Jan Vermeer
The Art of Vermeer
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Jan Vermeer
This place is dedicated to the painter Jan Vermeer :) This fanlisting is adopted from Giselle which who we spare love and interest for this great artist ...
Jan Vermeer, known too as VERMEER of DELFT was a 17th century Dutch painter, born and dead at Delft (1632 - 1675)
He acquired an unquestionable notoriety during his lifetime, without by any means having the guises of a Master, and fell rather quickly into oblivion. A Frenchman by the name of Etienne Thoré rediscovered him in 1866; under the name of William Bürger, and subsquently published a passionate study that aroused the interest of art historians and the admiration of impressionistic painters procured for Vermeer an astonishing posthumous glory ...
Vermeer Paintings
The first paintings believed to be by him seem to indicate that he was devoted initially to historical painting. To support this theory several works may be named such as : Diana and her companions (1654/1656), Christ in the house of Martha and Mary (1654/1656) and Saint Praxidis (in 1655). These works indicate an interest manifested for Italian painting, more particularly Venetian, as well as a certain relation to the historical subjects of Metsu : in these full compositions, the fluidity of matter and the treatment of volumes by broad strokes produce an effect of mobility.
The subjects which he then chose fit within the tradition of Dutch genre painting; indeed, his thematic repertory differs little from those of painters such as Pieter de Hooch, Van Mieris, Metsu and sometimes Maes. The adopted expressive register and the perfection of the means used reveal his deep originality and set him apart from the others. In the only outside views which are known of him, the View of Delft (1661), ) that had already caused the admiration of his contemporaries, and The little street (1661), reflected space, light and color reach a rare degree of accuracy akin to the naturalistic genre (he is supposed to have used a darkroom to set up his compositions) at the same time as he invested them with a poetic dimension ...
Vermeer Technic
His compositions are based on a very meditated sense of the organization of space, the relationship between the characters, the objects and the surrounding space are analyzed with acuity. He avoided the picturesque accumulation of objects and granted to each pattern a structural function in the whole of the composition, without abstaining from decorative effects ( table covers or rich brocades curtains ) or from meticulous description. His compositions are established according to strict geometrical ratios where right angles are dominant, the contrasts of horizontals and verticals being diversified by some diagonals ( lines of the tilings, the windows, the doors, the paintings on the walls, angles of the tables and the chairs ... ), and the treatment of lighting contribute to the harmony of the whole as well as a very large variety of light effects. Contrary to Rembrandt, Vermeer modulated lighting with clearness, thereby luminosity and limpidity. He analyzed the changing character of the light according to the matters on which it is reflected; he thus made sensitive the tactile quality of the materials, their texture ( bright colored fabrics, heavy textiles, wood, copper, tin, crystal, porcelain, mother-of-pearl ... ) , handling the color according to various techniques: using in turn and sometimes simultaneously a firm touch, small castings of matter that create a friable effect ( The Milkmaid ), a touch that finely reflects the light ( The Lacemaker ), a touch that melted and multiplied the glacis and the transitions, or larger strokes. The modification of his technique agreed with the increasing stylization of his works with the use of bare forms, almost shematized ( The guitar player ). Thereby a marrowy aspect, an almost consistent or smooth and pearly consistency of the matter is present. He created precious harmonies with cold tonalities, particularly of blue and yellow.
This technical refinement enabled him to moderate the atmosphere and express the most subtle human feelings, as his feminine portraits testify : Girl with a pearl earring (1665/1666), Portrait of a young woman (1672/1674), Girl with the red hat (1668). If the majority of his works indicate little inventivity as to the subjects (he was generally satisfied with carrying out a variation on the same topic), he proceeded by formal purification, psychological deepening, managing to give weight to the most gentle gesture, the most banal object, and an expressive intensity to a face with shut eyes. It is for this conjunction of formal rigour and poetic resonance that he is now regarded as one of the great painters of the 17th century ...
The Fanlisting
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The Affiliates
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