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The Ackland Art Museum at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill holds more than 600 Netherlandish works dating from the period between ca. 1400 to 1800. The most extensive collection includes sixteenth- and seventeenth- century prints featuring fine examples by Lucas van Leyden, Hendrick Goltzius, and Rembrandt van Rijn. The nearly 50 examples of paintings include works by Jan Lievens, Emanuel de Witte, Salomon van Ruysdael, Jan Weenix, Peter Paul Rubens, Jacob Jordeans, and Gerard Seghers.
In 2017, Drs. Sheldon and Leena Peck added to the Ackland’s modest collection of Netherlandish drawings through their transformative gift of 134 largely seventeenth-century Dutch and Flemish drawings. The Peck Collection includes landscapes, genre scenes, and figural compositions by both major and less well-known artists, including Jan van Goyen, Jacob van Ruisdael, Aelbert Cuyp, Peter Paul Rubens, Jacob Jordeans, and Paul Brill as well as seven drawings by Rembrandt, making the Ackland the first public university art museum in the United States to own a collection of drawings by Rembrandt. Every 12 weeks, the museum presents a Focus on the Peck Collection installation featuring meaningful pairings between the Peck Collection drawings and other works from the permanent collection, allowing for fresh perspectives and compelling dialogues between the works.
Dana Cowen, Sheldon Peck Curator for European and American Art before 1950, May 2020
Related CODART publications
Dr. Robert Fucci, “Drawn to Life: Master Drawings from the Age of Rembrandt in the Peck Collection at the Ackland Art Museum”, CODARTfeatures, September 2022.