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Vermeer Restoration Reveals a Painting Within a Painting

114 points by wartijn_ 5y ago

psychstudio 5y ago
As an aside, if you're curious about how you might be able to paint with such photorealism, be sure to check out "Tim's Vermeer".
- vessel 5y ago
  It's a 2013 documentary: https://m.imdb.com/title/tt3089388/ https://m.imdb.com/title/tt3089388/
  - rurban 5y ago
    Highly recommended. I still have to visit this new Vermeer restauration, probably today.
    - pbhjpbhj 5y ago
      Sorry to be that guy... restaurant (a place to eat) use that form which comes from Latin via French (food that restores you, and so a place for eating that food). For some reason the English version became 'restore' (to renew, repair, make good again) and so we use 'restoration'. Makes little sense to me.
- savant_penguin 5y ago
  It's an amazing movie produced by penn and teller
- nbzso 5y ago
  As an traditionally educated artist I can assure you, that even with the help of Camera obscura or other "invention", the level of composition, precise, confident brushstrokes and craftsmanship of Vermeer are of the charts. For the trained eye this is obvious. If you don't have the knowledge of anatomy, composition and color you will just make unconvincing value transfer. Yes, you can fool a lot of people, Youtube is full with "photo-realistic" amateur painters. The idea that Vermeer is not properly trained and his paintings are just mechanical transfer done because of the technology is naive. Technology in the hands of the master can create transcendental work. In the hands of the amateurs technology produces amusement for the masses. In the documentary you can see the frustration of the process, when done only in transfer mode, without the needed knowledge and craftsmanship. I laughed loud when they showed the closeups with chaotic brushstrokes and clear absence of mixing between the layers of paint.
  - flyingcircus3 5y ago
    Whats interesting about this entire theory is that so many people involved in the art world have a vested interest in disproving/disparaging the idea. The closer art gets to paint by numbers, or an otherwise mechanical process, like a very large set of pixels, the less impressive, and therefore less valuable the art becomes. And who wants that? But Tim's Vermeer makes extremely some compelling arguments about how certain features present in The Music Lesson would be impossible to recreate by eyesight alone, yet were trivial using the optical device. Finally, if the painting is photorealistic, and the actual room was arranged like it is in the painting, isn't composition at least partially a property of the room itself?
    - atoav 5y ago
      Photographic composition consists of: - the room, subjects placement - how they are lit - camera position and angle - focal length (strengthens or flattens the perspective effect depending on the room) - other optical effects (depth of field, long time exposure, bokeh, flares, ...) The last point probably wasn't relevant for Vermeer, but if he would have used a Camera Obscura, getting all the former points correct on a way that produces a compelling image is not easy. I could also imagine that he used a camera obscura to study and understand perspective and light, but painted without it, simply because that seems a little bit more practical.
    - nbzso 5y ago
      Compelling argument for what? It is not impossible to recreate by eyesight, it requires more time. To accomplish this level of realism geometrically, you create a perfect perspective grid and place what you see in it. To accomplish this level of tonal representation you patiently compare the values from the scene with values from your palette/canvas. It is classical painting craftsmanship, lost in the collective mind in post-modernistic world without need of art culture and knowledge. Using an optical device gives more time to concentrate on composition,execution and emotional message, that is the real point that becomes clear in the end of the movie.
  - chemmail 5y ago
    Any technique, Tech you could say, is just a tool. In the right hands you can be a master. In the wrong hands any tool, no matter how amazing, will be disastrous.
david927 5y ago
Is it just me, or was it a better composition with the empty wall? It's clear that it was there to lend an indication as to the contents of the letter -- but for me, I liked it better when it was less cluttered and more ambiguous.
- hellbannedguy 5y ago
  I don't think they should have messed with it. (I do look at it differently since watching Tim's Vermeer though. I wonder if the conservators looked at the painting a bit differently after seeing the documentary? Like hay, "Maybe it's not the masterpiece we thought?")
  - sixQuarks 5y ago
    On the contrary, it was a masterpiece in creativity
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ChuckMcM 5y ago
It would be nice if the old/new comparison slider was more accurately registered so that you weren't switching between two different points of view[1] One wonders if some sort of Elizabethan censorship was done on the painting. I agree with the article that Cupid adds the context to the painting that it was missing before. [1] Its subtle yes, but look at the edges of the window (they don't line up between new/old, the paper in her hand, same issue, Etc.
- carbocation 5y ago
  Agreed re: co-registration. To me it was most noticeable at the top, with the bath curtain bar.
  - Ballas 5y ago
    It looks like the aspect ratio is different. Top and bottom is further apart in the one image than in the other.
    - woko 5y ago
      Yes, it is very obvious if you look at the face: the width is the same before/after, but the height is different (smaller before than after).
kasey_junk 5y ago
