Rijksmuseum

Photographer Erwin Olaf donated 412 photographs, seven videos and countless magazines to the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. The museum also bought 60 of his other photographs and three videos for 200 thousand euros, the Volkskrant reports. 

The Rijksmuseum will host an exhibition of Olaf's work next year. According to Olaf and the museum, the photographs are the "core collection" of his oeuvre. Every two years, the museum and Olaf will consult and decide what will be added to the collection. 

The Dutch government is allocating an annual 80 million euros a year for culture education, according to the memorandum Culture in an open society that Minister Ingrid van Engelshoven of Education, Culture and Science presented on Monday. Her ambition is to make sure that the cultural sector "flourishes", NOS reports.

Amsterdam city center is facing a power outage on Friday morning. Several buildings, including the Rijksmuseum, were evacuated, Het Parool reports.

The artworks are not in danger, because a generator ensures safety, a spokesperson for the Rijksmuseum said to the newspaper. The rooms are dark however, so visitors were evacuated.

The painting scanner used by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam to analyze masterpieces may also help police detectives find trace evidence in present-day crime scenes. The investigators of the Dutch Forensic Institute (NFI) and the national art gallery of the Netherlands have formed a new collaboration to use the new technique to find bodily fluids.

All school children in the Netherlands must visit the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and the Tweede Kamer in The Hague at least once in their school career, according to agreements the VVD, CDA, D66 and ChristenUnie made in their government formation talks, sources told the Telegraaf. The parties want to make it mandatory for schools to arrange these trips.

The pistol used to kill populist politician Pim Fortuyn in 2002 became part of the Rijksmuseum's collection in 2012, former director Wim Pijbes said to Quote. Fortuyn's relatives donated the weapon to the museum via the Public Prosecutor, NU.nl reports.

In 2010 the Rijksmuseum announced interest in buying the firearm, in order to one day exhibit it. But due to a commotion that arose, Pijbes abandoned the purchase. After "extensive consultations with the Fortuyn family" the murder weapon was given to the museum in 2012. 

The Rijksmuseum bought an 18th century painting by Jean-Etienne Liotard titled Dutch girl at breakfast for nearly 5.2 million euros. The painting, which was owned by a British noble family for over 240 years, is the first purchase made by new director Taco Dibbits, the Telegraaf reports.

This week the British government issued an export license for the painting to be brought to the Netherlands.

The Amsterdam Dance Event will include a very special performance this year. Amsterdam DJ Meceo Plex will play one show, for free, in the bicycle tunnel under the Rijksmuseum

About 12,500 visitors arrived at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam on Saturday to see the free exhibition of the marriage portraits featuring Marten Soolmans and Oopjen Coppit, painted by Rembrandt. The paintings were purchased jointly for 160 million euros by the Rijksmuseum and the Louvre in Paris, with funding from the Netherlands and France.

The supervisory board of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam appointed Taco Dibbits as the new director of the museum. He will be taking over from Wim Pijbes, who is leaving the museum to work at the Voorlinde museum for contemporary art end July

In future the national museums in the Netherlands will store their non-exhibited artworks in a single large depot. Construction of this depot will soon start in Amersfoort and it should be ready for use by 2020