Our mission today is the Kunstmuseum and the Peace Palace. One bus ride deposits us outside the Kunstmuseum and we are awed at the building immediately.
The Kunstmuseum was built in 1935 as a modern museum that was accessible to everyone. It has the world’s largest collection of Mondrian works and various genres of art. We were as impressed by the building as the works of art.
I know Mondrian from his red, yellow, white and black angular paintings, but this collection has his early works of landscapes. They are stunning and I am thankful that I saw them. Mondrian was part of a group called De Stijl, designers, artists, architects. They explored new designs and methods at the same time as the Bauhaus in Germany and Frankfurt Lloyd Wright in the USA. It’s fascinating that they were all coming up with very similar looking designs for houses, furniture and art.
There is also an exhibit of Lois Dodd, a painter from the 1930s til today, from New York. She painted scenes looking out her studio window and inside her studio. Walking through the permanent collection we see works from Picasso, Monet and others.
The Peace Palace is the International Court of Justice for the UN. The building is quite imposing and regal. Tourists cannot get close to it unless on a tour, so we walk around it taking photos.
We have been riding the bus and the tram to get around The Hague and Scheveningen (please don’t ask me to pronounce that one!). Both the buses and trams run every 15 minutes or less. They use the tap on and off system, so a credit card can be used to pay for your trip. So easy! No tickets to purchase!
