The Hermitage Amsterdam reopened with a brand new exhibition, Tsars and Knights: The Romanovs’ Love Affair with the Middle Ages. The museum is proud to be able to present a very extensive, international art collection during the corona pandemic. Through more than 250 objects from the European medieval art collection and the Arsenal of the State Hermitage in St Petersburg, the exhibition tells tales of tsars and knights. Several highlights from these collections are shown in the Netherlands for the first time. They bring the Middle Ages–and its nineteenth-century revival in Europe and at the Russian court–to life, with knights and ladies, courtly love and tournaments. The impressive design is simultaneously heroic and romantic. The highlight is a spectacular hall of knights with a tournament setting in which mounted knights are engaged in a joust. Through collaborations with well-known historian Herman Pleij, among others, in the audio tour, the exhibition offers a unique journey through time, giving color to what is often called the Dark Ages. On view until the summer of 2021.
