Adventures in Europe, Day 9: Amsterdam
Today was going to be a museum day. I planned on making a trip to a grocery store to grab some portable vittles, swing back to the Anne Frank Huis, and then continue on to the Rijksmuseum for the afternoon. The grocery store leg of the journey went just fine, but then I got to the AFH. Let's just say that standing in that line, which stretched all the way around the corner, and then getting hustled into a tiny Dutch back house with all the other people in line. Instead I decided to walk through downtown and then head for the Rijksmuseum.
The walk through downtown was quite striking, as I took a wrong turn and wound up marching straight through the heart of the heavily policed Red Light District. That place holds absolutely no charm for me. Voluptuous women, scantily clad, with their breasts strategically overflowing from too-small corsets, hovering in the large windows of the canal houses - ironically designed so that the sailors' wives wouldn't have the requisite privacy to cheat on their absent husbands. There they wait for some desperate soul, so starved for intimacy as to resort to buying it, to come in and pay them to put on their show of affection - doubly a show - so they can put food on the table. Ach, it disgusts me, and I feel grave pity for everyone who's caught up in that web.
Soon enough I escaped the misery of the Red Lights and found my way to the Rijksmuseum, to my great delight. I spent a few hours there with my notebook, wandering around making bad ballpoint pen sketches after a few pieces, taking notes on others, and writing down names I shouldn't forget. The painter I couldn't remember from the other day is Aert van der Meer, and the painting is called Riviergezicht bij moonlicht (River View by Moonlight). This particular painting attains a quiet luminosity that borders on the sublime in its depiction of the warm moonlight. You can almost hear the wind rustling the leaves, the creaking of the cartwheels, the distant humming of the sailors at work, perhaps the cry of an owl on the hunt. Absolutely magical.
My other favorite has to be "Woman in Blue Reading a Letter" by Johannes Vermeer. A woman stands by a table, facing a window we cannot see. We see her in profile, her face illuminated by sunlight from the window, as she gives her full attention to a letter she is reading. Behind her on the wall hangs a large map, showing locations unknown. Two upholstered chairs stand around the table. The painting is dominated by two colors, a yellowish brown and a deep blue, but those two simple colors are an universe of their own, containing within them so much information about the subject's world that you feel you can touch it - and yet so little. It's the sort of scene one wonders about: what is in the letter? Where was it sent from? Did she spend long hours gazing at the map on the wall behind her, hoping a message would come from that place - be it near or far? And ah, the map. Maps are a known weakness of mine, but this one in particular is delightfully enticing. Only a corner of it is visible, and it defines the size of the room - which must be much larger than the corner we see, in order to house such a large map - as well as situating it in the greater context of the world around it. I also wonder about the actual map, the one Vermeer used as a prop. It appears in several of his paintings, and is one of his signature props.
This evening, Grímur's friend Kristján, who's studying jazz piano here in Amsterdam, came over and joined us for dinner and a trip to the Musiekgebouw for a piano recital. We went to this excellent Kebab/Falafel place on Rozengracht for dinner, and I had one of the better falafel wraps I've had, right up there with Med Wraps and the place by Nollendorfplatz in Berlin. The bun was exceptional in this case - thick and fluffy, instead of the tortillas and flat pitas they use elsewhere. Unfortunately I managed to lose the 40 Euros I got in change from my 50-Euro bill, which was quite a bummer - not sure how that happened, but I think I may have been pickpocketed. Ah well. I hope I fed some hungry soul for a week.
The piano concert consisted of works by Ravel and Debussy, two of my favorite composers, performed by Italian-Dutch pianist Paolo Giacometti. Once he got past some initial voicing problems at the beginning of Ravel's Sonatine, he delivered a commanding and powerful performance of the rest of the repertoire. The main problem with the concert was simply that at two full hours, it was too long and drawn-out. The impressionist theme started grating after a while, and it would really have been advisable to cut one of the longer Ravel pieces and replace it with another shorter Debussy. The Schubert encore was like a breath of fresh air in its harmonic simplicity.
The walk through downtown was quite striking, as I took a wrong turn and wound up marching straight through the heart of the heavily policed Red Light District. That place holds absolutely no charm for me. Voluptuous women, scantily clad, with their breasts strategically overflowing from too-small corsets, hovering in the large windows of the canal houses - ironically designed so that the sailors' wives wouldn't have the requisite privacy to cheat on their absent husbands. There they wait for some desperate soul, so starved for intimacy as to resort to buying it, to come in and pay them to put on their show of affection - doubly a show - so they can put food on the table. Ach, it disgusts me, and I feel grave pity for everyone who's caught up in that web.
Soon enough I escaped the misery of the Red Lights and found my way to the Rijksmuseum, to my great delight. I spent a few hours there with my notebook, wandering around making bad ballpoint pen sketches after a few pieces, taking notes on others, and writing down names I shouldn't forget. The painter I couldn't remember from the other day is Aert van der Meer, and the painting is called Riviergezicht bij moonlicht (River View by Moonlight). This particular painting attains a quiet luminosity that borders on the sublime in its depiction of the warm moonlight. You can almost hear the wind rustling the leaves, the creaking of the cartwheels, the distant humming of the sailors at work, perhaps the cry of an owl on the hunt. Absolutely magical.
My other favorite has to be "Woman in Blue Reading a Letter" by Johannes Vermeer. A woman stands by a table, facing a window we cannot see. We see her in profile, her face illuminated by sunlight from the window, as she gives her full attention to a letter she is reading. Behind her on the wall hangs a large map, showing locations unknown. Two upholstered chairs stand around the table. The painting is dominated by two colors, a yellowish brown and a deep blue, but those two simple colors are an universe of their own, containing within them so much information about the subject's world that you feel you can touch it - and yet so little. It's the sort of scene one wonders about: what is in the letter? Where was it sent from? Did she spend long hours gazing at the map on the wall behind her, hoping a message would come from that place - be it near or far? And ah, the map. Maps are a known weakness of mine, but this one in particular is delightfully enticing. Only a corner of it is visible, and it defines the size of the room - which must be much larger than the corner we see, in order to house such a large map - as well as situating it in the greater context of the world around it. I also wonder about the actual map, the one Vermeer used as a prop. It appears in several of his paintings, and is one of his signature props.
This evening, Grímur's friend Kristján, who's studying jazz piano here in Amsterdam, came over and joined us for dinner and a trip to the Musiekgebouw for a piano recital. We went to this excellent Kebab/Falafel place on Rozengracht for dinner, and I had one of the better falafel wraps I've had, right up there with Med Wraps and the place by Nollendorfplatz in Berlin. The bun was exceptional in this case - thick and fluffy, instead of the tortillas and flat pitas they use elsewhere. Unfortunately I managed to lose the 40 Euros I got in change from my 50-Euro bill, which was quite a bummer - not sure how that happened, but I think I may have been pickpocketed. Ah well. I hope I fed some hungry soul for a week.
The piano concert consisted of works by Ravel and Debussy, two of my favorite composers, performed by Italian-Dutch pianist Paolo Giacometti. Once he got past some initial voicing problems at the beginning of Ravel's Sonatine, he delivered a commanding and powerful performance of the rest of the repertoire. The main problem with the concert was simply that at two full hours, it was too long and drawn-out. The impressionist theme started grating after a while, and it would really have been advisable to cut one of the longer Ravel pieces and replace it with another shorter Debussy. The Schubert encore was like a breath of fresh air in its harmonic simplicity.