‘Goldrush’ one of the highlights during Rembrandt Year 2006

Treasure hunt through cultural heritage

LEIDEN - A six-week long treasure hunt through Leiden’s cultural heritage could earn the winner a bar of gold worth $15,000. The gold rush promises to be one of the most spectacular events of the Rembrandt Year 2006.

Announced as ‘Rembrandt’s Goldrush,’ the project is scheduled for June and July, 2006. Each week, a different aspect of the city’s history will be highlighted. These range from Leiden’s origins to the city’s role during the Eighty Year War and Leiden as the birthplace of famed artist Rembrandt van Rijn. The Goldrush treasure hunt comprises of a multitude of questions and activities, many of them on location throughout the centre of the historic city. Each week’s happenings are capped with a special event at an historic site. One such event takes place on the canal near the Weighhouse, where paintings of Rembrandt will be projected on giant screens.

One of the other capping events is a life manifestation of art, where one hundred well-known artists create their own take on Rembrandt during a day-and-night session in the open air at the Rembrandt Park. The art then will be auctioned at the Pieterskerk, the building where once many of the first waves of Pilgrims worshipped.

Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn was born on July 15, 1606. His father Harmen was a miller, his mother Neeltgen Willemsdochter van Zuytbroeck, the daughter of a local baker. After apprenticing with a number of artists, both in Leiden and Amsterdam, Rembrandt established himself as an independent painter in Leiden, sharing a studio with Jan Lievens. In 1632, Rembrandt moved to Amsterdam where he died October 4, 1669.