Moça lendo uma carta à janela (Girl reading a letter by an open window / Brieflezend meisje bij het venster) - Johannes Vermeer

Moça lendo uma carta à janela (Girl reading a letter by an open window / Brieflezend meisje bij het venster) - Johannes Vermeer

Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden, Alemanha

OST - 83x64 - 1657-1659

Texto 1:

Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window is an oil painting by Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer. Completed in approximately 1657–59, the painting is on display at the Gemäldegalerie in Dresden.

For many years, the attribution of the painting—which features a young Dutch woman reading a letter before an open window—was lost, with first Rembrandt and then Pieter de Hooch being credited for the work before it was properly identified in 1880.

After World War II, the painting was briefly in possession of the Soviet Union.

Apparently well-preserved, the painting may have been altered after the painter's death.

The painting depicts a young Dutch blonde girl standing at an open window, in profile, reading a letter. A red drapery hangs over the top of the window glass, which has opened inward and which, in its lower right quadrant, reflects her. A tasseled ochre drapery in the foreground right, partially closed, masks a quarter of the room in which she stands. The color of the drape reflects the green of the woman's gown and the shades of the fruit tilted in a bowl on the red-draped table. On the table beside the bowl, a peach is cut in half, revealing its pit.

In Vermeer, 1632–1675 (2000), Norbert Schneider indicates that the open window is on one level intended to represent "the woman's longing to extend her domestic sphere" beyond the constraints of her home and society, while the fruit "is a symbol of extramarital relations." He concludes that the letter is a love letter either planning or continuing her illicit relationship. This conclusion, he says, is supported by the fact that x-rays of the canvas have shown that at one point Vermeer had featured a Cupid in the painting. This putto once hung in the upper right of the piece before, for whatever reason, somebody closed the wall over it. This overpainting, reversed by restorators, seems to have taken place in the 18th century.

The draperies, hanging in the right foreground, are not an uncommon element for Vermeer, appearing in seven of his paintings. Even more common, the repoussoir appears in 25, with Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window, one of three which feature a rug-covered table or balustrade between the figure and the viewer. It was the last painting in which Vermeer featured this device.

This painting and Officer and Laughing Girl represent the earliest known examples of the pointillé (not to be confused with pointillism) for which Vermeer became known. John Michael Montias in Vermeer and His Milieu (1991) points out the "tiny white globules" that can be seen in the brighter parts of both paintings, including the still life elements of both and the blond hair specifically in this work. This use of light may support speculation among art historians that Vermeer used a mechanical optical device, such as a double concave lens mounted in a camera obscura, to help him achieve realistic light patterns in his paintings.

Vermeer completed the painting in approximately 1657–59. In 1742, Augustus III of Poland, Elector of Saxony, purchased the painting under the mistaken belief that it had been painted by Rembrandt. In 1826, it was mis-attributed again, to Pieter de Hooch. It was so labeled when French art critic Théophile Thoré-Bürger came upon it, recognizing it as one of the rare works of the Dutch painter and restoring its proper attribution in 1860.

Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window was among the paintings rescued from destruction during the bombing of Dresden in World War II. The painting was stored, with other works of art, in a tunnel in Saxony; when the Red Army encountered them, they took them. The Soviets portrayed this as an act of rescue; some others as an act of plunder. Either way, after the death of Joseph Stalin, the Soviets decided in 1955 to return the art to Germany, "for the purpose of strengthening and furthering the progress of friendship between the Soviet and German peoples." Aggrieved at the thought of losing hundreds of paintings, art historians and museum curators in the Soviet Union suggested that "in acknowledgment for saving and returning the world-famous treasures of the Dresden Gallery" the Germans should perhaps donate to them Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window and Sleeping Venus by Giorgione. The Germans did not take to the idea, and the painting was returned. Well-preserved, it is on display at the Gemäldegalerie in Dresden.

The painting was investigated by Hermann Kühn together with several other works of Vermeer in 1968. The pigment analysis has shown that Vermeer's choice of painting materials did not reveal any peculiarities as he used the usual pigments of the baroque period. The green drapery in the foreground is painted mainly in a mixture of blue azurite and lead-tin-yellow, while the lower part contains green earth. For the red drapery in the window and the red parts of the table covering Vermeer used a mixture of vermilion, madder lake and lead white. Trecho de texto da Wikipédia.

Texto 2:

For more than 250 years now, the famous painting by Johannes Vermeer featuring a profile depiction of a girl intently reading a letter in front of a light-coloured empty wall has held a firm place among the masterpieces in the Dresden Gemäldegalerie. This picture, which dates to around 1657–1659, is regarded as one of the earliest interior paintings by Vermeer with a solitary figure. Previous x-ray examinations indicated that a picture of a naked Cupid in the painting had been overpainted. Today, new laboratory tests have conclusively determined that the overpainting was not by Vermeer’s hand. On this basis, the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister decided in the course of the current restoration of the work to remove the overpaint. The painting can now be enjoyed looking just as it did when it left the artist’s studio.

