Just a Taste of the Golden Age: Prized Possessions in Bath

The British have long had a liking for art from the Dutch Golden Age; many of the paintings that made their way across the North Sea are to be found not in museums and galleries but in country mansions. Prized Possessions: Dutch Masterpieces from National Trust Houses offers a rare chance to see some of the best together in one place -- in a museum: the Holburne in Bath.

It's a small but well-formed show that offers an all-too-brief overview of the remarkably productive 17th century in the Netherlands: landscape, cityscape, church interior, portrait, genre scenes, flower painting and of course a naval battle against the English. With a great cast list too: Rembrandt, Jan Steen, Pieter de Hooch and Aelbert Cuyp.

The National Trust may not own a Vermeer, but it does have a number of paintings by de Hooch, his Delft contemporary. In the Holburne, The Golf Players from Polesden Lacey in Surrey is a classic example of his household scenes: the view through multiple doorways, the perspective given by the receding floor tiles, so beautifully rendered with all their imperfections, and the subtle play of the light on the ground and the door latch. The blue Delft tiles on the wall on the left wittily echo the subject matter of the painting, with their own depictions of childrens' games.

De Hooch's painting is at one end of an impressive wall of works that includes Gerard ter Borch's The Introduction (also known as An Officer Making His Bow to a Courtesan, or alternatively Making His Bow to a Lady), similarly from Polesden Lacey. The shimmering satin of the woman's dress shows how ter Borch could do for fabrics what de Hooch could do for tiles. The varying titles reflect the enigmatic quality of this image, as is often the case with ter Borch, demonstrated in last year's fantastic Louvre and Dublin exhibition to have been the inspiration behind so many themes in Dutch genre painting.

There are other fine genre scenes here too, including The Duet by Gabriel Metsu, from Upton House in Warwickshire. A man with a lute, a woman with a glass of wine and a footwarmer, a rather anxious little dog... that's quite a lot of erotic symbolism at work.

Taking pride of place in the centre of that back wall is this Rembrandt: Self Portrait Wearing a Feathered Bonnet. Only reattributed to Rembrandt in recent years, the painting is normally displayed at Buckland Abbey in Devon.

The homes, the fabrics: there's a tangibility to Dutch Golden Age art that is part of its appeal. And you get that in pictures of Dutch cities too. Cuyp's View of Dordrecht from the North, from Ascott Manor in Buckinghamshire, depicts a view of the artist's home town whose highlights are unchanged over 350 years later: the cathedral, the old city gate and the bustling shipping traffic at the point where three major rivers come together. You can sit on a riverside terrace with a drink in Dordrecht today and still wonder at the ceaseless passage of barges.

Back inside, the views are equally beguiling. Pieter Jansz Saenredam's Interior of the Church of St Catherine, Utrecht may appear just an architectural study in white, but look a little more closely and unexpected details reveal themselves. The Dutch weather looks to be doing some damage to the Gothic vaulted ceiling, to judge by the damp brown patches amid the remnants of decoration. Why did the shadowy brown figures in the centre-left foreground get painted out, you wonder. And then there are the clouds scudding past outside, visible through the tracery of windows that no longer contain stained glass.

Not every picture in the show matches these, but we should pick out Jan Lievens' Magus at a Table, with a fascinating Rembrandt-like aura.

This is, though, quite a small exhibition, with 20-odd paintings, so it's probably not one to travel a long way to see just for its own sake. But if you live in the region or are visiting, it's highly recommendable. There are other chances to catch it as well: After it finishes at the Holburne, it moves on to the Mauritshuis in The Hague from October 11 to January 6 and then to the National Trust's Petworth House in West Sussex.

Practicalities

Prized Possessions: Dutch Masterpieces from National Trust Houses runs at the Holburne Museum in Bath until September 16. Full-price tickets are £10, with National Trust members paying £7.50, and can be bought online here. The museum is a 15-minute walk from Bath Spa rail station or the bus station next door.

While you're at the Holburne

British painting had its own Golden Age in the 18th century, and the museum has a splendid collection of works by artists including Thomas Gainsborough, who spent 16 years in Bath. The Byam Family is one of several full-length portraits.

More shows celebrating the Dutch Golden Age

Opening on July 7, Rembrandt: Britain's Discovery of the Master at the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh will bring together key works by Rembrandt in British collections past and present.

There's a whole lot of Rembrandt going on in 2019, when the Netherlands marks 350 years since his death with a series of exhibitions. Read our preview here.

Pieter de Hooch gets a retrospective at the Prinsenhof in Delft starting in October next year, and looking a lot further ahead, the museum in Dordrecht is planning a big Cuyp exhibition running from December 2020.

Images

Pieter de Hooch, The Golf Players, c. 1658-60, Polesden Lacey, Surrey. (c) National Trust Images/Derrick E. Witty

Gerard ter Borch, An Officer Making His Bow to a Lady, c. 1662, Polesden Lacey, Surrey. (c) National Trust Images/John Hammond

Rembrandt van Rijn, Self Portrait Wearing a Feathered Bonnet, 1635, Buckland Abbey, Devon. (c) National Trust Images/Chris Titmus

Aelbert Cuyp, View of Dordrecht from the North, c. 1655, Ascott Estate, Buckinghamshire. (c) National Trust Images/John Hammond
Pieter Jansz Saenredam, The Interior of the Church of St Catherine, Utrecht, c. 1660, Upton House, Warwickshire. (c) National Trust Images/Christopher Hurst