BY PRECIOUS CHIDA
THE world’s greatest Dutch visual artist Rembrandt van Rhijn will be remembered through an exhibition to be held at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe in Harare and Bulawayo, courtesy of the Netherlands embassy under the theme @350 Exhibition.
Rembrandt, who was the most famous Dutch painter from the golden age, died 350 years ago.
Local artists have been called upon to select a Rembrandt work and recreate or interpret it with their own flair, and those whose pieces will be selected, will pocket an equivalent of US$100.
Netherlands deputy head of Mission to Zimbabwe Anne-Sietske Brinks said they were looking forward to giving artists a platform to showcase their work and see the Rembrandt in them.
“The embassy was looking for a way to not only celebrate Rembrandt, but more specifically celebrate him the Zimbabwe style. We truly hope that with this call, we have found a balance between giving every artist enough autonomy and on the other hand really seeing Rembrandt, albeit in an adapted 21st Century version,” she said during a recent arts function.
“Now, as Rembrandt is Dutch, it is obvious that we would celebrate him in the Netherlands, but the fact that more than 60 exhibitions worldwide are celebrating his life and his work just shows how important his contribution was to the arts.”
Rembrandt’s works depict a wide range of style and subject matter, from portraits and self-portraits to landscapes, genre scenes, allegorical and historical scenes, biblical and mythological themes as well as animal studies.
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Brinks said societies still lived with the same struggles that he faced at his time; a life of pain and misery, making his work still relevant and topical.
