 
 
|
This painting shares many compositional and thematic elements with A Lady Standing at the Virginal, but it seems unlikely that Vermeer painted the two works as pendants. An inventory made shortly after Vermeer's death indicates that one of these works, but not both, was owned by Diego Duatre, an organist and composer who lived in Antwerp. Duarte's painting was one of few works by Vermeer owned by a non-Delft collector prior to 1696, when twenty-one of his paintings were sold in Amsterdam as part of the Jacob Dissius collection. Another argument against their being pendants is that the two paintings differ stylistically. The modeling of folds on the woman's blue dress in this picture is more abstract than is seen in A Lady Standing at the Virginal, which suggests that Vermeer executed this one at a later date.
Excerpt taken from
Vermeer: The Complete Works
by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr |
|
|