A depiction of Cupid originally incorporated on the rear wall as a “painting within the painting” was later painted over again. As a result of the latest investigations and the current restoration of the painting, it has now been proven that this overpainting was not done by Vermeer himself but was executed by a different hand some years after the completion of the Girl Reading a Letter. It has not yet been possible to identify the originator of this overpainting that completely covered the background picture, including its broad black frame, nor to determine at what point in time it was performed.

Although only about half of the Cupid picture on the rear wall of the room has so far been exposed, the fundamental change to the overall impression of the painting is already evident. It is now clear that the Dresden Girl Reading a Letter is another one of the numerous interior scenes by Vermeer in which there is a “painting within the painting” located on the rear wall. In this case, the artist was probably quoting a painting in which a standing Cupid was depicted with an upright bow in his right hand and with his left arm raised. This motif is already known from three other interior paintings by Vermeer.

After being restored to its original condition, Vermeer’s Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window will appear more overt and less muted than previously. The vivid, almost sculptural representation of Cupid painted in ochre and brown tones hanging directly above the delicate figure of the girl will be about the same size as the section of her body that is visible behind the table. The powerful presence of the Cupid figure, positioned in such a way as to face the viewer directly, will be seen as pregnant with meaning and constituting a “commentary” on the scene, thus contributing substantially towards the viewer’s interpretation of the painting. The representation of the god of love will probably be interpreted as a reference to the amorous context of this seemingly innocuous everyday scene. The highly conspicuous background picture will create a spatial counterweight to the introversion of the letter reader, thus leaving the content of the scene open. It is then up to the viewer to decide how to interpret the letter in the girl’s hand.

In any case, the anticipated result of the ongoing restoration of the Girl Reading a Letter will undoubtedly show that the elements of concealment and seclusion in this early work by Vermeer in fact play a less dominant role than has been implied over the past two and a half centuries owing to the alteration of the composition by a different hand.

When work began on restoring Johannes Vermeer’s Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window in May 2017, it was possible to take advantage of numerous previous investigations. In 1965 Hermann Kühn had analysed paint samples taken from the painting. In 1979 the painting had been x-rayed and in 2009 it underwent infrared reflectography. In 2007 fabric structure analysis was performed on the picture support. In preparation for the exhibition “The Early Vermeer” in 2010, the painting underwent careful microscopic investigation, particularly with regard to the artist’s painting technique and the state of preservation. Since 2017, a further extensive programme of research has been an integral part of the current project.

The first stage in the restoration process was the removal of multiple layers of varnish which had turned yellowish brown as a result of ageing. This coating had been applied in the 19th century and had been subsequently renewed several times. The removal of this varnish resulted in the subtle, cool colours of Vermeer’s original painting being rediscovered. It also became evident that the painting – apart from the edge areas – is in an excellent state of preservation, given that it is 360 years old.

During the removal of the varnish, it was found that the solubility properties of the paints in the central part of the background differed from those of the other areas of the painting. It was already known, from the x-ray images taken in 1979, that a “painting within the painting” existed on the rear wall of the room – a depiction of a naked Cupid that had been completely painted over. For a long time, this overpainting was attributed to Vermeer himself.

Prior to continuation of work on this area of the painting, investigations concerning the structure of the paint layers were performed in the archaeometry laboratory of the Hochschule für Bildende Künste Dresden. These showed that aged layers of binding agent and a layer of dirt exist between the original paint layers applied by Vermeer and the paint used for painting over the Cupid picture. A period of several decades must therefore have intervened between the completion of the painting with the Cupid picture and the application of the layer of overpainting, which means that Vermeer cannot have painted over the background picture himself. When the painting came to Dresden from the collection of the Prince of Carignan in France in 1742, this major change to the composition had evidently already been carried out.

Following numerous tests, it was established that the most favourable method for meticulously removing the layer of overpainting was to use a fine scalpel under a microscope. Only in this way is it possible to retain the layers of binding agent between the original paint layer and the paint used for the overpainting. This layer may well be the last existing original varnish layer applied by Vermeer.

The later overpainting of the Cupid was undoubtedly due to altered tastes and not to any damage to the paint layer, such as the small areas of abrasion and the scratch above the boy’s right arm, which have now been exposed again.

The restoration is taking place in the paintings conservation department at the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden and is being performed by paintings conservator Dr. Christoph Schölzel. Trecho de texto da Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister.

Nota do blog 1: A imagem 1 é a versão antiga da pintura. Em 2021, ela sofreu um processo de restauro, onde foi descoberta uma alteração não feita pelo artista. A imagem 2 é a atual da pintura.

Nota do blog 2: Normalmente, prefiro sempre a versão original. Mas, neste caso, concordo com a alteração feita posteriormente por um pintor anônimo. Ficou, na minha visão, melhor que o original de Vermeer.

Nota do blog 3: Data e autoria não obtidas.