Those standing in front of him in the Regents of the Old Men’s Almshouse paintings were the administrators of such charity. During the winter of 1664, Hals was starving to death, and he had to apply for “public charity”. Berger explains that art historians have purposefully “mystified” his paintings, giving the example of a reading of Hal’s Regents of the Old Men’s Almshouse. I have seen his portraits of wealthy citizens so many times at the Rijks, yet not a single time is his background mentioned. When reading John Berger’s Ways of Seeing, I was shocked to find out that THE Frans Hals struggled so much through poverty. What I found funny nonetheless is how none of the other paintings have a historical context since a great majority of the subjects depicted are members of the government, military, or, just, the bourgeoisie. Some of them try to historicize the paintings by explaining how the painter, the event, or the figures depicted were connected to slavery. Took them more than 200 years, but better than nothing- I suppose. In my visit, I noticed that lately, the museum has added white boxes next to some of their paintings with the title of X and slavery (example: the church and slavery), in some late and vague attempt to incorporate the dark history of colonization and slavery of the Netherlands. One narrative that the museum has been trying to correct is that of the history between the museum and slavery. The whole reason I was there was because a month prior I read John Berger’s Ways of Seeing and its analysis of the history of art and class made me wonder what overarching narratives museums like the Rijks tell. I quickly listened to my audio guide hoping to find more information, but all of the explanations were limited to “symbolisms” of death, and the textures of the paintings. She explained that 1) to show the opulence of the Dutch empire, most of the food shown in these paintings was imported, and 2) that during the Golden Age, each Dutch upper-middle-class household had at least 1 of these paintings. The last time I was at the Rijksmuseum, I overheard an actual tour guide share two juicy facts about Dutch still life.
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