CAG on travel: Amsterdam

Apple, bacon and butter pannekoek

There isn’t much I can say about Amsterdam that everyone doesn’t know already… because it is amazing! Key points: Lovely Dutch people, amazing museums, cheese, pancakes and waffles, Indonesian food, and beer

Beautiful cheese wheels

This is probably just a tourist’s point of view, but a few weekends ago I partook in a little snippet of what a more normal Dutch life would be like if I lived in Amsterdam. I left for the weekend and stayed a little further out from the center in an area called De Pijp. Recently named one of the coolest neighborhoods in the world by Stylist magazine (a renowned and reliable source), and I believe this is true.

De Albert Cuypmarkt

De Albert Cuypmarkt

De Pijp is amazing. It has De Albert Cuypmarkt, which has delicious Dutch treats, which is a perfect place to do some people watching and is only about a 25 minute walk to the center. I heard accents from all over the world.

Herring, onions, pickle

Then off to the Rijksmuseum which hasn’t been open any time I’ve visited Amsterdam since I moved to Europe. I also previewed the famous Rembrandt ‘The Night Watch’ painting before I visited by watching the flashmob staged by the museum on youtube to mark its re-opening. It is really fun to watch (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6W2ZMpsxhg).

Henry Moore sculptures in garden

Stained glass window in the Rijksmuseum Great Hall

The museum was really beautiful. Both the architecture and the artworks were really engaging, and I haven’t been in a museum as busy since I went to the Louvre in Paris years ago. Not really worth fighting the crowds to take a photo of ‘The Night Watch’ when there were some much more serene galleries to take in the art and ambiance.

Sculpture gallery in Rijksmuseum

The rest of the trip focused on taking in the scenery around the edges of Old Amsterdam in Spui, eating, and drinking.

Spui

Indonesian feast

And then on to another night out in De Pijp, with all the other cool Dutch people. Most of the bars are all located within a few minutes walk of each other, but they all have very different feels, and most importantly different Belgian beers. It’s really lucky that England is so close to such a fun and beautiful city.

CAG on museums: Artist reflections on ethnographic collections- The George Brown collection

 Porcelain labels made in response to the George Brown collection.
Photo credit: Chris McHugh

At Sunderland Museum and Winter Gardens, there is currently a display on called ‘Community in Clay’ that showcases the work of mixed media artist Chris McHugh. McHugh is a doctoral candidate at Sunderland University with a background in archaeology. He has spent the past years researching historic pottery, Sunderland Museum and collection histories, and has also worked in Japan studying the George Brown collection in Osaka (http://communityinclay.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/community-in-clay-exhibition-of-ceramic.html).

This exhibition explores history and material culture of Sunderland, but also the historical event of the removal of the George Brown collection from the Northeast of England (see the previous post for the history of the GB collection sale) to its current location in the National Museum of Ethnology Osaka, Japan.

The George Brown collection on display at the
National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka. Photo credit: Chris McHugh

Trobriand Islands canoe prow at the National Museum of Ethnology
Osaka, Japan. Photo credit: Chris McHugh

The vessels McHugh has created artistically respond to the Solomon Islands lime containers from the Brown collection. The decoration on the vessels echoes the original decoration found on the lime containers in Japan while also referencing the importance of ceramic vessels in 19^th century Sunderland. McHugh reflects that Sunderland ‘was a busy port and pots bearing maritime imagery are common’. The time that George Brown set off to explore the Pacific in the 19^th century was the same time in which the Northeast was a thriving maritime centre. While explorers were discovering new places (to the Western world) and collecting objects to memorialize their experiences, the prosperity of the Northeast influenced the production of a material culture that embodied the wonder and fascination of a world increasingly connected through industry, trade, and colonization.

Details of pieces based on George Brown Collection. The black line imagery
comes from decoration etched into a piece of bamboo from the Solomon Islands.
Title: George Brown Series, porcelain, glaze, stains, decals and pink lustre.
Photo credit: Chris McHugh

Porcelain binoculars from a series of pieces entitled  'Explorer's Kit'.
The text is taken from the Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens'
register from the 1800s. Photo credit: Chris McHugh

The connections drawn between collectors, artistry, and heritage of the Northeast are celebrated in McHugh’s work, and such interactions between artists and the museum are very timely. Several large collaborative artist exhibitions outside of art museums have brought new audiences to cultural institutions and new awareness to a variety of subjects. Re-thinking ethnography collections from an artistic point of view becomes an interesting way of thinking about the intersections between museum history and art, but also imbues objects with an extra layer of history.

A contemporary cabinet of curiosities. Photo credit: Chris McHugh

CAG on museums: Kinloch Anderson and the Scottish Kilt

20th century book of all the clan tartans, incomplete

There’s nothing I like more than a little fashion and cultural history mixed together, and a wee stop to Kinloch Anderson in Leith really taught me a few things about the iconic Scottish kilt. The museum is located in the store and is very small, but encompasses some interesting tidbits of history and has a viewing window so that you can actually watch the kilt-makers create their handmade kilts.

View inside of the workshop

I found out that kilts actually did not come into popularity until around the 16^th century. For a brief period of time the checked tartans were outlawed between 1745 and 1782 in an attempt to break up the Highland Clan system, but when George IV visited Edinburgh in 1822 the pageantry of chiefs wearing their tartans for the King reignited their popularity and iconic cultural connections. This prompted families who did not have a clan tartan to want one of their own,  and the tartan become a symbol of kinship and belonging for Scots.

Sporrans, or the murse (male purse)

Typically there was a royal and a hunting tartan, which a tailor in the shop explained was really just to get a bit more variety in dress. Members of the Royal Family wear different varieties of the Scottish tartan as well. For the Royal Family many different tartans have been designed for them by Kinloch Anderson over the years. Because of their early connections to the Royal Stuarts (Stewarts) and Mary Queen of Scots, the Royals wear a variety of Stewart and Balmoral tartans.

From a contemporary fashion perspective, Kinloch Anderson has designed tartan patterns for some major brands which have become very iconic- Glenlivet scotch and especially Barbour.