Reliekschrijn 1857 - 1859

This is Pierre Joseph Hubert Cuypers's pencil drawing of a reliquary shrine. Cuypers was a key figure in the 19th-century Gothic Revival in the Netherlands, an architectural and artistic movement with distinct social and political implications. Made in a time of growing nationalism, Gothic Revival architecture was seen as a way to express national identity by drawing on local Medieval history. The Catholic Cuypers played a central role in this movement, designing numerous churches, including the Rijksmuseum itself. This drawing is of a "reliquary shrine," a vessel to hold religious relics, which gives us a clear sense of the cultural associations that Cuypers sought to evoke through his designs. Historians consult drawings like this alongside other resources such as letters, publications, and architectural plans in order to fully understand the impact of Cuypers’s designs on Dutch identity.