The Canon

Rogier’s Descent is unquestionably the painter’s masterpiece and a fundamental expression of the subject. The monumental figures convey different aspects of grief, and the body of the fainting Virgin echoes the pose of the dead Christ, thus visualizing her role as Co-Redemptrix. The work was to become the model for countless other images of the Descent until the sixteenth century.

Stephan Kemperdick, Curator of Early Netherlandish and Early German Painting, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin

The anonymous master was one of the most innovative artists towards the end of the fifteenth century, when Flanders produced an abundance of illuminated books of hours that were coveted all over Europe. The finely-executed miniature displays a completely new iconography that sheds light on the use of devotional books. While reading a book of hours, an elegant lady imagines herself to be in the very presence of the Virgin. This scene of worship is set in a magnificent church interior to which the window of the lady’s oratory seems to lead.

Stephan Kemperdick, Curator of Early Netherlandish and Early German Painting, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin

This gemlike small panel evokes such strong emotions and is so exquisitely well done that it deserves a place in the canon.

Suzanne Laemers, Curator Early Netherlandish Painting, RKD - Netherlands Institute for Art History, The Hague

In whatever list or group you may encounter this painting, it will always stand out. That in itself is a measure of the improbable eccentricity of Hieronymus Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights. Indeed, it might well be labelled the non plus ultra of originality, one of the most essential concepts in Western art. That no one has yet arrived at a satisfying interpretation of the central panel makes the work more intriguing still.

Friso Lammertse, Curator of Old Master Paintings, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam

The Spinario by Jan Gossart represents more than any other drawing by a Netherlandish artist the interest for Roman antiquity in the early Renaissance. Not only is Gossart's documented journey to Rome in 1508-09 a starting point for this antiquarian interest, the drawing also shows how the artist invigorated the classical statue with life, illustrating the process in which antique sculptures became the models for figure painters in the Netherlands.

Jef Schaeps, Curator of Prints and Drawings, Print Room of Leiden University, Leiden

Lucas van Leyden was unquestionably one of the two most important printmakers – along with Albrecht Dürer – of the first half of the 16th century. With his refined style of engraving, Lucas produced unprecedented pictorial effects. In this print, for instance, note the rendering of the animals’ muscles, hide and hair, and the texture of the wood and fabrics. This subtle print, with its rustic theme, was also a milestone in the development of genre scenes.

Joris Van Grieken, Curator of Prints and Drawings, Royal Library of Belgium, Brussels

Gossart was a pioneer in the art of adapting and amalgamating antique forms to and with Netherlandish painting. In this panel, he combines classical architecture with the Northern attention for the effects of light on surfaces. His Danae likewise displays elements of the Renaissance nude as well as of the Netherlandish tradition. The skillful rendering of skin and hair and the upcast eyes, reminiscent of the figures of saintly virgins, endow her with a sensuality that chimes perfectly with the story in antiquity of the love of the gods.

Stephan Kemperdick, Curator of Early Netherlandish and Early German Painting, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin

The Haarlem painter Frans Hals is rightly seen as one of the most important seventeenth-century portraitists in the Netherlands. In his best works, he depicted his models in classical poses with supreme confidence and an unprecedented freedom of style. With sublime technical perfection, in every aspect from minute details to bold brushstrokes, Hals contrives to make his models almost tangible. The merry, twinkling eyes of the Laughing Cavalier radiate the sheer pleasure of this painting.

Sabine Craft-Giepmans, Head of Fine Arts till 1750, RKD - Netherlands Institute for Art History, The Hague

The best picture in the genre. Showing a congregation of Antwerp's finest painters and collectors. It includes a self-portrait by the artist, who was the curator of Van der Geest's fabulous collection. The collection shows a lost picture by Van Eyck. The motto Vive l'Esprit, displayed above the entrance to the room makes the painting seem nothing less than a mission statement. A picture to which one can return time after time.

Bert Watteeuw Curator of Research Collections, Rubenianum, Antwerp

Rubens is the great painter of flesh hues, and in that respect this work represents the acme of his achievement. While the ideal of feminine beauty may be a little less voluptuous in the 21st century, the poetic manner in which Rubens presents the goddesses of beauty, creativity, and fertility in this tangible form remains overpowering. Standing before the painting itself – it is more than life-sized and executed entirely by the master himself – the viewer is struck by Rubens’s supreme mastery of his art, which speaks to us through every brushstroke.

