286. It is believed that his grandson Peter built the chapel, which dates back to 1343. In the early sixteenth-century a great hall was added, which reached through a 2-storey porch with a fine oriel on the upper floor. There is a ground-floor parlour with a great chamber above, the ceiling of which is decorated with an unusually early example of plasterwork ribs forming a pattern of stars and diamonds. When this addition was completed, the home was occupied by Henry Lyte, a keen herbalist and gardener who grew all kinds of fruits in the practical garden. In 1578, he dedicated his Niewe Herball to Elizabeth I ‘from my poore house at Lytescarie’.

By the mid-eighteenth century, the family faced serious financial difficulty and in 1755 they were forced to sell the estate to Lytes Cary. Lytes Cary was then tenanted by a series of farmers until Sir Walter Jenner bought the estate in 1907. When the Jenners arrived the Great Hall was being used as a cider press, the Great Parlour stored agricultural materials and the Little Parlour was a carpenter’s workshop. The Little Parlour later became Sir Walter’s private study. He restored the house to a seventeenth-century style and also added a new west wing. Sir Walter also created a new Arts and Crafts-style garden that mostly featured rectangular ‘rooms’ separated by yew hedges and stone walls, each reflecting a different mood or purpose. In 1948, Sir Walter decided to pass the house onto the National Trust.

Today, the intimate manor house of Lytes Cary is filled with the collection of the Jenners. On view are lovingly restored pieces of oak furniture and fittings from the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, paintings, and seventeenth-century Flemish tapestries. It also houses a large ceramics collection, from Chinese porcelain Kangxi wares and ming celadon dishes to European pottery. Besides several objects of Staffordshire pottery, the true highlight is formed by a pair of Delft blue and white pyramidal flower vases, decorated with the virtues and putti in characteristic chinoiserie borders. The vases, which stand 99 cm. (39 in.) tall, are marked for Adrianus Kocx of De Grieksche A (The Greek A) factory at the end of the seventeenth century.

The Musée Benoît-De-Puydt is located in the charming Northern French city of Bailleul. The museum was founded in 1859, when a wealthy collector Benoît De Puydt left his collection to Bailleul, his native town.

De Puydt was born in 1798 in Bailleul. He was a wealthy man, partly because his father was a rentier. As a notary and later also a rentier, he could afford to purchase fine art and objects and became a passionate art connoisseur and collector. With no family of his own, De Puydt focused on his collection with heart and soul. De Puydt’s collection included European works of art, as well as porcelain from the Far East. Because of his classical and literary education, he had a wide interest in furniture, sculpture, painting, ceramics and decorative art.

De Puydt bequeathed his collection to Bailleul, and in June 1859 the first inventory of the collection was made. In 1861, a drawing academy and the museum was opened. Over the years the collection expanded with donations by artists and art enthusiasts. These gifts have continued the legacy of De Puydt, in keeping with the style of the collector’s home, thus preserving the particular charm of this museum. However, a portion of the collection has also been lost. During World War I, many objects were transferred to Normandy, and the remainder was never recovered. The War also destroyed ninety percent of the city, including the museum. A new museum was designed in 1930 and opened in 1934.

The museum contains paintings from the Flemish, French, Dutch and Bailleul schools. It also boasts a collection of sculptures, especially sixteenth century Flemish statues, furniture, lace objects and gold- and silverware. Further, the museum has a large collection of Italian Maiolica, Chinese and Japanese porcelain and faience from Lille, Bailleul and Delft.

The Delft collection comprises both seventeenth and eighteenth-century objects, from vases, chargers and plates to plaques with chinoiserie, biblical, floral or genre scenes. The collection also houses two trompe l’oeil birdcage plaques, decorative Delft tableware, such as trompe l’oeil tureens, and polychrome figures of animals. An extraordinary object in the collection is an early eighteenth century red and gilded plate, with a face surrounded by sun rays in the center. It is marked for Adriaa[e]n van Rijsselberg[h] (1681-1735) who was a contracted painter at De Grieksche A (The Greek A) factory, and set up his own business after Van der Heul’s death.

The Musée de la Chartreuse is located in the city of Douai in Northern France. The initial museum, Musée de Douai, opened to the public in about 1800. The first core collections of the museum were formed during the revolutionary seizures from 1789 until 1794. The Douai collection transformed and grew throughout the nineteenth century and in 1914 comprised approximately 2,000 objects of painting and sculpture, 6,000 archeological exhibits and the same number of ethnographical pieces. However, during the World Wars part of the collection was looted or destroyed by bombs. Unfortunately, the Musée de Douai was also irreparably damaged by wartime bombing in 1944.

Not far from the destroyed Musée de Douai was the former convent of the Carthusians. Although also severely damaged by the bombing in 1944, the city of Douai bought the building complex to install the collections of the old museum in the early 1950s. The museum has been established in this former convent since 1958.

