2. The First Art Gallery, a Permanent Exhibition?
Having now established that art exhibitions had become far more common when van Breda
left his post at Teylers than they had been when he arrived, the crucial point is of course to try
and understand how the display at the First Art Gallery of Teylers Museum needs to be seen
in relation to other publicly accessible exhibitions during this period. What characterised the
display at Teylers Museum and therefore, by extension, Teylers Museum itself?
Two points are particularly striking. The first is that it was a privately funded, yet non-profit
and publicly accessible museum. As such it differed from the other major exhibitions and
museums, because neither was the government or any other public body involved, nor was the
exhibition’s aim that of making money. What’s more, the exhibition at Teylers was
permanent. As was already mentioned in the previous chapter, no statements or clues as to
exactly what purpose the trustees of the Teyler Foundation saw in presenting their art
collection to the general public in such a magnificent manner have been preserved — although
one can safely assume that the trustees would have felt their decisions needed to be in
accordance with Pieter Teyler’s last will and testament. One could therefore perhaps say that
the First Art Gallery was the result of personal interest and preferences on the one hand and a
tradition of public service in the Mennonite sense on the other hand.
More specifically, on the one hand the collection of paintings itself has an innately private
character — no clear principle according to which the paintings were acquired is discernible.
The only constant criterion appears to have been that the paintings had to be Dutch. (This
argument at least was brought forward in a polite refusal to acquire a painting that had been
offered for sale in 1854.76) One also can’t help but notice that some paintings were bought in
pairs, which would have been in line with a fashion coined by collectors of Romantic art.77
One of the very first acquisition for instance — “Storm op Zee” (“Storm at Sea”) by Johannes
Christiaan Schotel — evidently prompted the trustees to ask the artist to paint another work of
equal size depicting a calm sea. Finally, some of the paintings the Foundation acquired had
been praised by critics at exhibitions of contemporary art, which would have made them
desirable in itself — but not cheaper, and therefore not really suitable as a financial investment
either, ruling out another possible motive for acquiring these paintings.78 So, in all likelihood,
it was the trustees’ personal taste which formed the main determining factor in selecting new
acquisitions.
Yet, on the other hand, the trustees were ultimately not acquiring the paintings for themselves,
but for the Teyler Foundation. And not only had Teyler clearly stated that the arts and
sciences were to be stimulated with his bequeathal, but Teylers Museum had also had the
decade-long tradition of allowing access to whoever was interested in the collections housed
76 “Directienotulen”, 24.02.1854, Haarlem, ATS, vol. 9.
77 Annemiek Ouwerkerk, Romantiek aan het Spaame: schilderijen tot 1850 uit de collectie van Teylers Museum
Haarlem (Haarlem: Teylers Museum, 2010), 49-51.
78 On the acquisition o f works praised by critics see also: Ibid., 25; Terry van Druten, “Waarheid om bij weg te
dromen: De Nederlandse Romantiek in Teylers Museum en de Collectie Rademakers,” unpublished manuscript
(Haarlem, 2013).
there, free of charge. All this would inevitably have had a profound impact on how the
trustees handled the Foundation’s collection and helps explain why they had the First Art
Gallery constructed for such an innately private collection.
This accessibility brings us to the second point that is of crucial importance m understanding
the museum’s character around the time van der Willigen arrived there: this is the fact that it
was not intended to function as a venue for practical studies. Copying the works on display
was forbidden - explicitly so after 1852. The minutes of a meeting of the trustees held in July
of that year read:
“The question comes up whether the one or the other painter might be allowed to make copies
of pieces [paintings] in the Museum of this Foundation. Because of the many inconveniences
which would arise from this, it is decided not to grant permission.”79
Although this was not extraordinary for temporary exhibitions of contemporary art - after all,
copies would inevitably also have affected the pictures’ market value - this kind of
prohibition was not usual at museums. On the contrary: copying the old masters was
considered part of every aspiring painter’s basic training, and the most suitable place to do so
was a museum. In 1906 the painter Jozef Israels - by then he was more than 80 years old and
one of the most respected artists of his generation!- recalled how, when he arrived in
Amsterdam in the early 1840s, his teacher, Jan Adam Kruseman, had sent him to the
Rijksmuseum to make copies - even though Israels would much rather have copied paintings
from his master’s private collection. Israels described this in the following words:
“It was around the middle of the previous century, that I went to Amsterdam to tram as a
student of the art of painting under the direction of the then renowned portraitist Kruseman. I
was soon admitted to the studio of my master and I looked with great admiration at the
portraits of distinguished persons in Amsterdam that he was working on.
The pink colour of the complexions and the delicate treatment of fabrics and clothes,
sometimes standing out against a background of dark red velvet, pleased me greatly.
However, when I expressed my desire to be allowed to copy some of these portraits, I was not
given permission by the master; no, he replied, if you want to make copies, then go to the
museum in the Trippenhuis.”
79 “Komt ter spraak de vraag, o f aan deze o f gene schilders vergund zou kunnen worden om stukken van het
Museum dezer Stiehting te kopieren. Uit hoofde van de vele wordt
besloten, zoodanige vergunning niet te verleenen.” “Directienotulen , 30.07.1852, I de
80 “Het was zoo wat tegen de helft der vorige eeuw, dat lk naar Amsterdam ging om als Studiosus
schilderkunst mij onder de leiding van den toen zeer gerenommeerden portretschilder K™eman g g w B
Al spoedig werd ik toegelaten in het atelier van mijn meester en zag met groote bewondenng de portretten die
hij naar voomame personen van Amsterdam onder handen had. // De rose kleur der aangezichtenen de j
behandeling der stoffen en kleedage, soms uitkomende tegen een achtergrond van donker rood fluweel
behaaeden mij zeer. // Toen ik echter het verlangen te kennen gaf eenige dier portretten te mögen cop.eeren
werd mij dat door den meester niet toegestaan; neen, was zijn antwoord als gy copieeren wilt, ga dan naar het
museum in het Trippenhuis.” Jozef Israels, “Rembrandt,” De Gids 24, no. 3 (1906). 1 2.