490. Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675),

Dutch, The Kitchen Maid, c. 1658.

Oil on canvas, 45.5 x 41 cm.

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. Classicism.

 

 

Johannes Vermeer

(1632 Delft – 1675 Delft)

 

Vermeer is perhaps the heroic type of placid, for in none of his pictures is there the least breath of disquietude. We have the impression that he laid the strokes on slowly, but with faultless certainty, and that he was as interested in a reflection in a bottle, or a curtain on a wall, in the stuff of a carpet or a dress, as in the faces of his men and women. No apparent virtuosity, no prowess of the brush, no superfluities; all leads simply to perfection and to the maximum effect expressible through simple precision. His exactness of composition, of draughtsmanship, and of colouration in its clear and rather cold range under a silvery light, is a rare and original creation. Unlike his predecessors, he used a camera obscura to help in his meticulous rendering of perspective. He revolutionised how paint was made and used. His technique of applying paint anticipated some of the methods of the Impressionists over two centuries later.