I’m curious about the professional ethics of this. If they couldn’t know until after they uncovered it that it wasn’t covered by Vermeer how did they know they weren’t destroying the artist’s composition? If they didn’t know that how did they make the determination to do it?
- arketyp 5y ago
  Lab tests could show the cover up was added later than the rest of the paint.
- thewakalix 5y ago
  In the article linked in the article[0]: > In light of the many indications that supported the idea that the overpainting had been carried out by a hand other than Vermeer’s, the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, supported by the expert commission, decided early in 2018 to remove the layer of overpaint. [0] https://www.skd.museum/en/besucherservice/press/2019/a-new-vermeer-in-dresden/ https://www.skd.museum/en/besucherservice/press/2019/a-new-v...
  - Igelau 5y ago
    > In light of the many indications Such as? They are maddeningly vague about the details. They're not really telling us anything.
    - akiselev 5y ago
      > During a restoration and research project that began in 2017 and was supported by a panel of international experts, the team made or re-evaluated X-rays, infrared reflectance spectroscopies and microscopies of the oil painting in the past few years. The backing canvas was also analyzed in detail and research was conducted into the painting’s restoration history. Multiple color samples were taken from Vermeer’s painting and the layers and consistency were analyzed in Dresden Academy of Fine Arts’ Laboratory of Archaeometry (HfBK). These studies played a decisive role in reassessing the extensive overpainting of the Cupid figure in the Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window. We can now safely state that it was not Vermeer himself who painted over the background, and that the retrospective change was applied at least several decades after the painting was made, and significantly after the artist’s death. A full-surface X-ray fluorescence scan of the painting, conducted with the support of the Rijksmuseum in 2017, confirmed our new findings on the overpainting. http://www.essentialvermeer.com/cat_about/open.html http://www.essentialvermeer.com/cat_about/open.html
JohnJamesRambo 5y ago
Wow this isn’t some obscure Vermeer; this is huge. It changes the painting entirely. I’m not sure for the better for my tastes, but the colors are glorious.
wly_cdgr 5y ago
An interesting case where a faithful and expert restoration has cheapened and tarnished what seemed to be a truly great paiting Would be delighted if it turned out that Vermeer used less durable pigments for this part of the painting on purpose. How sneaky and clever that would have been
- wly_cdgr 5y ago
  Y'all have absolute trash taste on this board for this to be downvoted
antognini 5y ago
It is amazing how the effects of age end up coloring our interpretation of art. The faded colors and lines of old pieces seem to lend an air of gravitas. When we see the paintings restored to their original colors, it can often feel like some of that gravitas has been removed and the colors become garish and the shapes cartoonlike. After the restoration of the Sistine Chapel, a number of art historians were shocked at the results. Many had assumed that the darkened, muted palette they were used to was intentional. (A few examples: [1] [2]) The restoration of the Ghent altarpiece by Jan van Eyck changed the lamb at the center of the piece in a way that lots of people have found... bizarre and slightly disturbing [3]. And the strangest example is probably Greek architecture and statuary, which we today consider to be the height of dignity and gravitas, but were originally brightly painted. [4] But if we were to paint the Parthanon bright primary colors like the Googleplex, would we be recovering something or losing something? It feels like a bit of both. [1]: https://external-preview.redd.it/I4wkSd0S_hGySQbGLAtITMMPJq-wk0uQxvjPyPvMUyc.jpg?auto=webp&s=6f38acb4783d662ceab79ee8b5846a621262080f https://external-preview.redd.it/I4wkSd0S_hGySQbGLAtITMMPJq-... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gardenbeforeandafter.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gardenbeforeandafter.jpg [3]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51205614 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51205614 [4]: https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20180119-when-the-parthenon-had-dazzling-colours https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20180119-when-the-parthe...
- chemmail 5y ago
  Prob the best example is actually the Mona Lisa. A duplicate made at the same time, probably by a pupil, was discovered and shows how truly amazing the Mona Lisa could have been. The cloth actually looks translucent in the painting and the colors vibrant and cheerful. https://www.npr.org/2012/02/02/146288063/painting-sheds-new-light-on-the-mona-lisa https://www.npr.org/2012/02/02/146288063/painting-sheds-new-...
  - toyg 5y ago
    The BBC has a show called The Repair Shop, where people submit their old wares and heirlooms to be restored by specialist artisans. In most episodes there are paintings involved, and the first thing the specialist restorer does is to strip away layers of old varnish. The results are typically spectacular: colours become vibrant again, right off the bat, completely changing the mood of the composition. I’m sure there is a Louvre team dedicated to maintaining Mona Lisa so this will sound like an idiot request, but: maybe it’s time to do something like that for the old girl…?
dgan 5y ago
Wow looks amazing. Painting looks much less empty
woko 5y ago
If you look closely at the painting before restoration, you can see with your naked eye the rectangular dark frame of the Cupid painting.
apples_oranges 5y ago
I like Vermeer but I think the painting looks better without the painting in the painting

