VERMEER NEWSLETTER No. 52

December, 2023

Dear Subscriber,

If you haven't heard much from me, it's because in 2023 I was swept me out to sea by  a tidal wave: albeit a supremely benign one. For starters, the February-June Rijksmuseum Vermeer retrospective. I was able to visit Amsterdam three times and behold the luxurious exhibition more than a dozen times. I won't even attempt to describe the experience save to say that after each visit my admiration and consternation for Vermeer's apparently unobtrusive art increased more than I would have thought possible.

I was also invited to speak at the International Vermeer Symposium held at the Rijksmuseum halfway through the exhibition. Although mildly terrorized by the prospect of speaking to an auditorium packed with many of the world's leading Vermeer specialists and scholars, some of whom and I knew only by  name, the informal conversations during coffee breaks and many friendly pats on the backs gave me bit of caffeine and confidence to get me up to speed.

So as the tide of events slowly subsided and dragged me back on shore,  post-Vermeer clouds began to loom on the horizon.  And there was a huge, huge amount of work to be done: update EV with the latest scholarship and technical findings, enhance resources, improve user interface and images, but equally important,  provide a comprehensive proofread of the hundreds of web pages, footnotes, and captions—equivalent to a year's or more worth of work. Luckily, I discovered ChatGPT. While largely unproductive for art historical content, it is a remarkably efficient tool for about everything else. Provide it with clear instructions, and it will rectify typos, highlight factual and stylistic inconsistencies, manage footnotes (an incredibly  cumbersome task in HTML!), and generate a wide range of code solutions to increase interactivity.

Although this overhaul has been nothing less than an immersive ordeal, it should be completed by the end of January. At that point, I'll eagerly dive back into the aspects of running EV that I cherish the most—content and contact. One of my initial projects will involve crafting a comprehensive social diagram illustrating the cultural and social interactions between Vermeer and the people and artists who contributed to shaping his world. And after months of negligence, I am eager to get back to social media.

As always, if you have and comments of suggestions,  please don't hesitate to share them with me.

My best,
Jonathan Janson

1.
Vermeer's Mistress and Maid to be shown with the Lady Writing a Letter  with her Maid at the National Gallery of Ireland
Vermeer Visits
National Gallery of Ireland
11 May–18 August, 2024
<https://www.nationalgallery.ie/art-and-artists/exhibitions/upcoming-exhibitions/vermeer-visits>

The National Gallery of Ireland unites two of Vermeer's most luxurious works in an exhibition entitled Vermeer Visits;  The Frick Collection’s Mistress and Maid by Johannes Vermeer with the National Gallery’s Woman Writing a Letter with her Maid for Vermeer Visits. This is an unprecedented opportunity to unite the works, as the Frick’s Vermeer — one of the highlights of its holdings — has rarely travelled outside of New York. While the Frick’s period home is under renovation, Vermeer’s Mistress and Maid will make an exceptional trip to Dublin.

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2.
Antwerp and Dublin tronie exhibitions features Vermeer's Girl with a Red Hat
Turning Heads; Bruegel, Rubens and Rembrandt
venue one:
Koninklijk Museum van Schone Kunsten in Antwerpen, Antwerp
October 20, 2023–January 21, 2024
<https://kmska.be/en/turning-heads>
venue two:
National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin
24 February–26 May 2024
<https://www.nationalgallery.ie/art-and-artists/exhibitions/upcoming-exhibitions/turning-heads-rubens-rembrandt-and-vermeer>

from the KMSK website:
Human faces will be in the spotlight at the KMSKA this autumn, with the first major exhibition following the museum’s grand reopening, which focuses on the development of a Northern European genre, the tronie (head study).Interest in the tronie, the old Dutch word for "face" surged in the 17th century, when artists like Rubens, Rembrandt, and Vermeer (Girl with a Red Hat) poured their talent into painting the human face.

Artists in the 16th and 17th centuries were responsible for a seismic upheaval. Faces had previously been the preserve of crowded biblical and mythological scenes. Now, however, they were shown individually and in all their glory. They were played with, studied, and livened up with costumes and exaggerated expressions. Turning Heads is not an exhibition about portraits. In fact, it is very much not that. Artists of greater and lesser talent used anonymous models to carry out creative experiments on their own initiative.

