Earlier this week, the paintings Allegory of War (1664) by Jan Lievens and Allegory of Peace (1669) by Adriaen Hanneman left their permanent location in the plenary hall of the Senate of the Netherlands (Eerste Kamer) for the first time in centuries. The two extraordinary seventeenth-century paintings were transported from the Binnenhof in The Hague to the Dordrechts Museum for the exhibition The World of Johan de Witt (opens 27 April). The arrangement was made possible due to the large-scale renovation of the Binnenhof.
Installation of Adriaen Hanneman’s Allegory of Peace (1669) and Jan Lievens’s Allegory of War (1664) at the Dordrechts Museum.
Photo: Aad Hoogedoorn
In the 1660s, Johan de Witt, as Grand Pensionary of Holland, commissioned the renovation of the interior of the assembly hall of Holland, which included art. In May 1664, Jan Lievens and Johan corresponded about Jan’s artwork depicting the god of war Mars, and five years later, De Witt commissioned a second work from Adriaen Hanneman with the subject of peace. In the center of power, the works symbolize the connection between politics, conflict, and diplomacy, art, and identity in the seventeenth-century Dutch Republic.
The paintings, which normally hang opposite each other in the Senate, are only rarely seen outside the Binnenhof. The exhibition offers a unique opportunity to view these masterpieces up close.