114 points by wartijn_ 5y ago

As an aside, if you're curious about how you might be able to paint with such photorealism, be sure to check out "Tim's Vermeer".

vessel 5y ago
It's a 2013 documentary: https://m.imdb.com/title/tt3089388/ https://m.imdb.com/title/tt3089388/
- rurban 5y ago
  Highly recommended. I still have to visit this new Vermeer restauration, probably today.
  - pbhjpbhj 5y ago
    Sorry to be that guy... restaurant (a place to eat) use that form which comes from Latin via French (food that restores you, and so a place for eating that food). For some reason the English version became 'restore' (to renew, repair, make good again) and so we use 'restoration'. Makes little sense to me.
savant_penguin 5y ago
It's an amazing movie produced by penn and teller
nbzso 5y ago
As an traditionally educated artist I can assure you, that even with the help of Camera obscura or other "invention", the level of composition, precise, confident brushstrokes and craftsmanship of Vermeer are of the charts. For the trained eye this is obvious. If you don't have the knowledge of anatomy, composition and color you will just make unconvincing value transfer. Yes, you can fool a lot of people, Youtube is full with "photo-realistic" amateur painters. The idea that Vermeer is not properly trained and his paintings are just mechanical transfer done because of the technology is naive. Technology in the hands of the master can create transcendental work. In the hands of the amateurs technology produces amusement for the masses. In the documentary you can see the frustration of the process, when done only in transfer mode, without the needed knowledge and craftsmanship. I laughed loud when they showed the closeups with chaotic brushstrokes and clear absence of mixing between the layers of paint.
- flyingcircus3 5y ago
  Whats interesting about this entire theory is that so many people involved in the art world have a vested interest in disproving/disparaging the idea. The closer art gets to paint by numbers, or an otherwise mechanical process, like a very large set of pixels, the less impressive, and therefore less valuable the art becomes. And who wants that? But Tim's Vermeer makes extremely some compelling arguments about how certain features present in The Music Lesson would be impossible to recreate by eyesight alone, yet were trivial using the optical device. Finally, if the painting is photorealistic, and the actual room was arranged like it is in the painting, isn't composition at least partially a property of the room itself?
  - atoav 5y ago
    Photographic composition consists of: - the room, subjects placement - how they are lit - camera position and angle - focal length (strengthens or flattens the perspective effect depending on the room) - other optical effects (depth of field, long time exposure, bokeh, flares, ...) The last point probably wasn't relevant for Vermeer, but if he would have used a Camera Obscura, getting all the former points correct on a way that produces a compelling image is not easy. I could also imagine that he used a camera obscura to study and understand perspective and light, but painted without it, simply because that seems a little bit more practical.
  - nbzso 5y ago
    Compelling argument for what? It is not impossible to recreate by eyesight, it requires more time. To accomplish this level of realism geometrically, you create a perfect perspective grid and place what you see in it. To accomplish this level of tonal representation you patiently compare the values from the scene with values from your palette/canvas. It is classical painting craftsmanship, lost in the collective mind in post-modernistic world without need of art culture and knowledge. Using an optical device gives more time to concentrate on composition,execution and emotional message, that is the real point that becomes clear in the end of the movie.
- chemmail 5y ago
  Any technique, Tech you could say, is just a tool. In the right hands you can be a master. In the wrong hands any tool, no matter how amazing, will be disastrous.

