Prized Possessions

Celebrating the enduring British taste for collecting Dutch paintings from the long seventeenth century, this exhibition catalog will explore why and how this particular type of art was desired, commissioned, and displayed, through the consideration of Golden Age masterpieces from a number of National Trust houses. This catalog will be published to accompany the first ever exhibition of Golden Age Dutch pictures in the collection of the National Trust, which will be shown at the Mauritshuis in The Hague, the Holburne Museum in Bath and at Petworth House in West Sussex (2018–19). It will feature portraits, still lifes, religious pictures, maritime paintings, landscapes, genre paintings and history pictures, painted by celebrated artists such as Rembrandt, Lievens, Hobbema, Cuyp, Hondecoeter, De Heem, Ter Borch and Metsu, as well as less well-known artists such as De Baen and Van Diest. With over 350 heritage properties in the UK, the National Trust cares for one of the world’s largest and most significant holdings of art and its collection of Dutch Old Masters is particularly impressive. The catalog will include essays by Quentin Buvelot (chief curator at the Mauritshuis) and David Taylor (curator of pictures and sculpture at the National Trust). The authors will also discuss other aspects of the influence of Dutch culture in British country houses (using National Trust examples) – on furniture, garden design, and print and ceramics collecting.