The collection has grown steadily since the 1960s. During the first twenty years after the reopening, more than sixty paintings were acquired. The collection of the Musée de la Chartreuse includes works of art ranging from the late Middle Ages to the present day. It comprises paintings, sculptures, decorative arts and graphic arts. Besides several donations and legacies, the museum purchased many works of art to strengthen its collection.

The collection comprises also several Dutch Delftware objects, of which the pair of Hoppesteyn vases is the absolute highlight. To this date it is unknown how this remarkable pair of vases entered the museum collection. The oldest provenance available is from 1877 when the pair was listed on the museum inventory list. As more primary source materials are digitized, we may one day be able to pinpoint the missing links between Musée de la Chartreuse and the factory that produced the pair in late seventeenth century Delft.

The Kunstmuseum in The Hague has an important collection of Dutch Delftware and we have been fortunate to partner with them in the past years. In the magnificent permanent exhibition ‘Delftware Wonderware‘ the history of Dutch Delftware is told with many objects. It comprises over 235 items, which give a unique view of the Delftware industry through the ages in a dynamic presentation. As interesting and fascinating as Delftware was back in the seventeenth and eighteenth century, the exhibition also shows how contemporary designers are still inspired by the Delftware of yesteryear.

The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam houses an important collection of Dutch Delftware. Part of this collection is on view in a gallery dedicated to King Willem III. Especially his wife, Mary, was a great admirer of Dutch Delftware and the orders of her and her court were an important stimulus for the Delft faience industry. 

Dishes, jugs, candle sticks and so many other objects from various Delft factories are on show in this gallery. Mary was fond of gardening and to display her flowers and plants, she ordered large urns, vases and flower pyramids. Of the latter a wonderful large pair is exhibited. Inspired by a Chinese porcelain tower, these obelisk shaped flower holders have a Chinese decoration. But at a closer look, one sees also the western influence, which can be found among others in the recumbent lions that support the bases with a ball or terrestrial globe clamped between their forepaws, the volutes with sphinxes on top of the base with the obelisk rising on top of them, and the crowning finial of a classical female bust, possibly Queen Mary herself.

One of the greatest Dutch Delftware collections is housed in Museum Kunst & Geschiedenis, which is part of the Royal Museums of Art and History in Brussels, Belgium. The historic building, which was erected by former Belgian King Leopold II, is dedicated to National Archaeology, Antiquity, Non-European Civilizations and European Decorative Arts. The Dutch Delftware collection, bequeathed by A. Evenepoel in 1911, consists of more than 1500 pieces, ranging from the early chinoiserie blue and white style objects to the colourful eighteenth-century European pieces.

An important part of the collection of the Museum Kunst & Geschiedenis is a selection of rare black and brown Delftware. Furthermore it contains lovely plates and plaquettes by Frederik van Frytom and a wonderful vase by Hoppesteyn. Another absolute highlight is the Delft bird cage, decorated in an expanded Imari-style palette, of which the bottom has the most beautiful decoration.

An interesting Dutch Delftware collection in the United States of America is in the located in Hartford, Connecticut. The Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art was founded by Daniel Wadsworth in 1842 and opened two years later with just seventy-nine paintings and three sculptures. Today the collection exceeds 50,000 works of art, comprising not only European and American Decorative Arts, but also European, American and Contemporary Art. The ceramics collection contains a large number of Dutch Delftware, mostly a bequest from the Richard and Georgette A. Koopman collection. The pieces range from seventeenth-century ewers and dishes to eighteenth-century figures of cows, plaques and flower holders.

Beautiful is this eighteenth-century pair of flower holders, executed in a so-called ‘cashmire’ palette, which exists out of the colors blue, green and iron-red. The vases are formed in the shape of a fan, with two rows of spouts and handles in the shape of birds. Polychrome colored flower holders are in the minority, since the production of polychrome wares set in after the fashion of the flower holders with spouts reached its height.

Originally intended to accommodate the gentlemen’s society for repatriated sugar planters, the Arnhem museum was founded in 1856 with the idea to create a ‘Local memorabilia related to history and art’. The museum has the great honor to exhibit the impressive collection of the Arnhem nobleman baron Willem Frederik Karel van Verschuer (1845-1922), one of the most important 19th-century Delftware collectors.

Amongst the 800 pieces that are presented, no less than 300 are marked. Not only the collection shows what were the interests of a typical 19th-century collector, it also has the particularity to give a great understanding of the Delftware evolution, from its beginning to its decline. We are delighted to admire such a wide variety of objets: beautiful tableware like a magnificent bottle cooler made by De Grieksche A (1686-1701), miniatures and figurines, numerous home objects including an extremely precious black Delft tea caddy (1700-1725), plaques and many more.

By its didactic scenography, the Museum of Arnhem gives us the opportunity to do a big jump in the past and help us to understand the whys and wherefores of Delftware history, and consequently some essential components of the Dutch culture.  At the end of the visit the influence of blue and white Chinese export porcelain, the Dutch 17th-century tableware conventions, or the predominant pride of place ceramic took in the home of wealthy citizens, noblemen and royalty are no longer a secret.