Terms and Conditions
The artist, title and date of the work must be listed anywhere the image is reproduced:
Hendrick van Vliet
The interior of St Janskerk at Gouda 1662
oil on canvas
110.0 × 128.7 cm
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Felton Bequest, 1933
Photo: National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Where possible, the image must be reproduced in full (no cropping or over-printing). If you wish to use a detail of the work, a full reproduction of the work must also be reproduced elsewhere in the publication.
While the NGV believes this work to be in the Public Domain, it is the responsibility of the publisher to ensure that no further permissions are required for use.
For a complete list of terms and condition of use see the National Gallery of Victoria’s copyright policy.
The interior of St Janskerk at Gouda
1662
Medium
oil on canvas
Measurements
110.0 × 128.7 cm
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Felton Bequest, 1933
Gallery location
Rembrandt Cabinet
Level 2, NGV International
About this work
Church architectural painting was a highly specialised field in which a number of Dutch painters, including van Vliet, excelled. Each church had its own identity and local significance which the artist was expected to convey. This exquisite study of St Janskerk at Gouda is van Vliet’s only known painting of the sixteenth-century church, which is dedicated to St John the Baptist, patron saint of Gouda. The church’s austere interior reflects the iconoclastic stripping of sculptures and paintings undertaken by the Calvinists at the time of its acquisition in 1573. The open grave recalls John Calvin’s observation that the world is ‘but a tomb’.
Artwork Details
Inscription
inscribed in grey paint l.c.: H. (...illeg.) Vliet. / 1662
Accession Number
4716-3
Department
International Painting
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of Digitisation Champion Dame Carol Colburn-Grigor CBE through Metal Manufactures Limited
Subjects (general)
Architecture Interiors Religion and Mythology
Subjects (specific)
arches churches (buildings) columns (architectural elements) Gouda (inhabited place) graves Netherlands (nation)