The collection of the Israel Museum’s Department of European Art spans the period from the fifteenth to the early twentieth century, representing the many nations of Europe. It comprises paintings on wood and canvas; sculptures in marble, bronze, and ivory; porcelain; silverware; tapestries; and textiles.

Over the years the department’s holdings have steadily grown in scope and they were substantially enriched in recent years by gifts of a number of masterworks, among them The Destruction and Sack of the Temple of Jerusalem by Nicolas Poussin (lost for over two centuries and only rediscovered in 1995); The Death of Adonis by Peter Paul Rubens; and St. Peter in Prison by Rembrandt van Rijn. These paintings are exhibited in the department’s recently renewed galleries along with other pieces from the permanent collection: works by Dutch artists such as the Cuyps, Jan Victors, Pieter Lastman, the school of Hieronymus Bosch, and Anthony van Dyck; Italian artists such as Bernardo Strozzi and Bartolomeo Bettera; French artists such as Dominique Ingres; German artists such as Lucas Cranach the younger; Spanish artists such as Jusepe de Ribera; and English artists such as Thomas Lawrence and George Romney. Recurrent themes are stories from the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and classical mythology, scenes from everyday life, still lifes, landscapes, and portraits.

Also under the care of the department are three period rooms. An eighteenth-century French salon, designed and furnished in the Rococo style, was brought in its entirety from Paris; a small anteroom leading into it presents a display of porcelain and furniture from late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. The eighteenth-century Venetian sitting room reveals the influence of China on Venetian art and design in that period. The English dining room reflects the style of the aristocratic country house in the latter part of the eighteenth century.

Shlomit Steinberg
Hans Dichand Curator of European Art .

Jacob Gerritsz Cuyp and Aelbert Cuyp Dutch, 1594-1650 and 1620-1692 Portrait of a Family in a Landscape, 1641 Oil on canvas, 155 x 245 cm (61 x 96.5 in)				18th-Century English Dining Room				William Adolphe Bouguereau, French, 1825-1905 Girl Holding Lemons, 1899 Oil on canvas, 65.9 x 49.8 cm (26 x 19.5 in)
Bartolomeo Bettera, Italian, 1639-after 1688 Still-life with Musical Instruments and Books Oil on canvas, 70 x 825 cm (27.5 x 32.5 in)				Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669), Dutch St. Peter in Prison, 1631 Oil on panel, 59x47.8 cm				Pieter Lastman (1583-1633), Dutch Hagar and the Angel in the Wilderness, ca. 1625 Oil on panel, 51.6x45.8 cm