Talk:Johannes Vermeer

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Johannes Vermeer article.
Article policies
This article is within the scope of the following WikiProjects:
Other languages WikiProject Echo has identified Johannes Vermeer as a foreign language featured article. You may be able to improve this article with information from the Dutch, German, Hebrew or Polish language Wikipedias.
This article has been reviewed by the Version 1.0 Editorial Team.

I made a redirect here from Jan Vermeer (though nothing links to it), but shouldn't the article be at Jan Vermeer instead? They get about an equal number of Google hits (38 800 for Johannes, 34 000 for Jan), but my first instinct when I was looking for him here today was to search for Jan. Adam Bishop 04:41, 23 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I've always heard him referred to as Johannes. -- Viajero 10:59, 23 Nov 2003 (UTC)

The museums here could use links, many have articles. -- Jmabel 00:25, Sep 23, 2004 (UTC)

I have done a bit of this Notjim 13:36, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

TO DO: mention the role Vermeer played in Proust at a time before he had reached his current popularity. Notjim 13:36, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I added a link under influences Notjim 14:02, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Also, the Italian version of this is fantastic, it has an entry for every one of the pictures, anyone fancy translating the Italian? Notjim 13:44, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Finally, I added the new one: A Young Woman seated at the Virginals, maybe someone would like to *comment on this attributation in the main text, I amn't really qualified, my understand is just that it is widely accepted. Notjim 14:02, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] List of Works

As I understand it there are 34 surviving works generally attributed to Vermeer (see for example [1]). However, we currently have a list of 36 works. Can anyone spot the repetitions or falsely attributed works? -- Solipsist 19:43, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well one of the extra ones was only attributed recently: Young Girl at her Viringals. Notjim 22:25, 17 July 2005 (UTC)
There is great disagreement among art historians as to whether "Young Girl at the Virginals," recently purchased by Steve Wynn for display in his Las Vegas art gallery, truly was painted by Vermeer. It is not mentioned in the historical record. Its provenance is questionable. Unlike most Vermeer paintings, it is unsigned. All the art history experts who "authenticated" the painting were employed by Sotheby's, the auction house which was selling the painting (and would gain a siginificant commission in its sale). Because of this, its sale price was much lower than otherwise would be expected for a Vermeer, which are - as this article points out - extremely rare. The value of truly authenticated vermeers has been estimated to exceed $200 million in many instances. Accordingly, because many art historians dispute "Young Girl at the Virginals" being ascribed to Johannes Veermeer, this painting should be included in the list of disputed works, not the list of actual works. 65.28.9.8 17:29, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

I am appalled by the entirely unjustified accusation that the above mentioned art historians and experts should have been employed by Sotheby’s while examining the "Young Girl at the Virginals". This is simply NOT the case. I was one of the persons and I acted entirely independent and never received any compensation in any way for the many hours of research put into the project. This was also the case with the other experts. I insist that the writer of the above publicly withdraw his accusation. Or come forward so that we can have a proper confrontation – but indeed in another forum. Jwacph (talk) 18:05, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Yo, what about "Girl in a red hat?" That ones not in there. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 35.8.250.103 (talk) 12:50, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Painting from a window

The section Johannes_Vermeer#Themes currently starts: Vermeer painted mostly in-house scenes, and even his two known landscapes are framed with a window.

This is incorrect - neither View of Delft nor the little Street Scene have any indication of being framed with a window. - User:84.191.75.90 21:06, 9 August 2005 [comment moved from main page -- Solipsist 17:22, 12 August 2005 (UTC) ]

[edit] Incorrect attribution?

I have never before seen 'Portrait of a Woman' (Budapest), illustrated in this article, credited to Vermeer. Does anyone have credible evidence for this attribution? JNW 14:36, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

  • Not finding any source for this attribution, I have removed the image. If anyone can cite scholarly attribution, please re-install the picture. JNW 15:19, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lapis

After doing some copy editing of the section on lapis lazuli, I researched the source of the information--turns out that it was a direct quote from an interview on another web site. The interview was with the conservator for the The Hague, who had actually restored Girl with a Pearl Earring; moreover, it appears that it might have been he who was contributing his own quote. Obviously, this is an expert's contribution. I am glad that the conservator's thoughts have been added to the article, and I hope my that edits have benefited in terms of the spoken interview 'reading' more properly, without compromising the fine content. JNW 03:36, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the corrections. Appreciated! Jwacph (talk) 18:07, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hans van Meegeren

I have reverted the following from the article, finding it unnecessarily detailed and repetitious of the material already presented. JNW 21:32, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

ADDITION TO THE ABOVE

Hans van Meegeren was jailed for selling Dutch National Artworks to the Germans when they occupied the Netherlands. In jail he convinced the supervisor that they were forgeries as he had maintained all along and received the materials he asked for to prove that he could do it. He made a forged copy which was judged by world experts on the paintings of Vermeer. They declared the forgery was a real Vermeer. Van Meegeren was then charged with dealing wirh the enemy but was soon released.

[edit] Move

The title "Johannes Vermeer" is wrong. The Vermeer expert Wheelock publishs his works by using "Jan Vermeer" and in the German literture I used to write the excellent article in the German Wikipedia only the name "Jan Vermeer" is mentioned. So I think the article should be moved to "Jan Vermeer". Julius1990 (talk) 23:40, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Is there really nobody who wants to comment on this question? Julius1990 (talk) 19:25, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

The Rijksmuseum, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Frick Collection, The Mauritshuis and the National Galleries of Scotland all use "Johannes". Liedtke's 2001 catalogue from the Met exhibition (ISBN 0300088485) uses Johannes, as do Krueger (van Meegeren biographer) and Gaskell & Jonker (editors of "Vermeer Studies" from the National Gallery Washington). That's close enough to a consensus for me. RobHutten (talk) 19:53, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

It's not that easy. But when you think it's right that way, I won't do anything. I only can say that i worked properly for my german article and the name there got changed too (comment on the question there). It's used by the litearture (I can name at least three reference books that use it). Then it had two candidatures in which many users proofed the accuracy and no one claimed of the name Jan. Naturally Johannes is the forename, but the important thing is the used artist name which is Jan. But I don't want to argue and have better things to do ... Julius1990 (talk) 06:16, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
Was this figure's surname originally (or alternately) Van der Meer? [2] [3] Robert K S (talk) 11:15, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Some contemporary references used "van der Meer" but I don't think anyone claims it was "originally" so. The two mean the same thing. Surnames just weren't cast in stone so much then. --RobHutten (talk) 18:30, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ignatius, first or third son?

The claim that Ignatius was Vermeer's first son is offered at the National Gallery web site: [4], but is contradicted here [5]. I'm inclined to go with the latter, owing to its more comprehensive overview. JNW (talk) 13:20, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Elaboration added, with ref from here [6]. JNW (talk) 13:33, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] John Michael Montias

It is hard to believe to work of Montias is not mentioned in this article. Vermeer was from being a saint, nor his or her family. See: Montias, J.M. (1989) Vermeer and his milieu.Taksen (talk) 14:59, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

If Montias' findings are reliable, it would make sense to introduce specific biographical information about the artist, rather than an overview of the author's contributions to cultural or economic studies. As it reads now, the paragraph on Vermeer's life contains more information on Montias than it does on Vermeer. JNW (talk) 20:03, 25 May 2008 (UTC)