Ben Apfelbaum

REMBRANDT AND THE DUTCH GOLDEN AGE – MASTERPIECES FROM THE RIJKSMUSEUM

Rembrandt and the Dutch golden age opened on Saturday 11 November at the Art Gallery of NSW.

The exhibition is a panorama of Dutch society during an era of wealth, power and cultural influence with outstanding works by the great Dutch masters. The art of painting flourished like never before with subjects ranging from intense portraits and dramatic seascapes to scenes of domestic life and studies of fruit and flowers.

Drawn from the Rijksmuseum of the Netherlands, this exhibition has a rare painting by Johannes Vermeer and a room dedicated to one of the greatest minds in the history of art, Rembrandt Van Rijn.

At the official opening on Friday, the Dutch Ambassador to Australia spoke about the riches of the Dutch East India Company in the 17th century through the spice trade. This enabled a great blossoming of the arts in the Netherlands and led to the pre-eminence of the great artists Rembrandt, Vermeer and others in the Dutch Realism style.

The common man was the subject of this art, and he was shown in the most realistic and illuminated way that appeals to much of us today.

A very wonderful show well worth attending.

The Rembrandt and the Dutch Golden Age exhibition will be on view at the Art Gallery Of New South Wales until the 18th February 2018.

https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/

 

Published by Ben Apfelbaum

My photography began when my father handed me the proverbial brownie box camera as a child. As cameras developed I went through Fujica and Olympus range finders graduating to my first single lens reflex camera, the Minolta SRT101, the latter being the greatest facilitator to my growth as a photographer. Digital photography has only added to this. I was a regular contributor to Camera Craft magazine (Australian Camera ) for over three years. During Australia’s Bicentennial year (1988) I made it a personal project to document the celebrations. This culminated in the creation of a book of my photos which was published in 1989. The book was called CELEBRATING AUSTRALIA and came with an accompanying calendar. My works have appeared in a number of publications including the coffee book entitled MY AUSTRALIA (1989), publisher Robertsbridge Severn. This book had a preface by the then Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke. I was a co-photographer on a book entitled SYDNEY- DISCOVER THE CITY with text written by Robert Treborland. Major Mitchell Press was the publisher. Also for two years I was the photographer for calendars celebrating Sydney’s multicultural communities. The two calendars were entitled MULTICULTURAL SYDNEY. My work appeared in a group exhibition held at Sydney’s Town Hall pertaining to the diversity of life in South America to raise money for orphanages there. I have over one hundred photos stored in the New South Wales State Library archive. I had a solo exhibition held in 2007 entitled Ben’s Lens at the Sydney Jewish Museum which celebrated the vibrancy of the Sydney Jewish community. Some of these photos are on the Museum’s permanent display. I have exhibited internationally firstly at the Spruill Gallery in Atlanta Georgia, united states, and in an exhibition entitled Kosher and Co at the Jewish Museum in Berlin. Currently I am a regular contributor to J-Wire and this esteemed publication.