Vermeer exhibition in Amsterdam sets new record
The popular Johannes Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, which closed on June 4th, welcomed a staggering 650,000 visitors. This figure makes it the most visited exhibition in the museum’s history and brings much-needed post-pandemic capital to the historical site with €30 per admission over a 16-week period.
Stats gathered by the museum show that 55% of visitors came from the Netherlands, with notable admirers flocking in from France (7.7%), Germany (7.2%), the United Kingdom (7.2%), and the United States (6.3%).
The exhibition showcased a remarkable collection of the Dutch Old Master’s paintings, with 28 out of 37 works on display. Notable masterpieces such as ‘The Milkmaid’ and ‘The Girl With the Pearl Earring’, which had been returned to The Hague’s Mauritshuis museum in March, were among the most popular pieces on display.
Furthermore, the Rijksmuseum made significant enhancements by upgrading three paintings, including ‘Girl with a Flute’, sourced from the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.
Taco Dibbits, the general director of Rijksmuseum, issued a new statement: “We wanted the visitors to enjoy it to the fullest. This was only possible by limiting the number of visitors. The Rijksmuseum is grateful for the generous loans from museums around the world that have enabled it to bring together more works by Vermeer than ever before.”
“Though it was a logistical miracle to corral three-quarters of Vermeer’s output into one show, 28 is still very few paintings to hang in a large exhibition space. Luckily for us, the curators Gregor J.M. Weber and Pieter Roelofs have kept their nerve and trusted in ‘less is more’,” novelist Tracy Chevalier wrote per The Art Newspaper.
More than 100,000 copies of the €35 Vermeer catalogue were sold during the exhibition, marking another record for the Rijksmuseum. Various research projects were also conducted during the exhibition, with one making an intriguing observation regarding ‘The Milkmaid’.
“The can and board visible in the underpainting, but not in the final painting, indicate that Vermeer continued to seek tranquillity and the perfect composition during the painting process,” read the project’s concluding statement.
