Even if you have the time and money to visit Amsterdam and see the Rijksmuseum’s historic, never-to-be-repeated Vermeer exhibition before it closes on June 4, tickets sold out within hours of being made available last year. However, a good plan B is available next Monday and Tuesday in nearby Claremont, Glendale and Santa Monica: Vermeer: The Greatest Exhibition. (We’ll also be screening Close to Vermeer on July 17 and 18 at the same venues. It’s also about the Rijksmuseum show.)
From Vermeer: The Greatest Exhibition producer and co-writer Phil Grabsky: “If there is one exhibition that I have been asked about more than any other to inquire whether we filmed it for Exhibition on Screen, it is the 1995 Vermeer exhibition at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. My Exhibition on Screen brand did not germinate in my mind until 2009 and the first film, Leonardo from the National Gallery, did not emerge until 2011
so, no, we didn’t capture that 1995 show.
“Since then we have made two films with a Vermeer theme: one specifically on Girl with a Pearl Earring and its wonderful home, the Mauritshaus in The Hague, and the second film Vermeer & Music based on a very fine exhibition at the National Gallery in London. But when I heard that the Rijksmuseum was planning the greatest Vermeer exhibition in history, I
knew that the Exhibition on Screen cameras had to be there.
“We weren’t alone in requesting access to show, but we’ve worked at the Rijksmuseum before and they trust us – and, I think, like us. Thus it was, on the eve of the opening, we the team (led by director David Bickerstaff) found ourselves in the enormously privileged position of having the galleries to ourselves to film in. We were given the time to interview the key
participants as well as one of the United Kingdom’s leading art historians. I knew from the minute that I saw this exhibition it was something special but even I was amazed that all tickets sold out within hours for the entire three month run. That only confirms how important it is that as often as we can Exhibition on Screen captures, for posterity, not only the huge efforts of those who put on a show like this but also the way that the art looks when hung together in this way.
“We can only do this if you keep coming to the cinema and spread the word about Exhibition on Screen to your friends and colleagues. Please visit our website for more background clips, etc and lots of offers and goodies. I hope you enjoy the film.”