david927 5y ago

Is it just me, or was it a better composition with the empty wall? It's clear that it was there to lend an indication as to the contents of the letter -- but for me, I liked it better when it was less cluttered and more ambiguous.

hellbannedguy 5y ago
I don't think they should have messed with it. (I do look at it differently since watching Tim's Vermeer though. I wonder if the conservators looked at the painting a bit differently after seeing the documentary? Like hay, "Maybe it's not the masterpiece we thought?")
- sixQuarks 5y ago
  On the contrary, it was a masterpiece in creativity

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

ChuckMcM 5y ago

It would be nice if the old/new comparison slider was more accurately registered so that you weren't switching between two different points of view[1] One wonders if some sort of Elizabethan censorship was done on the painting. I agree with the article that Cupid adds the context to the painting that it was missing before. [1] Its subtle yes, but look at the edges of the window (they don't line up between new/old, the paper in her hand, same issue, Etc.

carbocation 5y ago
Agreed re: co-registration. To me it was most noticeable at the top, with the bath curtain bar.
- Ballas 5y ago
  It looks like the aspect ratio is different. Top and bottom is further apart in the one image than in the other.
  - woko 5y ago
    Yes, it is very obvious if you look at the face: the width is the same before/after, but the height is different (smaller before than after).

kasey_junk 5y ago

I’m curious about the professional ethics of this. If they couldn’t know until after they uncovered it that it wasn’t covered by Vermeer how did they know they weren’t destroying the artist’s composition? If they didn’t know that how did they make the determination to do it?

arketyp 5y ago
Lab tests could show the cover up was added later than the rest of the paint.
thewakalix 5y ago
In the article linked in the article[0]: > In light of the many indications that supported the idea that the overpainting had been carried out by a hand other than Vermeer’s, the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, supported by the expert commission, decided early in 2018 to remove the layer of overpaint. [0] https://www.skd.museum/en/besucherservice/press/2019/a-new-vermeer-in-dresden/ https://www.skd.museum/en/besucherservice/press/2019/a-new-v...
- Igelau 5y ago
  > In light of the many indications Such as? They are maddeningly vague about the details. They're not really telling us anything.
  - akiselev 5y ago
    > During a restoration and research project that began in 2017 and was supported by a panel of international experts, the team made or re-evaluated X-rays, infrared reflectance spectroscopies and microscopies of the oil painting in the past few years. The backing canvas was also analyzed in detail and research was conducted into the painting’s restoration history. Multiple color samples were taken from Vermeer’s painting and the layers and consistency were analyzed in Dresden Academy of Fine Arts’ Laboratory of Archaeometry (HfBK). These studies played a decisive role in reassessing the extensive overpainting of the Cupid figure in the Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window. We can now safely state that it was not Vermeer himself who painted over the background, and that the retrospective change was applied at least several decades after the painting was made, and significantly after the artist’s death. A full-surface X-ray fluorescence scan of the painting, conducted with the support of the Rijksmuseum in 2017, confirmed our new findings on the overpainting. http://www.essentialvermeer.com/cat_about/open.html http://www.essentialvermeer.com/cat_about/open.html