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 3.
Vermeer's Lacemaker travels to the Louvre-Lens in Lens (Lens, France)
<https://www.louvrelens.fr/exhibition/au-temps-de-la-dentelliere/>

In an effort to introduce this exquisite Vermeer artwork to a broader audience, one of only two Vermeer paintings housed in the Louvre in Paris, The Lacemaker, Louvre-Lens has curated the exhibition, Au temps de La Dentellière (In the Time of the Lacemaker). This exhibition brings together pieces from the regional heritage and contemporary artworks, offering diverse perspectives on this masterpiece.

The Louvre-Lens, also referred to as the Louvre's "little brother," was established as a way to decentralize France’s vast collection of art and allow a wider audience to have access to the works of great cultural and historical significance.

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4.
Vermeer's Girl Interrupted at her Music travels to Pittsburgh in 2024
Vermeer, Monet, Rembrandt: Forging the Frick Collections in Pittsburgh and New York
Frick Collection Pittsburg
April 6-July 14, 2023
<https://www.thefrickpittsburgh.org/Exhibition-Vermeer-Monet-Rembrandt-Forging-the-Frick-Collections-in-Pittsburgh-and-New-York>

The Frick Pittsburgh is set to present an exhibition next spring that will bring together many of the most significant artworks from its own collection and those of its counterpart, The Frick Collection in New York City. This exhibition will feature over 60 artworks, spanning paintings, sculptures, works on paper, and decorative arts. Its primary focus will be on the collections of Henry Clay Frick, a 19th-century industrialist, and his daughter, philanthropist Helen Clay Frick. The goal is to showcase the similarities and differences in their collecting interests and how their acquisitions played a role in shaping the museums they established.

One of the standout works in this exhibition is Vermeer's painting Girl Interrupted at her Music. This particular piece gained prominence earlier this year when it was featured in the Rijksmuseum's landmark Vermeer retrospective in Amsterdam.

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5.
Vermeer’s own copy of The Guitar Player: or another artist’s version?
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Through January 1, 2024
<https://philamuseum.org/calendar/exhibition/vermeer-highlight>

from the Philadelphia Museum of Art website:
For the last century, Philadelphia’s Lady with a Guitar has been the subject of fascination and questions. Long catalogued as a "Copy after Vermeer" in the John G. Johnson Collection at the museum, the work is either Johannes Vermeer’s own replica of his painting The Guitar Player in the collection of Kenwood House, London, or another artist’s close copy of it.

Since the 1920s, scholars have puzzled over the relationship between the two pictures. The hairstyles are different–the Philadelphia musician does not have corkscrew ringlets–but otherwise, the images are nearly identical. Complicating the comparison is the fact that the London painting is one of Vermeer’s best-preserved works, while the Philadelphia version is in a compromised condition.

Most scholars have felt that the Philadelphia painting is a copy by another artist. In March 2023, researcher Arie Wallert reasoned that the Philadelphia painting could be by Vermeer himself, altered at some time in its past by aggressive cleaning attempts that removed much of the artist’s uppermost finishing layers of paint.

In light of the new findings, Philadelphia Museum of Art scientists, conservators, and curators are pursuing further study of the painting in collaboration with colleagues at other institutions using the most advanced analytical tools available. The aim is to add to knowledge of the work’s construction and materials and, it is hoped, shed more light on who made it.

Old restorations were removed from the painting 50 years ago, revealing exactly what remains of the original paint. The painting is on view in this unrestored condition, giving all a rare opportunity to see what researchers have been looking at for the past five decades in their search for clues of style, technique, or materials that might yet tell us—Vermeer’s own work, or another artist’s?

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6.
Mega Scan of Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring
<https://www.hirox-europe.com/gigapixel/girl-with-a-pearl-earring/>

from:
"Explore Vermeer’s Girl With a Pearl Earring in Astonishing Detail," The Messenger Text, by Andrew Liszewski
<https://themessenger.com/tech/girl-with-a-pearl-earring-zoom-detail-108-billion-pixel-scan-hirox-90x>

Depending on the piece, many museums let you get surprisingly close to their art, where you might notice details not seen in the majority of photos posted online. But the naked eye is nothing compared to a 3D microscope with 90x magnification, which digital microscope company Hirox recently proved while scanning Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring.

