Amsterdam is a great city – not only for the regular tourist but also for art lovers. Since Holland has a long tradition in classical art you’ll find many places with beautiful paintings – not only in the museums but also in little galleries close to the Rijksmuseum. The Rijksmuseum will reopen after renovation on April 13th so this time I did not go there. Instead I walked around the area opposite to the Rijksmuseum – the Spiegelkwartier.
Unfortunately I wasn’t allowed to take pictures inside the galleries but at the Marco Gasparri Galerie I could take pictures looking inside his gallery. I had a nice talk with the former Florence Academy of Fine Arts student.
In a museum the guard would come and complain in case you come too close to a painting but in these little galleries they let you come as close as you wish. Once when I was in a gallery in Amsterdam they gave me a magnifying glass to get an even closer look. So don’t just stand in front of the gallery but rather go inside, take your time and enjoy the artworks. There was one gallery which was really big inside but you couldn’t tell from the outside. And even if they display abstract modernist art in the shop window they propably have traditional realist art as well.
There are also many Antiques shops where you’ll find neat things for your next still life. But I won’t tell you about the places where you can get some artistic inspiration – hehe.