This exhibition takes a journey into human existence, through art from the Middle Ages to today. While so many aspects of human life are universal – birth, youth, growing up, sexuality, ageing and death – we have experienced them differently across the centuries.

Friso Lammertse, curator of 17th century Dutch painting RijksmuseumInternationally acclaimed collection

The collection of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, largely assembled by Rotterdam collectors, industrialists, and shipping magnates who had a great fondness for art, is internationally renowned. The museum houses famous old masters and a prominent collection of contemporary art.

ExhibitionBesides the pieces already mentioned here, the exhibition includes Two Girls near an Apple Tree by Edvard Munch, Vincent van Gogh’s Portrait of Armand Roulin, Composition with Colour Fieds by Piet Mondriaan and The Shooting Gallery by Pyke Koch, as well as work by Cindy Sherman, Salvador Dalí and Pablo Picasso. And of course we have included The Pedlar by Hieronymus Bosch. There will also be a generous selection of outstanding drawings from the Print Room, by the likes of Käthe Kollwitz, Hendrik Goltzius, Peter Paul Rubens and Matthias Grünewald. Ugo Rondinone’s light installation Breathe, Walk, Die will be displayed in our Vermeer extension, where it will be visible from outdoors on Museum Square. In the atrium of the Philips Wing, a work by Donald Judd (Untitled, 1984) will be on display, constructed with large aluminum colour panels. The exhibition will be arranged thematically, allowing artworks from all periods to be seen in relation to each other.

Newly restoredYayoi Kusama’s Infinity Mirror Room – Phalli’s Field (Floor Show) (1965/1998) is on show for the first time since its extensive restoration, at the Rijksmuseum. A team of restorers from Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen has worked for months cleaning the white fabric phalluses covered with red dots, so the work by Yayoi Kusama now on display looks like new. She is among the world’s most acclaimed contemporary artists.

Reason for the exhibitionThe main reason for this collaboration is that the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam is currently being renovated in a project that will take many years. The collection is still on view, however, thanks to the opening of Depot Boijmans van Beuningen in 2021, the world’s first art storage facility open to the public. The Rijksmuseum exhibition features many important works from the Rotterdam collection that are on display for the first time in the Netherlands since 2019.

Audio tours: words and musicThe exhibition is accompanied by an audio tour in which Rotterdam-based presenter and musician Raven van Dorst and the curators wander from artwork to artwork discussing the themes of the exhibition. There will also be a music tour composed and produced by DJ Upsammy.

The Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen at Rijksmuseum exhibition has been made possible by generous loans from Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam.