Vermeer's Paintings in the Context of 17th c. Dutch Art

The Broader Context: Specialization Among Dutch Artists

It has been estimated that between five and ten million works of art had been produced during the century of the Golden Age of Dutch art. Very few of these, perhaps less than 1%, have survived. "Works of art, ranging from simple prints and copies to originals hung in almost all Dutch homes. For example, pictures of some kind or another were found in about two thirds of Delft households."¹

After the end of the 80 year war with Spain in 1648, the Netherlands had emerged as a vital new political, economic and cultural force. One of the consequences of the Republic’s independence was the change in the balance of power, power which had for the first time in modern history, passed into the hands of bourgeois. This decisive change was to have enormous repercussions on the art market. Although the birth of a capitalistic society is often cited in relation to the sudden explosion of artistic production, the abundance of money may explain why pictures, if desired, could be bought, but it does not explain either why they were so strongly desired or why there was an urge to make them. Perhaps the reasons for which a number of great artists suddenly flourish in any given period of time has not been understood. Just to the south, France, a much large country had far fewer painters than in the Netherlands even though the arts had been actively encouraged by Louis XIV.

One of the reasons often used to explain the Dutch desire for paintings is related to quintessential Dutch affection for their land and home.  “…a considerable proportion of inhabitants of Dutch towns had more than sufficient income to provide for their fundamental needs. Many chose to spend their surplus on furnishing for their homes, including pictures. This lead to a great demand for paintings at low prices. Since they were to be hung in rooms of ordinary Dutch houses, most of them were small." ² In 1968 Johan Huizinga explained the evident Hollanders’ love for pictures in a different way calling upon their   "intense enjoyment of shapes and objects, the(ir) unshakable faith in the reality and importance of all earthly things, a faith that... was the direct consequence of a deep love of life and interest in one's environment."  All this was undoubtedly nurtured by a surge in pride in their newly founded country.

In any case, “for the Dutch in the seventeenth century, art functioned as a social cement, reinforcing the shared beliefs and aspirations that helped unite communal concerns. In the works of most artists both style and content reflected taste not of the wealthy and sophisticated, but of people in moderate circumstances. For this reason, international fashion could be large himself had ever traveled to Italy but seemed to content to develop their own particular style of painting in their homeland."³

Patronage, Competition and Diversification

The church and monarchy, which had been traditionally the most powerful patrons of the arts, were substituted in the Netherlands's by a newly formed and wide base middleclass. After the iconoclasm of the Calvinists in the 1560s the church had all but ceased to provide commissions for painters. The Reformed Church allowed money to be spent only for the decoration of church organs. “ Compared with the rulers of other European countries, the House of Orange was relatively modest patrons of the arts, especially in regard to Dutch painters who rarely received commissions from them." ⁴

History painting, which once dominated the pictorial arts, gradually became a minority art even though it would be continued to be produced for the upper classes and the aristocracy. In the place of history painting, new categories quickly evolved. Portraits, landscapes, seascapes, still-lives, flower painting and genre themes, which had once existed primarily as descriptive elements within history painting, became independent in the early 16th c. were in high demand surpassing the more traditional categories.

It has been calculated that between  5 and 10 million works of art were produced by 17th c.Dutch artists. This astounding number can be explained by a widespread demand for art supported by purchasing power of prosperous middle class and naturally, a veritable army of artists and craftsmen. Prints, maps and copies of paintings could be found in many Dutch homes.

Not only could the more traditional religious, mythological and historical themes be bought or commissioned, but portraits, landscapes still-lives and genre themes were in high demand as well. Each category was subdivided into even more specific categories. Landscape painters, for example, produced naturalistic views of the Dutch countryside, cityscapes, winterscapes, imaginary landscape, seascapes and Italianate landscapes. The diversity of categories in Dutch seventeenth-century paintings was fostered by the fact that instead of painting to the order the few wealthy and powerful, painters were (for the first time in the history of Western art) producing whares commercially to individual buyers of different economic and cultural backgrounds receptive to pictures of all kinds of subject matter and a wide range of styles.

Prices were generally low since competition was fierce. In order to survive each painter had to secure himself a particular style to differentiate his work from others already available. Many painters depended on secondary sources of income to survive. Vermeer himself was not able to support his numerous family with his painting but depended on the generosity of his well-to-do mother-in-law. Since it took a very long time to become proficient in any of these categories, painters usually specialized in one area only.

Within this context Vermeer, like Rembrandt, was part of a minority of more talented Dutch painters who were able to create masterpieces in different categories although he worked prevalently in his famous gentre interior mode.

History painting, which once dominated the pictorial arts, gradually became a minority art even though it would be continued to be produced for the upper classes and the aristocracy. In the place of history painting, new categories quickly evolved. Portraits, landscapes, seascapes, still-lives, flower painting and genre themes, which had once existed primarily as descriptive elements within history painting, became independent in the early 16th c. were in high demand surpassing the more traditional categories.

Vermeer's Subjects

Vermeer is know to have painted religious and mythological  themes,¹ genre interiors, landscapes as well as bust length figures. The term "bust length figure" has been used since it is very likely that these works were not intended as true portraits, but rther belonged to a unique category of painting called tronies. The large-scale religious and mythological paintings belong to Vermeer's  formative first years. He returned only once to a religious theme² after he had begun to paint in the genre mode that was very popular in Delft as elsewhere in the Netherlands. It might be said that once the painter had discovered the expressive and perhaps commercial potential of subjects of contemporary life, he lost interest in the more traditional subjects. No still-lives or flower paintings are know by Vermeer's hand.

Vermeer's Clients and Patrons

The scholar John Michael Montias has shed the most light upon Vermeer’s social and economic situation. His seminal research has shown there were at least a small number of people who acquired Vermeer’s paintings during his lifetime or shortly thereafter and that at least one of these, a wealthy collector named Pieter Claez van Ruijven, may have been a significant patron, protecting Vermeer and his family during his lifetime from the vicissitudes of the national economy.

After reviewing the records which Montias and others have uncovered, two facts become apparent. First, Vermeer's paintings commanded relatively high prices when compared to many of his contemporaries. The price of six hundred livres that the baker thought reasonable for his painting compares favorably with the six hundred livres that Gerrit Dou (1613-1635) asked from De Moconys  for his Woman in a Window, "clearly also a painting with only one figure." Evidently, a painting by Vermeer had the same market value as a work by Dou, whom King Charles II of England had invited to become his court painter in 1660. Dou, one of Rembrandt’s prized students, commanded very high prices for his work throughout his career.

In addition, Vermeer apparently sold his paintings to a very few affluent clients who were capable of recognizing the extraordinary quality of his work, despite the fact that his name was not nearly as widespread as other some Dutch masters of the time, including especially Dou. During his life, Vermeer's fame did not generally reach much farther than nearby The Hague. Nonetheless, word of the artist's talent was passed from one connoisseur to another in a relatively strict circle. Other than the six occasional but distinguished buyers of a single work, only Van Ruijven could possibly be called a patron. The Delft baker, Pieter Van Buyten, had purchased one painting from the artist while he was still alive and received another two after Vermeer's early death as payment for a huge debt the artist had accumulated. Three paintings acquired in such circumstances probably don’t establish Van Buyten as a true patron, either.

Apparently, Vermeer’s only real patron was Pieter Van Ruijven. Although the exact nature of Vermeer's relationship with him is subject to debate, it seems likely he had acquired at least some works directly from Vermeer. In fact, Van Ruijven's son-in-law Jacob Dissius had in his possession twenty-one Vermeer’s at the time of his death. If we accept Montias'  estimate of the total number of Vermeer's paintings to be from 44 to 54, this would mean that either Van Ruijven, or members of his family, had bought about one half of Vermeer's entire artistic output.

Montias himself believes that "the relationship between Van Ruijven and Vermeer went clearly beyond the routine contacts of an artist with a client." Van Riujven lent Vermeer money. He witnessed the will of Vermeer’s sister Gertruy in her own house shortly before her death. More significantly, Van Ruijven's wife, Maria Knuijt, left Vermeer a conditional bequest of five hundred guilders in her will.³ Such a testament was extremely unusual at the time.

However, the distinguished Vermeer specialist, Arthur Wheelock, has expressed reasonable doubts about the exact nature of their relationship. "The hypothesis that Van Ruijven was Vermeer's patron, although appealing, should be cautiously approached, for no document specifies that Vermeer ever painted for Van Ruijven. Moreover, no source confirms that Van Ruijven himself had any Vermeer paintings in his possession.  While Van Ruijven may have acquired painting from Vermeer, it seems unlikely that he assumed such an important a role in the artist's life as Montias suggests. Should Van Ruijven had been Vermeer's patron, one would expect that Balthasar de Monconys  would have visited Van Ruijven himself in 1663, rather than the baker, Hendrick van Buyten, upon hearing that Vermeer had no paintings  at home. Similarly, the Vermeer enthusiast Pieter Teding van Berckhout would also have made an effort to see the Van Ruijven's collection in 1669 on his two visits to Delft." Wheelock further states: "While it is probable that some of the twenty Vermeer paintings listed in the inventory of 1683 ( the inventory taken after the death of van Ruijven’s daughter) came from Van Ruijven, others may have been acquired by {his daughter} Magdalena, Jacob Dissius (his son-in-law), or his (Jacob’s) father, Abraham Jacobz Dissius, at a sale of twenty-six paintings from Vermeer's estate held at the Saint Luke's Guild Hall on 15 May, 1677."⁴ While the precise relationship between Vermeer and Van Ruijven may never be known, it is evident that the Van Ruijven family held Vermeer's work in high regards, having, at one time or the other, assembled a significant part of the master's oeuvre.