It is very easy not to dwell on things. For instance, I learned at school that we sailed to the East to get nutmeg and pepper. Stuff that just rolled off the trees into the boats there and that we could sell very expensively here. Sugar, another thing. That came to us from plantations just like that,...
In the dead of night on 9-10 June, the restored Golden Coach was hoisted over the roof of the Amsterdam Museum in a wooden box. A special and spectacular moment that took place in the middle of the night because the tram lines had to be shut down for this major operation. Everything went well and the Golden Coach was lifted last night....
With journalist Bianca Stigter's book Atlas of an occupied city, you walk through today's reality, as it were, with historical virtual reality glasses on. An extra layer appears over the familiar backdrop of Amsterdam's streets: of World War II occupation. What wartime past is hidden in the streets and behind the facades? Atlas...
Godfried Bomans died half a century ago. Almost immediately afterwards, the Netherlands' best-loved writer sank into oblivion. It is time for a reappraisal of Bomans' literary work and even his political views. I delved into the archives, also looking for the few traces of Bomans in Amersfoort. First some round figures. Seventy years ago, he delivered a lecture...
The Dutch cultural sector is in distress. Halbe Zijlstra's spending cuts ten years ago started a free fall that has still not stopped. The Social and Economic Council (SER) calculated that these cuts of 200 million not only caused impoverishment in cultural supply, but also wreaked havoc on the labour market. 20 thousand permanent jobs disappeared
With 'A monument to the BKR', Fransje Kuyvenhoven has indeed written a tribute in her "history of a high-profile artists' scheme (1949-1987 )". If only because the first hundred pages contain no text, but a chronological showcase of artworks from the BKR. By Karel Appel, Corneille, Constant, Lucebert, Jan Wolkers, Kees van Bohemen, Ger Lataster, Armando, among others. And because there are...
'There is no other sector in the Netherlands that is as controlled and regulated as the cultural sector.' D66 MP Salima Belhaj sighed this towards the end of the debate organised by the assembled cultural sector lobby clubs on Monday 8 February. 'It takes an incredible amount of work, time and especially money. And the basis is distrust.' The most culture-friendly party of...
On Friday 12 February 2021 from 12:00-17:00, the Amsterdam Museum, together with its various partners, is organising the Refresh Symposium on the Amsterdam art climate. A symposium in which makers such as Bas Kosters, Massih Hutak and Raquel van Haver together with representatives of cultural institutions such as NDSM-werf, AFK and Amerpodia will critically examine the art climate in the city. The symposium...
What happens in 2022, when refunds are due or not, we will determine on 17 March. But we may just have to count on the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science changing its name already.
Dutch theatre is thriving, despite frantic attempts by various Rutte cabinets to bring it down. And even though money is always short as a result: a lot of new theatre is being made. More than ever, even. But.
There is a but.
The support cultural organisations receive from the government seems generous, but we can add some nuance to this. This is because if a local authority gives emergency support to a museum, support is then set off against the National Enterprise Scheme (NOW).
Albania's National Theatre, recently declared a protected monument by Europa Nostra, was unexpectedly destroyed on Sunday, 17 May, after two years of protests. Early in the morning, when it was still dark, the bulldozers came. A sudden wave of policemen wearing mouth caps chased activists and artists out of the theatre and formed a cordon around the audience....
'At some point, you get it again. then you just have to start paying again. Unless there will somehow be remission, but that is not the case for now.' For Paul Baltus, director of museum dome Amersfoort in C, a big challenge awaits if the intelligent lockdown will slowly be lifted. How can...
Utrecht-based theatre group Aluin is in dire straits. Like all other theatre companies, they cannot do their work, and performances have been postponed or cancelled. That it does not only apply to ongoing tours is now apparent. Performances scheduled for autumn and next spring have also been cancelled. The company reports this in a press release. Alum would...
In 2016 initieerde fotograaf en beeldend kunstenaar Jaap van den Berg een bijzonder project in Gouda. In het historische centrum op de Markt stelde hij diverse mensen van allerlei rangen en standen de vraag: Waarom gaat het goed in je leven? Mensen die op die vraag ingingen zette Van den Berg daarna op de foto. Er werden 140 portretten gekozen…
When he started for himself in 2006, the CoC's question was not, how Oscar Kocken would later deal with a global pandemic of apocalyptic proportions, income-wise. This is just to point out what a stooge our minister of economic affairs is, and how we can yet gain some understanding of the wall of misunderstanding where the...
'All that remains for me to say is that I think it is a fantastic painting and that I find it downright criminal that the Heineken family is unwilling to display the painting in a public place. It shows what an incredible thug the Heineken family is.' Dixit Maarten van Rossem at the end of his speech at the...
They have learned something at Boekman. The foundation, which since this year has had the honour of managing the culture index, understands that trend graphs say precious little. We have observed this several times on this site, and the researchers now confirm this wholeheartedly. So this year the club is doing things differently. For the past few months, sixty wise men and women have been...
Door de storm aan publiciteit lijkt Vincent van Gogh’s ‘Onkruid verbrandende boer’ (1883) de ster van de nieuwe tentoonstelling Barbizon van het Noorden – De ontdekking van het Drentse landschap 1850-1950. Het middelpunt van de expositie laat, zoals het een goede diva betaamt, nog even op zich wachten. Het is ‘fashionably late’. Er is wel alvast een plekje gereserveerd. De…
The culture sector will have to be patient for a while yet. Minister Ingrid van Engelshoven had no intention of changing any of her policies on Monday 18 November, during the discussion of the culture budget in the Standing Parliamentary Committee on Culture. Despite a fairly widely supported desire, especially from the opposition, to do something about the 8.6 million cut in the...
This weekend, gallery owner Henk Logman discovered to his horror that artworks from the Amersfoort Art Loan were being offered for sale on a Belgian auction site. On his facebook page, he reports: 'The extraordinary thing about the whole thing is that the now still living artists were not informed of this. I would at least have expected that to have happened....
'Nothing can make up for the past. But the real, enduring power of the past lies in how it affects our present and our future. What we can do is shape a future history in which we consciously and determinedly carry with us only the best of our past.' Not keep rooting, but cognitive behavioural therapy for the whole of Europe, you might...
We treat our cultural heritage too casually. This is evident from the report 'Reserved and Involved', presented on Monday 30 September, drawn up by the Pechtold committee at the request of minister Van Engelshoven. In 110 pages (with pictures), it says that the current design of the Heritage Act leads to arbitrariness and uncertainty. This means that unsavoury situations like...
Members of the States General, This year about 72 years ago we had the first Holland Festival. After years of enslavement and tyranny, hope for a better future literally came from above, in the form of Maria Callas. Eyewitnesses who saw the lights in the Stadsschouwburg turn red that day would never forget that image. 72 years later, it seems...
De poppen zullen dansen, de rapen zijn gaar en de poep heeft de ventilator geraakt. Het Amsterdam Museum vervangt ‘Gouden Eeuw’ door het neutrale ’17e eeuw’. Een typisch voorbeeld van oikofobe omvolking en politiek correcte taalzuivering, of een nuttige aanpassing aan een veranderende tijdgeest? Tijd gaat het leren, maar explosief is het wel. Bij mij roept het vragen op. Dat…
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