Day Seventeen: Scheveningen & Museum Beelden aan Zee

Today was Rob's first official day of class, so I had a day to myself to get a few paperwork things done this morning for our art show in November in Mississauga. I still have at least two more pieces I'd like to get done for that before the end of September. With all the traveling around for the past couple of weeks, I haven't had much time to think about my pieces.

This afternoon, Jos thought he'd give me a little inspiration and bring me out to Scheveningen, which is a beach off of the North Sea. Very beautiful, lots of wind and waves, but a very nice place to walk along.



Also, along the beach, built into a sand dune, is Beelden aan Zee Museum (which translates to "Sculptures by the Sea"). The museum has a huge collection of sculptures from many different artists in many different styles. I was very pleased to find out that I could take pictures in the galleries, as there are many galleries that don't let you do that. So, of course, I went crazy taking pictures.

I'm no expert on Sculptors and the sculptural art world (i'm more of a 2-D person), but it seemed to me like a great collection of pieces spanning the second half of the 20th century to the present day. What I really liked about the museum was architectural layout of the building, as it was itself almost a sculpture. There were a lot of outdoor terraces and areas to walk, and the corridors told a story as you moved through them.

This was work from a collection called Ghost Riders by Nicolas Dings:





I hadn't heard of any of the sculptors (which is no surprise since my knowledge of sculptors is limited to the Classical Sculptors, Henry Moore, and Matisse.) I have no real grasp on modern sculpture. BUT, that being said, this collection was lovely, playful, and fun to explore. The collection of work by Gooitzen de Jong was quite interesting, as his work reflected figure painting in a loose three dimensional way.

My favourite work was in the outside courtyards, though. You can see the Sea from up there, and the rest of the city, which is pretty cool. This is the outside of one piece:



And now from the inside:



There was also a special exhibit called Father and Son, where a handful of artists born between 1910-1930 were each asked to select their favourite artist from the generation that followed them (1930-1950), and they in turn chose five more (1950-1970). This results in a large variety of work.



After the Museum, Jos took me down to the Water Front, which was wonderful. The strong gusts didn't hamper anybody from coming out and enjoying the sun and the warm breeze. I even made a new friend!

Tomorrow we go to the Rotterdam Zoo. Very excited!

Oh, by the way, There is a lot of construction going on right now to reconstruct the water front in Scheveningen, and Jos sent me this you tube video of what the project entails. Because the Beelden aan Zee museum has a permanent collection of scupltures that had to be moved inside during construction, they have become sort of mascots in this little animation of the plans. check it out: