Information
Te Papa, Aotearoa New Zealand’s National Museum and Art Gallery, has significant print holdings of seventeenth-century Dutch and Flemish works. These have their origins in the Colonial Museum, opened in Wellington in 1865, which became home to a collection of 600 prints gifted to the government by Bishop Ditlev Monrad in 1869. This founding collection is particularly strong in sixteenth-century German and seventeenth-century Dutch prints. It includes examples of work by Cornelis Bega, Ferdinand Bol, Albert Cuyp, Lucas van Leyden, Adriaen van Ostade, Paulus Potter, Herman van Swanevelt, as well as 43 etchings by Rembrandt van Rijn. The Monrad collection has been expanded over the years, particularly between 1952 and 1973, when a gift from Sir John Illott boosted Te Papa’s Rembrandt holdings to 88 works.
Te Papa also has important collections of works by the Dutch émigré artists Petrus van der Velden (1837-1913) and Theo Schoon (1915-1985).
Dr Rebecca Rice, Curator Historical Art (January 2024)