Technical Description
Woman with a Water Pitcher
The support is a plain-weave linen with a thread count of 14 x 14 per cm². The canvas has been lined and the original tacking edges have been removed.
The ground is pale gray and contains lead white, chalk, and umber. In the brightly lit areas of the wall is a thin gray layer, slightly paler than the ground, containing some ultramarine. Yellow ocher was added to this layer in the shadows and half-shadows. The left shaded side of the basin has a red underpaint that extends under the adjacent part of her skirt. It is visible as a red outline describing the top edge.
The composition has been altered. There once was a chair with lion's head finials in the lower left foreground and the map the back wall was placed further to the left in line with the left edge of the woman's headgear. The red velvet lining of the jewelry box lid has faded, though the color is still intense where it has been shaded by the frame. Abrasion along all edges and in thin-glazed shadows, as well as scattered flake losses, are present.
* Johannes Vermeer (exh. cat., National Gallery of Art and Royal Cabinet of Paintings Mauritshuis - Washington and the Hague, 1995, edited by Arthur Wheelock)
signature:
no signature appears on this painting<