The ongoing exhibition, Rembrandt and His Time, at the National Museum of China in Beijing features 74 paintings, including 11 by Rembrandt and one by Johannes Vermeer.[Photo by Jiang Dong/China Daily]

The collection made its China debut on Friday. It features 74 paintings at the National Museum of China in Beijing through September, celebrating the most acclaimed period of the Dutch Golden Age. It will later move to the Long Museum in Shanghai.

The exhibition titled Rembrandt and His Time includes 11 works by Rembrandt and one by Johannes Vermeer.

"Vermeer and Rembrandt are considered to be the two greatest geniuses of this period (the Dutch Golden Age)," says John Stainton, deputy chairman of Christie's old master paintings department, who was at the Beijing opening.

Kaplan purchased works largely through dealers and also at auctions by Christie's and Sotheby's. Between 2003 and 2008, he bought on average one painting every week.

"Our desire is to build a collection of the best of its kind."

Speaking about the Kaplans' quest, Stainton says: "There are a good number of Dutch 17th-century paintings in private hands. The very best of them are relatively few. But there are still very fine works that come to the market."

He says the exhibition is important to helping people understand what was going at the time in the Dutch Republic (1581-1795), which is now the Netherlands.

"It was a new republic, so the people felt very free for the first time. Commercially, there was a burgeoning wealthy middle class. And artistically, one saw an explosion of creative talent, with this middle class commissioning and buying artists' works," Stainton says.

"It fostered an environment in which artists could really flourish. That is why it was a high point of European old master painting when there was so much creative talent in a relatively short period."