Using an HRX-01 scanning microscope with 90X magnification, Emilien Leonhardt and Vincent Sabatier spent 88 consecutive hours scanning the painting. During that time, the computer controlled microscope made 41,106 scans, which were later assembled into a massive 108-gigapixel image — that's 108 billion pixels — that can be zoomed and explored online through Hirox's website. The result, showing the rough canvas and the globs of paint stuck to it, almost looks like an alien landscape.

Many museums and art galleries don't allow photography, as camera flashes and even the invisible light used by autofocus systems can have negative longterm effects on artworks. To safely scan Girl with a Pearl Earring, LEDs were used as a close-up light source, with each scan limited to "around seven seconds at each position," Leonhardt told PetaPixel. The approach ensured that the surface of the painting wasn't heated or harmed in any way during the long scanning process.

A close-up look at the cracking paint on Girl With a Pearl Earring in 3D.

Is it a painting, or an alien planet?

The detailed scan also reveals every tiny crack that has formed in the paint over the past 350 years in 3D, at times making the painting look like the surface of an alien planet. That may seem like overkill — it's hard to truly enjoy a masterpiece when only looking at a pinhead sized portion of it — but revealing its 3D surface structure helps researchers understand how the painting's condition is deteriorating over time, and provides insights into what needs to be done to preserve it for another 350 years.

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 7.
Essential Vermeer addition: Sortable Table of Vermeer's Complete Oeuvre
<http://www.essentialvermeer.com/references/sortable-vermeer-paintings.html>

Are you looking for basic information about Vermeer's paintings but don't want to spend time on lengthy searches? The Sortable Table of Vermeer's Complete Oeuvre allows you to easily search Vermeer's works using a simple, user-friendly table. With just a click of your mouse, you can sort Vermeer's works by title, date, dimensions, theme, collection, country, city, and even popularity.

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8.
Essential Vermeer addition: The Timeline of the City of Delft: 1100-1836
<http://www.essentialvermeer.com/delft/timeline-of-delft.html>

The Timeline of the City of Delft: 1100-1836 is a meticulously curated historical timeline that unfurls the intricate tapestry of Delft's storied past, commencing from its humble origins in the 12th century and culminating with the poignant year of 1836, when the illustrious Rotterdam and Schiedam Gates, immortalized in Vermeer's renowned View of Delft, were dismantled. This chronological narrative provides an enlightening perspective on Delft's evolution, from a marshy lowland to a major cultural, artistic, and political center in the Netherlands and beyond, as well as the beginning of its gradual descent.

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9.
EV enhancement: The Complete Table of Vermeer Exhibitions
<http://www.essentialvermeer.com/references/vermeer_exhibitions.html>

The Complete Sortable Table of Vermeer Exhibitions has already served as an important interactive resource for scholars and enthusiasts wishing to probe the 300-plus exhibitions featuring one or more works by Vermeer. It's a virtual journey began in June 1838 when Vermeer's Young Woman with a Water Pitcher was publicly exhibited for the first time in London and extends to include the current, ongoing, and upcoming exhibitions.

While this table initially allowed visitors and researchers to conveniently sort exhibitions by date, city, country, and the number of paintings, it lacked a crucial feature - the ability to sort by individual paintings, perhaps the document's Achilles' heel.

With the assistance of ChatGPT, which took care of the behind-the-scenes JavaScript—my knowledge of Egyptian hieroglyphics is better than my knowledge of JavaScript—, I have been able to address this vital omission. Now, all you need to do is click on a thumbnail of any of Vermeer's works displayed in a convenient popup modal, and the table will seamlessly sort by that specific artwork.

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10.
VERMEER: Experience the Exhibition from Home
<https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/vermeer-360>

If you were not able to visit the Rijksmuseum Vermeer retrospective, or you want to relive a bit of the experience, the Rijksmuseum has published a virtual 3-D tour of each of the exhibition's galleries and pictures.