Ride on time to see the Dutch masters
WITHIN hours of arriving in Den Haag to attend the Crossing Border Festival came an experience which seemed so characteristically Dutch and to capture the essence of the laidback simplicity of the festival itself.
Mistaking the address of the Crossing Border office for the venue staging festival events I asked directions from a man emerging from the building. "You're in luck," he said, "I am the director of the festival and can give you a lift." The director's mode of transport, however, turned out to be a push bike and so it was I found myself straddling the rack over the back wheel, trying to keep my feet off the ground, as we bounced over the cobbled streets and tram tracks of the Dutch capital.
Any preconception of Den Haag, or The Hague, as a somewhat staid and conservative city was immediately dispelled. It turns out considerable effort and resources have been devoted over the past 10 or 20 years into changing its image from an austere bureaucratic centre into an attractive and lively city that's a pleasure to walk around.
One of the ways that has been achieved is by organising festivals throughout the year such as Parkpop (Europe's largest free open-air pop festival) and Crossing Border which unusually combines music and books so you find yourself flitting from readings by Booker Prize-winners DCB Pierre and Aravind Adiga to gigs by Fleet Foxes or Liam Finn.
What is the thinking behind mixing the pleasures of reading and listening?
Simple, according to Louis Behre, the man who founded the festival 16 years ago (and the good samaritan on the bicycle). "I love books and I love music and couldn't decide whether I wanted a music or literature festival, so I decided to do both."
But whether or not you coincide with a festival, you won't run out of things to see and do in Den Haag.
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Latest sport As you would expect it’s got some historic buildings – from palaces and the civic halls of Binnenhof to dear old windmills – and no less than 30 museums and galleries, although it’s not the quantity but the quality that impresses with a wealth of art treasures which are to be highlighted in a special tourist promotion, The Hague Art City 2009-11.
Top of the must-see list is the iconic Girl with a Pearl Earring by Vermeer but it’s only one attraction in the Mauritshuis, a compact gallery with an array of old masters from Rubens, Bruegel, Rembrandt and Holbein.
By contrast the Gemeentemuseum is a spacious Art Deco building whose headliner is a comprehensive collection of Mondriaans, the most famous Dutch painter of the 20th century, but can also boast paintings by Picasso, Kandinsky, Warhol and Bacon.
Don’t miss venturing down to the basement laid out specifically to appeal to young people with exhibits arranged by colours and lots of interactive displays.
If you’ve got the stamina to fit in one more arty pursuit, there’s a museum devoted to another homegrown artist, MC Escher, familiar from those black and white posters with their ingenious “impossible constructions” where water flows uphill or a seemingly continuous line of people go up and down stairs in Ascending and Descending.
While banging on about all this culture, it should not be overlooked that Den Haag is by the sea, or at least Schevengen, one of Europe’s great resorts, is a short tram ride away. If you catch the No 10 tram in the opposite direction, incidentally, you get to Delft, home of the famous blue and white ceramics.
But back to the simple pleasures of walking around, Den Haag’s long history of supplying goods and services to the court and diplomats has evolved into an extensive modern shopping centre (mostly pedestranised), along with some chic bars and restaurants. The character of the place can be summed up by the fact that it may be known worldwide as the City of Peace and Justice but it also moonlights as the Pop City of the Netherlands.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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