YUAG Takes A Closer Look

Imagine yourself peering through the large end of a telescope, looking at the world in miniature. You feel blown out of proportion, almost godlike, a giant out of Gulliver’s Travels staring down at people the size of insects going about their days. But as you look, you begin to notice details in the minute, humanity condensed to an anthill ready for your inspection. You see the big picture, made small.

This is the experience provided by the Yale University Art Gallery, in partnership with the Center for Netherlandish Art at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, through their current exhibition, ​“Thinking Small: Dutch Art to Scale” — now entering its last week at the Yale University Art Gallery at 1111 Chapel St., where it runs through July 23.

The show provides an intimate experience of the world by shrinking it down, encouraging viewers to look closely and observe the intricacies of the miniature. From finely wrought drawings and paintings that capture details with mouse-sized brushstrokes, to delicate objets d’art that inspire interactive experiences, the exhibit provides a taste of Dutch art, and the world, in bite-sized proportions.

Upon entering the gallery, the viewer first notices the Nautilus Cup, an ornate drinking vessel from the 1660s formed from a nautilus shell from the South Pacific and engraved by Jan Bellekin. At first glance the cup looks radiant, shining and majestic. But take a closer look — as it compels you to, the tiny incisions on the shell drawing you in like a magnet — and you begin to notice a darker, more down-to-earth message. The satiric images on the cup contrast the vulgar and mundane with the pious and divine. One picture shows a disturbing rape scene, and directly beside it sits a church. Bellekin subverts expectations of beauty to make viewers think more carefully.

Etched along the Nautilus Cup you will find hyper-realistic depictions of insects, a theme throughout the exhibit. Through the examination of natural life on a small scale, the artists encourage viewers to put themselves in perspective. A collection of books are spread open to reveal vivid drawings of natural life, such as the three volumes of Johannes Goedaert’s 1600s Metamorphosis naturalis (Natural Metamorphosis). Goedaert paid close attention to his subject to give it the respect he believed it deserved. As the plaque beneath the book states, ​“He studied the growth of a large tortoiseshell butterfly with the naked eye for approximately four weeks.” Through his technical precision and attention to detail, Goedaert’s drawings reward the viewer for giving the butterfly an equal level of scrutiny.

Goedaert might have captured the anatomy of the butterfly using only his eyes, but the invention of the microscope allowed artists to observe the natural world through an even more exacting lens. ​“In the second half of the seventeenth century, the increasing use of the microscope allowed for the detection of what the Dutch naturalist Jan Swammerdam called ​‘the wisdom of God in a minute point’ and the discovery of the ​‘whole universe in a particle of line,’” an accompanying note in the gallery states. Swammerdam’s 1685 book, Historia Insectorum Generalis (General History of Insects) lies open on a page featuring the engraver Heinrich Christian de Hennin’s enlarged portrait of a mosquito. The bug appears spindly and vicious, but careful examination yields a certain humanity to its carefully constructed form. The insect may look small, but this exhibit has proved that perspective matters. 230 years before Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis, Christian de Hennin shows that bugs and humans are not so different. All he had to do was change the proportions.

Artist Melchior d’Hondecoeter also focuses on the natural kingdom in his painting Animals and Plants of the Forest. Using dark, luscious oils, d’Hondecoeter creates a delightful if unrealistic ecosystem where creatures that could not coexist in the real world live in harmony. As always with this show, the painting invites the viewer to lean in closer and probe its depths to discover the hidden treasures within: a tiny bee or a camouflaged thistle. The hyper-realistic style of the painting brings the scene to life, and offers a new perspective on interactions in the animal world.

Perspective proves important once again in the landscape paintings spread throughout the gallery. These intricate worlds, condensed to the size of a small canvas, focus on views from afar. Hans Bol’s 1589 View of Amsterdam from the South shows people, animals, and ships clustering the panel with action and vibrant life. To look at the painting feels like staring down at the city from a high-up window, and at first glance, the people look like bright dots of color. But look closer, and every person has a story to dissect, from the lovers reclining on the grass to the men leaning over the railing to watch the gondoliers.

As expected in a Dutch art exhibition, ships abound. Willem van de Velde the Elder’s mid-to-late 17th century drawing Dutch and English Ships Running in Toward a Fleet at Anchor makes a massive scene miniature. It feels like standing on the shore of a beach, looking far out to sea as the fleet approaches from the distance. It might look small from here, but you never doubt its breadth or its power. ​“Representations of landscapes and seascapes — in drawings, maps, prints, and more — celebrated vast spaces and embodied artistic responses to a question of scale: How does one represent an enormous area on a small surface?” reads the print on the wall. Van de Velde the Elder’s drawing answers that question by playing with the viewer’s perspective and experience of size. The ships may look small now, but they are coming closer. All sizes depend on how close the viewer cares to get.

Walking out of ​“Thinking Small: Dutch Art to Scale” feels like turning that telescope back around. All of a sudden, the world looks enormous again. After all this attention to the minute, it feels almost overwhelming to have everything maximized back to its usual size. But the lessons learned in the exhibit linger on, and you can return to the world with a newfound respect for detail and the knowledge that you can always find more to see. All you have to do is open your eyes, and lean in close.