Netherlands - Traditional Costume

Two Dutch Girls in Costume.

Sent by Marianne, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - Johannes Vermeer

Johannes Vermeer's Masterpieces : The Milkmaid (c. 1658), Street in Delft (c. 1657-8) and Girl With a Pearl Earring (c. 1665).

Sent by Bertie, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

This is from Wikipedia : Johannes, Jan or Johan Vermeer (Dutch pronunciation: [joˈhɑnəs jɑn ʋərˈmeːr]; baptized in Delft on 31 October 1632 as Joannis, and buried in the same city under the name Jan on 15 December 1675) was a Dutch painter who specialized in exquisite, domestic interior scenes of middle class life. Vermeer was a moderately successful provincial genre painter in his lifetime. He seems never to have been particularly wealthy, leaving his wife and children in debt at his death, perhaps because he produced relatively few paintings.

Vermeer worked slowly and with great care, using bright colours and sometimes expensive pigments, with a preference for cornflower blue and yellow. He is particularly renowned for his masterly treatment and use of light in his work.

Vermeer painted mostly domestic interior scenes. As Koning points out: "Almost all his paintings are apparently set in two smallish rooms in his house in Delft; they show the same furniture and decorations in various arrangements and they often portray the same people, mostly women".

Recognized during his lifetime in Delft and The Hague, his modest celebrity gave way to obscurity after his death; he was barely mentioned in Arnold Houbraken's major source book on 17th century Dutch painting (Grand Theatre of Dutch Painters and Women Artists), and was thus omitted from subsequent surveys of Dutch art for nearly two centuries. In the 19th century Vermeer was rediscovered by Gustav Friedrich Waagen and Théophile Thoré-Bürger, who published an essay attributing sixty-six pictures to him, although only thirty-four paintings are universally attributed to him today. Since that time Vermeer's reputation has grown, and he is now acknowledged as one of the greatest painters of the Dutch Golden Age.

Netherlands - Familie Hofmann

Traditional costumes of the Netherlands.

Sent by Nanda, a postcrosser from Sas van Gent, the Netherlands.

Netherlands - Queen Beatrix

Queen Beatrix of Netherlands.

Sent by Tessa from the Netherlands.

This is from Wikipedia : Beatrix (Beatrix Wilhelmina Armgard; born 31 January 1938) is the Queen Regnant of the Kingdom of the Netherlands comprising the Netherlands, Curaçao, Sint Maarten, and Aruba. She is the first daughter of Queen Juliana of the Netherlands and Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld. She studied law at Leiden University. In 1966, she married Claus von Amsberg, with whom she had three children: Prince Willem-Alexander (born 1967), Prince Friso (born 1968), and Prince Constantijn (born 1969). When her mother Juliana abdicated on 30 April 1980, Beatrix succeeded her as Queen of the Netherlands. On 6 October 2002 Prince Claus of the Netherlands died.

Princess Beatrix was born Princess Beatrix Wilhelmina Armgard of the Netherlands, Princess of Orange-Nassau, Princess of Lippe-Biesterfeld on 31 January 1938 at the Soestdijk Palace in Baarn, Netherlands. She was the eldest daughter of Crown Princess Juliana of the Netherlands and Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld. Beatrix's five godparents are King Leopold III of the Belgians, Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone, Princess Elisabeth of Waldeck and Pyrmont, Duke Adolf Friedrich of Mecklenburg, and Countess Allene de Kotzebue. When Beatrix was one year old, in 1939, her first sister Princess Irene was born.

When World War II broke out in the Netherlands in May 1940, the Dutch Royal Family fled to London, United Kingdom. One month later, Beatrix went to Ottawa, Ontario, Canada with her mother Juliana and her sister Irene, while her father Bernhard and maternal grandmother Queen Wilhelmina remained in London. The family lived at the Stornoway residence. In thanks for the protection of her and her daughters, (then) Princess Juliana established the delivery of tulips to the Canadian government every spring, which are the centrepiece of the Canadian Tulip Festival. Her second sister Princess Margriet was born in 1943. During their exile in Canada, Beatrix attended nursery and the primary school Rockcliffe Park Public School.

The family returned to the Netherlands on 2 August 1945. Beatrix went to the progressive primary school De Werkplaats in Bilthoven. Her third sister Princess Christina was born in 1947. On 6 September 1948, her mother Juliana succeeded her grandmother Wilhelmina as Queen of the Netherlands, and Beatrix became the heiress presumptive to the throne of the Netherlands at the age of ten.