Friso Lammertse, Curator of Old Master Paintings, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam

Anthony van Dyck was indisputably the most popular portrait painter of his day. He painted the likenesses of numerous rulers and nobles, as well as celebrated and lesser-known contemporaries, several of whom were among his friends and associates. He may have decided to turn them into prints to exploit the growing demand for printed portraits. Van Dyck initially experimented with etchings. He wielded the etching needle with virtuoso technique, successfully translating the immediacy and rich character of a study into the medium of a print. It is possible that his initial plan was to publish a volume with portraits of famous people. He also made an etching of Erasmus based on Holbein’s portrait of the philosopher. At quite an early stage, he enlisted the aid of engravers such as Paulus Pontius and Lucas Vorsterman to help complete his portraits. Later on, these and other engravers worked directly after his studies, supplementing the series with prints after his paintings. It was not until after his death, in 1645, that the first commercial edition appeared of the work that would become known as the Iconographie ou vies des hommes illustres – or Iconography. With their audacious experimentalism and brilliant technique, these etched states of prints, executed by Van Dyck’s own hand, are among the most superlative highlights of graphic art.

Joris Van Grieken, Curator of Prints and Drawings, Royal Library of Belgium, Brussels

In the Huis ten Bosch Palace, the residence of the Dutch king in The Hague, we find the Oranjezaal, one of the most impressive monuments of the seventeenth century. Anyone who has seen this room with their own eyes will be truly astonished. Dozens of large paintings, on canvas and on the wooden parts of the architecture, exemplify the full range of Dutch and Flemish painting around 1650. The program of decorations was chiefly designed as a tribute to the memory of Stadholder Frederik Hendrik, who died in 1647. The scale of this project was unprecedented for the Dutch Republic. The largest and most important painting, The Triumph of Frederik Hendrik, is executed on an enormous canvas measuring 731 x 756 cm. In commissioning this painting, the preference was for a Flemish rather than a Dutch painter: as Rubens had already died, the commission went to Jordaens. For many years, this unforgettable room attracted little attention. More recently, however, there has been a revival of interest in wall decorations, and in history and classicist paintings. The scenes in the Oranjezaal are worlds apart from the still lifes and landscapes with which the seventeenth century abounds!

Quentin Buvelot, Senior Curator, Mauritshuis, The Hague

Fortunes wax and wane. Whereas the Leiden artist Gerrit Dou was one of the best-paid artists of his day, frequently earning more than his famous teacher, Rembrandt, the nineteenth century saw him sink into near-oblivion. In the 1930s, we even find German museums divesting themselves of paintings by him and other fijnschilders. This sublimely-painted scene displays Dou at his best: the diverse materials are all depicted highly convincingly, as is the little sleeping dog with its tender, touchable appeal.

Quentin Buvelot, Senior Curator, Mauritshuis, The Hague

Whether it was the palest light of early morning or the warm flush of evening, Aelbert Cuyp could capture the light of each and every moment of the day. This view from the north of Dordrecht, the city where Cuyp worked, is the most spectacular example of the artist’s brushwork, especially in the reflection of the city’s profile in the water. Scenes of this kind were extremely popular among eighteenth-century English collectors. As a result, there are more Cuyps to be found in England today than anywhere else in the world.

Quentin Buvelot, Senior Curator, Mauritshuis, The Hague

The Jewish Bride is one of Rembrandt’s finest works. A highly intimate, serene image of two lovers, executed sublimely in inimitably thick layers of paint. As Vincent van Gogh wrote, after having seen the painting in 1885: “Would you believe it, and I honestly mean what I say, that I should be happy to give ten years of my life if I could go on sitting here in front of this picture for a fortnight, with only a crust of dry bread for food?”

Sabine Craft-Giepmans, Head of Fine Arts till 1750, RKD - Netherlands Institute for Art History, The Hague

Large white clouds in the sky; you can almost feel the wind. Although Meindert Hobbema was famous for his wooded landscapes and his characteristic depiction of large trees with abundant foliage, he displays his finest qualities in a landscape with scrawny trees lining a road: the avenue of Middelharnis, close to where he was born. It is a quintessentially Dutch landscape basking in the bright daylight. The viewer is drawn irresistibly into the painting.

Sabine Craft-Giepmans, Head of Fine Arts till 1750, RKD - Netherlands Institute for Art History, The Hague

From 1699 to 1701 the talented artist Maria Sybilla Merian made a study trip with her daughter Dorothea to Suriname to study and draw the life cycles of insects. It resulted in the book Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium (The Metamorphosis of the Insects of Suriname) that was published in 1705. The book was immediately well received and Merian was highly regarded as an entomologist and as an artist. Nowadays her detailed colorful drawings are a feast to the eye and inspire scholars and the general public when they are on display.

Dr. Hanna Klarenbeek Curator of Paintings, Prints and Drawings, Paleis Het Loo, Apeldoorn

Church furniture was one of the areas in which baroque sculpture flourished most outstandingly in the Southern Netherlands. This unique pulpit was made by the Antwerp sculptor Michiel Van der Voort for the Norbertine convent of Leliëndal in Mechelen. It represents the striking culmination of an evolution in which sculptural aspects came increasingly to dominate the appearance of such items of furniture, until the point that what remained was only an expressive, naturalistic whole.

Valérie Herremans, Curator of Sculpture, Royal Museums of Fine Arts, Antwerp