Yesterday, Emma, Diona and me went to an ice sculpture festival in Leiden. I am not sure if this is an annual festival but I got the impression it is. This year’s theme was Rembrandt, as it is almost 400 years ago that Rembrandt was born.

When we arrived there were not many visitors yet. So we bought tickets and entered the exhibit. As we were already expected that it might be cold we brought winter coats and gloves. Alas, that proved to be insufficient. I estimated that the temperature would be only slightly below 0°C, but it was -10°C. Emma complained about the cold so we went back and bought a Rembrandt scarf in the souvenir shop. They had everything there, even Rembrandt pretzels. Although I am not sure if they had those 400 years ago :).

After entering the exhibit for the second time, this time for real, we saw that the sculptors had given meaning to the theme in a very cool (no pun intended) way. There were excerpts from Rembrandt’s paintings made with ice sculptures and impressions of the time he had lived in. And I must admit, my impression of ice sculpting was that it was a craft and not an art, but after visiting this festival I must say I am definitely wrong about that. They had given a meaning to Rembrandt’s work with their sculptures and by doing so became artists instead of craftsmen according to my definition of art.

We quickly went through the exhibit to get some hot coco and apple pie to get warm again. After which we went back for a second time. I can safely say that if you have some spare time go visit this festival. To give you a small impression a new gallery has been added. In an attempt to get you even more excited I must say that the people from Leiden are very nice. I got lots of greeting and smiles. So only that would make it worthwhile :).