Netherlands - Birds of Dutch Forests

Birds of Dutch forests.

Sent by Sara, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - Goes

Images of Goes.

Sent by Aren, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

This is from Wikipedia : Goes is a municipality and a city in the southwestern Netherlands in Zuid-Beveland, in the province Zeeland. The city of Goes has approximately 27,000 residents.

Goes was founded in the 10th century on the edge of a river: de Korte Gos (the Short Gos). The village grew fast and in the early 12th century it had a market square and a church devoted to Maria. In 1405 Goes received city rights, and in 1417 it was allowed to build walls around the city. The prosperity of the city was based upon the cloth industry and the production of salt. In the 16th century Goes declined. Its connection to the sea got bogged down and in 1544 a large fire destroyed a part of the city.

In 1577 the Spanish soldiers who occupied Goes were driven out by Prince Maurits of Nassau. The prince built a defence wall around Goes, which is still partly present. In the centuries thereafter Goes did not play an important role, except as an agricultural centre. In 1868 a railway was constructed through it, but this did not lead to industrialisation. Agriculture remains the most important economic activity.

Although The Netherlands were neutral in the First World War, seven bombs hit Goes and Kloetinge, due to an error by a British airplane. A house in Magdalenastreet in Goes was destroyed and one person killed. Goes did not suffer extensive damage during the Second World War, but was under German occupation until 1944.

Goes did not experience much population growth until the 1970s and 1980s. Then, the city grew fast because of new districts like Goese Meer, Oostmolenpark, Overzuid and Ouverture being constructed. Goes is now the fourth economic centre in Zeeland.

New districts are in preparation, amongst them Goese Schans, Mannee and Aria, where 3,000 new houses are to be built.

Netherlands - Field of Sunflowers

Field of Sunflowers.

Sent by Petra, a postcrosser from Netherlands.

Netherlands

Images of the Netherlands.

Sent by Albertine, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - A Girl & Tulips

Sent by Kitty, a postcrosser from Holland.

Netherlands - Kinderen (Children)

Kinderen or children. Two Dutch children wearing national costumes.

Sent by Manfred and Linda from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - Birds of the North Sea

Birds of the North Sea.

Sent by Daisy from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - Ot en Sien

An illustration from a children book called Ot en Sien.

Sent by Monique, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

This is from Wikipedia : Ot en Sien is an old children's book, written by a teacher in Drenthe, the Netherlands.

It was the start of a new method of writing children's books and had profound influence on Dutch elementary education in the first half of the twentieth century

Ot and Sien are the main characters in a series of Dutch children's tales that were very popular in the first half of the twentieth century. The first series titled Dicht bij Huis ("Close to home"), appeared in 1902. The second series Nog bij Moeder ("Still with mam"), followed in 1904. De author of the stories was Hendricus Scheepstra. However, he acted on the inspiration of Jan Ligthart, who had the intention to expose young people to what he considered a healthy daily family life. The illustrations were made by Cornelis Jetses.

After WWII the stories of Ot and Sien gradually went out of fashion and they were often ridiculed for the unrealistic picture they gave of life in the province. A century after their appearance there is a revival in the interest for the publications and in 2004 an exposition was held, focusing mostly on the artwork by Jetses.

Ot (short for Otto) and Sien (short for e.g. Francine) are two next door neighbors, a boy and a girl. Their illustrations were based on two children that actually lived in Jetses' neighborhood. The stories are situated in Drenthe that was at the time the most impoverished province of the Netherlands where quite a few people were still living in dwellings constructed of peat and sods. The surrounding poverty is nowhere to be seen in the stories that depict a very idealized version of reality.

Netherlands

Typical features of the Netherlands.

Sent by Diana, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

Holland

Typical things of the Netherlands.

Sent by Carolien, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - A Painting by Shunyam

A painting by Shunyam, a Dutch artist.

Sent by Mirjam, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - Beautiful Holland

Costumes.

Sent by Femke from LE Eindhoven, Netherlands.

Netherlands - Tulips

I received many tulips postcards from the Netherlands that these days I do not blog about them. But this one stands out.

Sent by Margaret, a 80-year old postcrosser from the Netherlands.

Netherlands - Traditional Costumes

Sent by Kelly from the Netherlands.

Netherlands

Images of Holland.

Sent by Marissa from the Netherlands.

Netherlands

HOLLAND
Cheese market, Tulip field, Windmills, Madurodam.

Sent by Suzanne, a postcrosser from the Netherlands.