Jan Vermeer
View of Delft 1660-61 39x46in oil on canvas
Mauritshuis Museum, The Hague
This is the grandest cityscape ever painted. It is a fanciful and imaginative portrait of the painter's beloved city captured in his unique sparkling light. The precise place where he painted it has been located- the upper story of a particular house- but by no means is the painting a copy of what his eyes saw. Vermeer condensed part of the image and spread out other parts to form a beautifully balanced composition. Vermeer was 'rediscovered' in the mid-1930's and scholars are still trying to stitch together his life story.
This is the grandest cityscape ever painted. It is a fanciful and imaginative portrait of the painter's beloved city captured in his unique sparkling light. The precise place where he painted it has been located- the upper story of a particular house- but by no means is the painting a copy of what his eyes saw. Vermeer condensed part of the image and spread out other parts to form a beautifully balanced composition. Vermeer was 'rediscovered' in the mid-1930's and scholars are still trying to stitch together his life story.