Top 3: Elco Brinkman
chairman Lucas van Leyden Patronage
Despite the increased mobility in our time, summer months are still oases of valuable stability in our memories and dreams about the future. I can't lie down on the beach for days or weeks, even though Noordwijk on the sea is still my favorite destination in this period. Home sweet home remains a stable value in our ever more global world. And because you have more time during the holidays, you should, I think, always keep a good book nearby to feed your daydreams. That's why I ask your attention for these 3 hits from Museum De Lakenhal in Leiden. They have eternal value in our unstable times.
View of Leiden
For the last quarter of the previous century, I've lived in Jan van Goyen's View on Leiden from the North East (1650), across the ducks, in the lower right corner of the painting. There, on Damastroos 10 in the Leiden district of the 'Merenwijk', my love for this deliciously dreamy city began. This silhouette of the city is still there, only to be seen when you don't rush by.
Gezicht op Leiden uit het noordoosten
Jan van Goyen
Jan van Goyen, een van de leidende landschapsschilders van de Gouden Eeuw, schilderde bij herhaling zijn geboortestad. De ingetogen tinten en de virtuoos-vlotte techniek met fijnzinnige detaillering, zijn typerend voor zijn latere werk. Wanneer een reiziger op een bewolkte dag per trekschuit of zeilschip de stad over het riviertje de Zijl naderde, moet hij Leiden ongeveer zo hebben gezien. Toch week Jan van Goyen om schilderkunstige redenen enigszins af van de realiteit. De twee grootste kerken schilderde hij vanuit twee verschillende windrichtingen. De Hooglandse Kerk is gezien vanuit het oosten, zodat het half voltooide schip gemaskeerd bleef, terwijl de Pieterskerk vanuit het noorden wordt getoond om het hoge schip beter te doen uitkomen. De suggestie van serene rust bereikte Jan van Goyen door een harmonieuze plaatsing van schepen en koeien, door een stemmig licht en door de ongestoorde dagelijkse werkzaamheden van zijn personages.
Read morenecessary dike
Windmills were there, the've gone, and now the people demand them back, regardless their negative image due to their size, shape and sheer amount. The river Zijl was still meandering quietly, in a smooth transition from land to water, there where a small dike now helps keeping cyclists, drivers and skaters to stay out of the water. While also further spoiling the view on the meadows. That little dike is necessary, I know, since I increasingly need to worry about a repeatedly flooded basement in the city centre.
to sit where Van Goyen placed his easel
Yes, a lot changed because the people say it needs to, but the desire for a balanced Holland, with the quietness of the countryside and the hustle and bustle of the city in their mutual coherence, remains. New generations keep on coming, bringing their different uses and needs. New visions on the future they keep on bringing too. City and surroundings can't live without each other, that goes for their inhabitants, their views and their boards. That last thing aside, but I mention it to kick off, now I still have to deal with it. But this one image endures: in today's 24/7 economy we need to schedule hours to sit back at the spot where Van Goyen once placed his easel.
At home in Noordwijk
Harm Kamerlingh Onnes painted a View on Noordwijk in 1918, a view I hope to paint again once more in my own fashion, this summer on the sea side. Provided that windmills don't clutter the horizon by that time.
Gezicht op Noordwijk
Harm Kamerlingh Onnes
Gezicht op Noordwijk is opgebouwd als een mozaïek van bijna identieke kleurrijke verfstreepjes. Het is veel abstracter dan het vroegere werk van Harm Kamerlingh Onnes en de kleurintensiteit is sterker. Kamerling Onnes maakte verschillende schilderijen met zonnen die hoog aan de hemel uiteenspatten in stralen van licht en kleur. Architect J.J.P. Oud noemde het werk van zijn vriend terecht ‘on-Hollandsch weelderig’, ‘zeer kleurgevoelig’ en ‘lyrisch’.
Read morewindmills out of sight
His splashing color palette is one of the thousands of interpretations of the game of light and dark, sun and clouds, water and sand, always there to experience while waving and snoozing. However busy or quiet, you're forced to shape your own image of that wide reality. That really gives one new energy. And therefore, windmills must be out of sight!
Leiden: something for everyone
After reading many books in Noordwijk, I hope to return fit and rested in the city centre that has been photographed so inspiringly by Casper Faassen. Sometimes noisy (like the students two doors down the road), sometimes modestly enjoying the beautiful park. With all its appealing features, Leiden has been offering something for everyone for centuries. Innovations based on long lasting traditions.
sample book
In the sample book of the Cloth Hall from 1700, one of the most important traditions is kept. Literally closed in a book, but as soon as you open it, you understand why Leiden was, is and remains famous; those beautiful colors and warm fabrics are pieces of the vital software of our shared identity in our ever denser built surroundings.
tradition provides chances for innovation
However many new designs and products computers will make of it, we should be forever grateful to the craftsman and their skills, described in this book. Based on their tradition, innovation can banish the last pieces of darkness that hover over our times. To let them blow in the wind, and be shined upon by a sun that also shines above the city after yet another downpour in the changeable whether we face today. We dress ourselves in Leiden Cloth again, everywhere and always, our bodies, our houses and the streets - maybe even on the beach. Yes, innovation is hidden in a book, if you're willing to read it. Mark my words, as soon as Museum De Lakenhal reopens, this secret of the future will be unveiled, but only if we start dreaming now.
Elco Brinkman
Mr. Drs. Elco Brinkman is former chairman of Bouwend Nederland, fraction chairman of the CDA in the Senate and chairman of the Lucas van Leiden Patronage, an inspiring and lively network for citizens and companies with a special connection with the city of Leiden and Museum De Lakenhal in particular. In the period 2011-2017, all the proceeds of the Patronage is used the restoration and expansion of Museum De Lakenhal.
more about the Patronage