The way I see it after viewing a small portion of Rubens prolific output, the authentic Rubens experience would be an outdoor orgy DJ’d by a satyr. In Antwerp at the house where Peter Paul churned out his immense paintings, the “Rubens Experience” is confined to a basement exhibit that purports to “immerse you into his world.” But before that treat, it’s suggested to check out the courtyard garden he created.
The front of the Rubens estate is a drab brick exterior that doesn’t excite any envy. Peter Paul was probably a popular guy in the ‘hood. Inconspicuous house and all those assistants he hired, why he was a regular pillar of the community. But enter the house and find the garden and you’re transported to upper-class nobility. It’s the flowered courtyard of a Renaissance prince.
A sudden downpour drives us out of the garden into the basement where the intriguing Rubens Experience awaits. Given Rubens approach to painting I expect something over-the-top. (Rubens’ Christ in “The Descent from the Cross” looks like a heaven-sent aerial attack testing the mettle of his followers.) Instead of a mosh pit, a flesh-pit of plump scantily clad party-goers passing out grapes. Or a dynamic projection of his paintings flashing on all four walls roiling us through his life story. Something between the Hans Memling slide-show and the Carriéres des Lumières outside of Les Baux-de-Provence.
Instead we sat on a curved bench and had scattershot images of a few of his paintings broken up into images out of context. And a lot of portraits. I mean, really, who goes to a Rubens exhibition to dote on the portraits? I want the turmoil, the abundance, the robust, flush-faced exuberance of Baroque entanglement. Not a sweet voiced narrator flashing separate shots of wives one and two and the kids. That’s a lot of people’s experience; the Ruben’s experience on canvas explodes with religious melodrama and mythological misdeeds.
But, hey, the alternative was to step outside in the driving rain and get soaked. Better to be sitting nice and dry with the watered down Rubens collage.
We enjoyed the Vermeer Center when we were in Delft. No actual Vermeer’s on display, but an interesting recreation of his studio. He made his own paints from pigments like my friend in Oaxaca. Enjoy Delft, beautiful city.
We’ve been to Delft many times but I don’t think we’ve ever been to the Vermeer Center. We will try to check it out. Grubb has informed me that we’ve seen every Vermeer painting except one. There was a huge exhibition in Amsterdam, of most of the vermeer paintings a few years ago that we managed to get to.