Museum information
In 2008 the city of Dusseldorf will be celebrating the ‘Jan Wellem Jubilee’ on the occasion of the 350th birthday of the elector Palatine Johann Wilhelm von der Pfalz (1658-1716), popularly known as ‘Jan Wellem’. Numerous of the city’s arts organisations offering a varied cultural programme will be contributing to the success of this event.
The anniversary’s principal exhibition will be hosted by museum kunst palast. Based on the works from the electoral collection which have remained in our stock, the ambitioned exhibition project is intended to be enhanced by high-quality loans.
Peter Paul Rubens and his ‘Assumption of the Virgin’, alongside its genesis, variants, as well as works of his followers will be at the centre of the exhibition and, for the first time, are to be presented in a comprehensive manner within the contexts of a passion for collecting, the notion of taste culture and the power politics of Jan Wellem and his second wife Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici. Furthermore, these interconnections will be exemplified with a view to the cultural exchange between the courts of Florence and Dusseldorf. The Galleria degli Uffizi, the Galleria Palatina and the Museo degli Argenti, Palazzo Pitti have kindly agreed to a first-time presentation in Dusseldorf of a core base of works which, with respect to their provenance, are associated with the electoral couple. For further information, please refer to the enclosed brief concept.
To accompany the exhibition a scholarly catalogue will be published, encompassing source references as to the reception of the electoral collection of paintings.
Publication
Himmlisch – Herrlich – Höfisch: Peter Paul Rubens, Johann Wilhelm von der Pfalz und Anne Maria Luisa de’ Medici
Bettina Baumgärtel
Catalogue of an exhibition held in 2008 in Düsseldorf (Museum Kunst Palast)
192 pp., hardbound
Leipzig (Seemann) 2008
ISBN-10: 3865021921
ISBN-13: 978-3865021922