The artists' village of Bergen
Bergen has always attracted artists due to its beautiful natural landscape and unique light. At the beginning of the last century, the first artists came to Bergen and settled in studio apartments. Around 1915, a distinctive painting style even emerged around the French painter Henri Le Fauconnier: the Bergen School. Avant-garde artists painted portraits, landscapes, and still lifes in angular, powerful forms and moody, contrasting colors. It is the Dutch expressionism of Leo Gestel, Dirk Filarski, Arnout Colnot, Matthieu Wiegman, and Charley Toorop. Patrons such as August Maschmeyer and later Piet and Marie Boendermaker, who supported the artists financially, were of great importance to the Bergen School.
The Bergen artists inspired each other in numerous encounters. The studio house ‘De Vlerken’ of grande dame Charley Toorop became the place where artists from inside and outside Bergen met. Piet Mondriaan, Gerrit Rietveld, John Raedecker, Roland Holst, and Pyke Koch met here. Photographer Eva Besnyö captured these special encounters. The museum houses a special collection of these photographs, which provides a wonderful picture of the close-knit circle of artists in Bergen. In the period after 1940, the artistic climate in Bergen was dominated mainly by the COBRA movement. The poet and artist Lucebert played an important role in this.
Collection Museum Kranenburgh
Museum Kranenburgh was founded in 1993 and was originally housed in Villa Kranenburgh. The museum owes much of its collection to private donations and, in addition to its own works, also has works on loan from other museums and private individuals.
Museum Kranenburgh also manages the collections of the municipality of Bergen and the Noordhollands Kunstcentrum (NHKC). A number of works from the Bergen municipality collection originate from the Boendermaker collection. After the war, the municipality actively implemented the BKR scheme. The NHKC was founded in the 1950s with the aim of promoting art in Bergen in general. On the recommendation of artists, it began collecting art from Bergen.
