Sold Out Jan Vermeer Amsterdam Exhibition Goes Online
When the large-scale exhibition of works by Dutch master Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) opened on February 10 at Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum, all 450,000 tickets sold out quickly. The museum is displaying 28 of some 37 extant works by the Delft painter until June 4, 2023.
This is the first time that so many Vermeer paintings have been shown together at the same time, and it may be the last, considering the cost of the works. This is probably also why the show attracted so many visitors. With the initial batch of tickets sold out, the museum extended its opening hours and offered more chances to see the works of the Dutch master. These tickets also sold out quickly and even briefly crashed the museum’s website. Now, the museum is offering a free, interactive online exhibition called “Closer to Johannes Vermeer.” It is narrated by English actor and writer Stephen Fry and allows visitors to get up close to Vermeer’s life and times, even if they cannot see the works in person.
Crazy for Vermeer
The facades of two red brick houses stand out against an overcast sky. In a narrow passageway between them, a maid leans over a shipping container, framed by a door. She is rubbing; the water is still glistening in the ravine. Meanwhile, two children play on the sidewalk, while a woman sits in the open doorway of her house and sews.
In addition to his most famous work, “Girl with a Pearl Earring”, Vermeer is famous for his sensitive portrayals of 17th-century middle-class life in the Dutch city of Delft.
Alongside Rembrandt (1606-1669), Vermeer is considered the greatest painter of his time. He masterfully captured different materials and surfaces on his canvas: the raw brick, lead-glazed windows, aged wooden shutters, whitewashed sections of wall. Everything seems real, almost photographic: the contrast of light and dark, the perspectives, the silence that vibrates with energy.
28 Vermeer masterpieces from around the world
“The Little Street” is a masterpiece, as are all other surviving Vermeer paintings, although not many of them exist.
When he died in December 1675, aged 43, his oeuvre comprised 37 paintings; 28 are now on display at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, for over 26 years at the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague. Artworks were borrowed from major international museums and from private collections in Europe and the United States. Private sponsors dug deep into their wallets. It is Vermeer’s largest solo show to date.
What attracts Vermeer fans is difficult to describe: Vermeer’s handling of brush and ink, his technical skill, his virtuoso play with lighting effects, the composition, the fidelity of perspective. “Vermeer was a master of light,” said Gregor Weber, co-curator of the Amsterdam exhibition. No artist ever painted light like Vermeer, realistically and at the same time full of enigmatic calm, he observed.
Source: DW
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