Amsterdam sightseeing, art, galleries, museums

Art

Amsterdam is an important artistic centre. Its Rijksmuseum is one of the great art collections of the world, full of Rembrandts and other Flemish old masters, but also non-Dutch artists.

The street for art lovers is the Paulus Potterstraat, with its 3 famous museums, the 3 most important museums of Amsterdam: the Rijksmuseum (National Museum), the Van Gogh Museum and the Stedelijk museum (Municipal Museum), the latter for modern art.
For music, the Concertgebouw is Amsterdam's famous concert hall.

Amsterdam sightseeing hints'n'tips

Dutch National Tourist Office, tel. 0906 871 7777 (60p per minute). Amsterdam tourist office, tel. 00 31 20 551 2525.


Tourist offices in Holland are called VVV.

The main one in Amsterdam is opposite the Central Station, at Stationsplein 10. Tel: (020) 551 2525 or (0900) 400 4040. Fax: (020) 625 2869.
E-mail: info@amsterdamtourist.nl
Opening hours: daily 8am to 5pm.

There is another office on Platform 1, and a smaller one at the Leidseplein/Leidsestraat.

Services provided by the VVV include general tourist information, hotel and package reservations, excursions and canal cruises, maps and guidebooks, walking tours, public transport tickets, theatre, concert and museum tickets, souvenirs and posters, telephone cards, VVV gift vouchers and currency exchange.

In addition, there are a number of tour organisers on the Damrak, near Central Station.

Amsterdam has 42 museums, 141 galleries, 22 paintings from Rembrandt, 206 paintings from Van Gogh and much more. Besides the famous museums such as the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh Museum, the less well-known museums are also interesting: visit the Kattenkabinet (Cat Cabinet) and the Woonbootmuseum (Houseboat Museum).
There are three major museums, the Rijksmuseum, the Stedelijk (modern art) and the Van Gogh. All three are situated around the Museumplein.

Rijksmuseum. Hours 10:00-17:00. Large museum containing paintings by some of the Netherlands' great 17th century painters such as Rembrandt, Vermeer and Van Hals, but non-Dutch masters as well. The Nightwatch by Rembrandt is their most important exhibit. Contains many artefacts as well as paintings.

Stedelijk. Hours 11:00-17:00. Important collection of modern art from around 1880.

Van Gogh Museum has the world's largest collection of Van Gogh works. Hours 10:00-18:00. Tel. 0031 - 20 570 5200.

Amsterdam has museums of all sorts, exhibiting everything from torture to piggy banks, from erotica to cannabis. To visit many of them, a good option is the Museumboot, connecting 16 museums and costing the equivalnet of 9 pounds for a whole day.
In addition, you could get on the Canal Bus from Central Railway Station to the Rijksmuseum (about the same price for a day ticket). The Van Gogh Museum is across the park from there.

HOURS OF OPENING OF MUSEUMS IN HOLLAND
Business hours vary, however, most museums are open from 10 am until 5 pm every day of the week, except Mondays.

Amsterdam does not have a historic quarter: it is one. As many as 7,000 of the city’s buildings are listed. The listed buildings are mainly the 18th-century houses along the canals. Amsterdam looks like a canvas from the Golden Age.

The Anne Frank House, Prinsengracht 263 (Westerkerk), hours 9am-7pm (9pm in the summer). The wartime hiding place of the young Jewish girl and her family, finally caught by the Nazis, made famous by Anne Frank's diaries. Go early, or late, to avoid the queues.

Amsterdam has many 'hofjes', enclosed courtyards hidden away between houses. The Begijnhof, dating from the early 14th century, is one of the largest, most famous and most intriguing: it feels strange to find this oasis of peace so close to the bustling city centre. Hidden behind the busy Spui shopping strip, it's a well-kept courtyard with minuscule houses all around it. There is a doorway in the row of houses on the Spui that leads you to the Begijnhof. It was formerly a convent home to the Beguines, a Catholic order of unmarried or widowed women from wealthy families who cared for the elderly and lived a religious life without taking monastic vows; the last true Beguines died in the 1970s. It has an English church built in 1400, with pulpit panels designed by Mondriaan, and the oldest house in the country, built in 1475, one of Amsterdam's few surviving wooden houses. Turn left out of the other entrance, to visit the Amsterdam Historical Museum and its free gallery of old paintings of city guards.

Hortus Horticultural Gardens, Waterlooplein, hours 9am to 5pm (weekends 11am to 5pm).

Heineken Brewery, 78 Stadhouderskade, hours 10am to 6pm. It was a brewery until a few years ago, and is now a museum and visitors' centre. No unaccompanied children. No reservations.

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