JohnJamesRambo 5y ago

Wow this isn’t some obscure Vermeer; this is huge. It changes the painting entirely. I’m not sure for the better for my tastes, but the colors are glorious.

wly_cdgr 5y ago

An interesting case where a faithful and expert restoration has cheapened and tarnished what seemed to be a truly great paiting Would be delighted if it turned out that Vermeer used less durable pigments for this part of the painting on purpose. How sneaky and clever that would have been

wly_cdgr 5y ago
Y'all have absolute trash taste on this board for this to be downvoted

antognini 5y ago

It is amazing how the effects of age end up coloring our interpretation of art. The faded colors and lines of old pieces seem to lend an air of gravitas. When we see the paintings restored to their original colors, it can often feel like some of that gravitas has been removed and the colors become garish and the shapes cartoonlike. After the restoration of the Sistine Chapel, a number of art historians were shocked at the results. Many had assumed that the darkened, muted palette they were used to was intentional. (A few examples: [1] [2]) The restoration of the Ghent altarpiece by Jan van Eyck changed the lamb at the center of the piece in a way that lots of people have found... bizarre and slightly disturbing [3]. And the strangest example is probably Greek architecture and statuary, which we today consider to be the height of dignity and gravitas, but were originally brightly painted. [4] But if we were to paint the Parthanon bright primary colors like the Googleplex, would we be recovering something or losing something? It feels like a bit of both. [1]: https://external-preview.redd.it/I4wkSd0S_hGySQbGLAtITMMPJq-wk0uQxvjPyPvMUyc.jpg?auto=webp&s=6f38acb4783d662ceab79ee8b5846a621262080f https://external-preview.redd.it/I4wkSd0S_hGySQbGLAtITMMPJq-... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gardenbeforeandafter.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gardenbeforeandafter.jpg [3]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51205614 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51205614 [4]: https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20180119-when-the-parthenon-had-dazzling-colours https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20180119-when-the-parthe...

chemmail 5y ago
Prob the best example is actually the Mona Lisa. A duplicate made at the same time, probably by a pupil, was discovered and shows how truly amazing the Mona Lisa could have been. The cloth actually looks translucent in the painting and the colors vibrant and cheerful. https://www.npr.org/2012/02/02/146288063/painting-sheds-new-light-on-the-mona-lisa https://www.npr.org/2012/02/02/146288063/painting-sheds-new-...
- toyg 5y ago
  The BBC has a show called The Repair Shop, where people submit their old wares and heirlooms to be restored by specialist artisans. In most episodes there are paintings involved, and the first thing the specialist restorer does is to strip away layers of old varnish. The results are typically spectacular: colours become vibrant again, right off the bat, completely changing the mood of the composition. I’m sure there is a Louvre team dedicated to maintaining Mona Lisa so this will sound like an idiot request, but: maybe it’s time to do something like that for the old girl…?

dgan 5y ago

Wow looks amazing. Painting looks much less empty

woko 5y ago

If you look closely at the painting before restoration, you can see with your naked eye the rectangular dark frame of the Cupid painting.

apples_oranges 5y ago

I like Vermeer but I think the painting looks better without the painting in the painting