The Joy of Everyday Life
in the Netherlands and Denmark
28.1. – 16.6.2024
Quiet moments and hard toil, exuberant company and rowdy parties, love and fighting – plus all the breaks in between. The prolific Dutch art world of the 17th century bore witness to a new trend, as painters increasingly began to depict everyday events and objects. During the Danish Golden Age of the 19th century, Danish artists followed suit and The Nivaagaard Collection has now gathered together some famous masterworks and hidden treasures from these two periods in one large exhibition.
The exhibition focuses on what is known as genre painting – depictions of folk like in which ordinary people take on leading roles as narrative subjects within everyday settings. The scenes depicted are frequently sensuous and humorous, often peculiar and sometimes moralising. And they are loaded with detail – from glimmering copper kettles to soft textiles and reflections in a beer glass. Even today, genre painting still manages to reach right our own life experiences and provoke feelings of presence, compassion, revulsion or perhaps even a smile as we come face to face with people from a forgotten time, depicted by some of the greatest artists in history.
The exhibition has been made possible thanks to support from the A.P. Møller and Chastine Mc-Kinney Møller Foundation.