www.privateairny.com Private Air | Winter 2021/2022
67
To echo this idea, Vermeer's
composition supports the woman's
hand lifting upwards towards the
heavenly scene in the painting
reinforced by the black vertical of the
picture frame, while PDH's motif
remains in this world and pulls the
hand downwards towards the
gold in the scale that resonates
throughout the whole scene, supporting
the more worldly motif, via the chair
vertical.
Could this incredible matchup of
masterworks in similar size have
been commissioned by a single client,
choosing the master duelers of Delft
to attack this motif: Vermeer with
his characteristic religious bent and
De Hooch with his more humanist
approach?
e new discovery of the Cupid
picture hidden behind the surface in
the Dresden Vermeer's Girl Reading
a Letter at an Open Window" shows
us clearly how the present tastes can
change the past. Someone apparently
post Vermeered that picture by
emphasizing the solitary single figure
and painting out the Cupid
picture.
is newly uncovered painting
within a painting also appears in
the much later National Gallery
picture and should now bump
forward the previously dated circa
1657-8 Dresden picture. To be
sure, the dating on many Vermeer's
works is highly debatable but it
should be noted that a repetition
of objects in Dutch painting often
implies a closer chronology.
But comparisons with De Hooch's
work can sometimes be helpful
with dating. is new Vermeer
composition relates to De Hooch's
pictorial interests in the mid
1660's where curtain, painting
and interior geometry create a
dense overlapping of forms and
movement. And even whether the
artists were in touch or not, there
Un-Vermeering
Gemaldegalerie Dresden
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza National Gallery, London
ART
