Vermeer A life lost and found

Bold new claims about Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer and why he painted are at the core of this exemplary biography from art historian Graham-Dixon (Caravaggio). Drawing from a wealth of historical documents, the author argues that Vermeer (1632--1675) did most of his work for two patrons: husband and wife Pieter Claesz van Ruijven and Maria de Knuijt, members of the Collegiants, a dissenting Christian movement that developed in response to the Eighty Years' War. The sect prized egalitarian values, eschewed traditional preaching, and gave women equal rights to speak. Meetings were often held in members' homes; those that occurred in the van Ruijven household likely used Vermeer's paintings as "devotional pictures" to aid members in their worship. Domestic scenes in Vermeer's paintings are actually loaded with religious symbolism, Graham-Dixon contends. For example, nails protruding from walls in the backgrounds of The Milkmaid and Woman with a Balance symbolize Jesus's crucifixion, and Girl with a Pearl Earring was likely a baptismal portrait of Vermeer's patrons' daughter, Magdalena. Drawing from auction and inheritance records, the author convincingly repositions Vermeer, about whom relatively little is known and whose motivations were presumed to be mostly secular, as a painter with egalitarian religious views. Along the way, Graham-Dixon makes informed, well-researched guesses about whom Vermeer might have apprenticed with, among other mysteries. Serious Vermeer fan won't want to miss this. (Apr.)

New perspectives on an iconic painter. British historian Graham-Dixon draws on archival sources to create a richly delineated portrait of Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer (1632-75) and the political and religious turmoil that shaped his life. The author focuses the biography on two overarching questions: "Why did he create his paintings? What did they mean to their creator, and to those for whom they were painted?" Showing artistic talent even as a child, Vermeer was apprenticed to an artist when he was between 10 and 12. Early in his career, he thought of himself as a history painter, but soon made a transition to the genre paintings for which he has become famous. Graham-Dixon makes a convincing case, however, that what look like genre paintings carry religious themes, a reflection of Vermeer's close links with religious dissidents--Remonstrant and Collegiant movements opposed to Calvinism that argued for tolerance and free will. Vermeer's parents were affiliated with Remonstrants, as were his patrons. Of the 36 works by Vermeer that survive, the most distinctive, according to the author, were created for the Van Ruijvens, his patrons for some 13 years. The author analyzes Vermeer's paintings, beautifully reproduced in color plates, to reveal religious allusions, evidence of Vermeer's thorough knowledge of the New Testament and Dutch dissenting literature. Virulent religious tensions were not Vermeer's only experience with conflict; his life was embedded in war: the Eighty Years' War that resulted in Dutch independence from Spain; the Thirty Years' War, ended in 1648, which sent hordes of refugees from Central Europe into the Netherlands; and the French invasion of 1672. While Vermeer stands as "one of the first purely tonal painters in the history of Western art," Graham-Dixon portrays him as a man of his time. A well-researched, penetrating investigation. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.