The paintings
View of Delft
and
The little street,
The only two exterior oil paintings by the Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) welcome visitors to the largest retrospective organized to date by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, the Netherlands' national museum of art and history.
The canvases are the gateway to the private universe full of symbols of an artist recognized in his time, almost forgotten afterwards, and rescued for glory in the 19th century by the French art critic Théophile Thoré-Bürger.
The room has managed to bring together 28 paintings donated until June 4 by 14 museums and collections from seven countries that form a formidable set of domestic interiors bathed in light, enigmatic female figures and some of the males who visit them, and a profusion of richly woven tapestries.
With a total production of about 45 works and an attribution of 37,
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Vermeer reveals the mystery of his light on the eve of his biggest retrospective in Amsterdam
Simply titled
Vermeer
, the exhibition is the first dedicated exclusively to the painter since the one organized —between 1995 and 1996— by the National Gallery of Art, in Washington, and the Dutch gallery Mauritshuis, in The Hague.
It is also a true balancing act between the blockbuster —it opens on February 10 and 200,000 tickets have already been sold in advance— and the artistic experience.
For now, the Rijksmuseum has decided to extend its hours until 10:00 p.m., from Thursday to Saturday, and hopes to manage the flow of visitors so that there are no crowds.
“Not even Vermeer was able to see so many of his oil paintings together in his lifetime.
Bringing them together was a once-in-a-lifetime affair.
From now or never ”, says Taco Dibbits, director of the Dutch museum, who walks with delight through the rooms of the Philips Wing of the institution, where he presents the works.
'View of Delft', by Johannes Vermeer (circa 1660).<a href="https://www.mauritshuis.nl " target="_blank"> Mauritshuis.
The Hague (Holland)</a>
As the museums that own pieces by the artist do not usually give them away, it is considered a milestone that the Frick Collection in New York, which is renovating its facilities, has sent the three from its catalogue:
Lady with a maid and a letter, The music lesson interrupted and Military and girl laughing.
His specialists and those from the Rijksmuseum have worked together to be able to exhibit this trio of aces, to which they later added the four paintings by the painter kept by the Dutch room itself.
They are equally famous:
The milkmaid, The little street, The love letter and Woman in blue reading a letter
.
Then came the three titles in the possession of the Mauritshuis gallery:
View of Delft
and
Diana and her companions
, and the artist's most famous,
The girl with a pearl
.
The latter will return to The Hague in April.
They were already 10 canvases high, and aroused the enthusiasm of other museums and private collections in Europe, the United States and Japan, which have donated the rest of the paintings.
'The little street'.rijksmuseum
Vermeer has been called the mystery, the enigma, and also the Sphinx of Delft, his hometown.
“Well, now we are closer to him than ever, despite the fact that he left no self-portraits,” says Pieter Roelofs, head of painting and sculpture at the show.
In the absence of the artist's face, the smiling figure that looks at the viewer in
La alcahueta is considered a sort of self-portrait.
The canvas comes from the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, in Dresden (Germany), and presents a red-cheeked young woman with a drink in her hand, who receives some coins for her services.
“We don't have her face, but in a way, Veermer's face is in every one of her paintings.
In the use of color and light.
On his perspective and knowledge of optics.
In the spaces that open and close, because he plays with the limits of what is ours and what is his”, continues Roelofs.
Distributed chronologically, the works occupy a dozen rooms, and the passage of religious scenes executed between 1654 and 1655 is observed, such as
Christ in the house of Mary and Martha
, from the National Gallery of Scotland, and
Santa Práxedes,
arrival of the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, as well as the domain of the female figure.
The woman walks through her work, whether dressed in yellow or blue;
with collected hair, cap or hat.
She predominates busy with a letter, playing the virginal (a type of key or spinet) and in front of a window.
Some look at the painter, like
Lady in Yellow Writing,
from the National Gallery of Art, in Washington.
Others do not raise their eyes from his work, like
The Milkmaid
, and investigations into the manner of painting have shown the changes made as he progressed.
'The milkmaid'.rijksmuseum
“In
Woman in Blue Reading a Letter,
he first applied a layer of lapis lazuli to the jacket, and then a first pass of pale blue to the wall.
Later, a second blue layer on the garment, and one more, gray and final, on the wall.
She left an open line around the clothing, to graduate the transition from one to the other, something that others did not do in the 17th century.
In addition, the lapis lazuli appears in all the upper layers, from the face of the protagonist to the map and the shadows, so there is a chromatic harmony”, says Ige Verslype, conservator and restorer of paintings at the Rijksmuseum.
in
the milkmaid
, the blue color is much more intense and stands out on the apron of the maid, who is making a bread cake, and on the table.
“The mood of the woman on the menu is serene, while this maid, who is alone and working, draws attention with her vibrant ultramarine hue,” she adds.
The studies carried out with the most advanced means have also been applied to
La callecita
.
“The woman who is sitting on the threshold of the house, who belonged to her aunt, according to the latest investigations, appeared before on the right.
The children playing in front were added later, and the red shutter, which now stands out, put it near the end.
A window ajar, ended up closed.
He tells a story and only ends it when he is satisfied,” says Anna Krekeler, curator at the Rijksmuseum, who has participated in the technical analysis of the paintings.
'Lady in yellow writing'.Rijksmuseum
With a production of less than fifty, an average of about two pieces a year, the aura of mystery that surrounds Vermeer derives in part from the lack of personal documents.
There are no handwritten letters, as in the case of Van Gogh, who was a prolific writer.
Rembrandt, for his part, was very famous and has a catalog of 340 works considered his.
It is known that Johannes Vermeer was in contact with art as a child, because his father ran an inn in Delft and was a picture dealer.
That he learned the trade from him with a teacher, otherwise he could not have been a member of the Guild of Saint Luke, in Delft.
From a Protestant family, he married a young Catholic, Catalina Bolnes, and they had 15 children.
His mother-in-law, Maria Thins, was wealthy and initially opposed the couple.
As Gregor Weber has discovered,
Chief Curator of Fine Arts at the Rijksmuseum, the Jesuits showed the artist the use of the camera obscura, an optical instrument forerunner of photography.
He believes that he inspired him, but he did not use it in his works, the outline of the clothing shines and the bronze lights up.
Supported by a Delft collector who bought him some twenty paintings, the artist's life came to a halt in 1672 because of the Franco-Dutch war.
He couldn't sell paintings or support his family, and he got sick and passed away within a couple of days.
According to the funerary register of the Oude Kerk (Old Church) of Delft, at least fourteen bearers carried his bier, and the bell was rung once in his honor.
It was an honorable end paid for by his mother-in-law.
Later, his wife, Catalina, had to declare bankruptcy, overwhelmed by the debts contracted by the painter.
He was almost forgotten, but his name is not only linked today to the stellar trio that he forms with his compatriots, Rembrandt and Van Gogh.
Johannes Vermeer, who painted on the first floor of his house, maintains intact the attractive force of the northern light that entered through the window.