THE GEOGRAPHER

 

These are the comments from last year student Shaila Olmos about the painting: 

The Geographer

      Very much like the geographer we find in this marvellous painting, it seems that Vermeer was a very patient and attentive painter and a rather contemplative observer. Many of his works show his mastery making especial a simple and silent moment, apart from revealing those deep qualities of such moments.

 

       At first sight, it may seem that the geographer is just a man who studies the Earth but if we examine the canvas carefully, we will realize that he is an expert in navigation and topography, a man who is aware of vast distances, aware of the heights of mountains and the endless of oceans. He does not just deal with the territory but also with maps, carefully constructed images of the world.

 

            We might think that he has been travelling around the world; therefore, he is a man of deep knowledge that after having experienced different situations and discovered new sides of the world, now, he knows every corner of the Earth without leaving his chamber. He is there, in his room deeply concentrated in his thoughts and problems, which are represented in his notebooks, at the same time he shows how skilful he is with his nautical charts and maps, with his dividers. It is not only an intellectual activity but also a manual one.

 

          Behind this man of deep, deep knowledge, there is an orderly world of cartographic objects — rectangles, a globe, shadows projected by sturdy furniture — and before him, is a rumpled rug, curled maps, one of which has fallen to the floor. He is trying to create order from a kind of disorder. The globe, the books on top of the cupboard and the map on the wall and floor are part of other men’s knowledge, which our geographer uses in his own inquiries. He is up there in his studio, charting, measuring, counting, categorizing, naming, recording etc.

 

            He is looking towards the window. However, he is not disturbed by something he sees outside. His facial expression and his posture indicate that he has just arrived at some important insight following a phase of concentrated contemplation.

 

The light comes in trough the window hitting different surfaces in the room. This flow coming from left to right brings alive the canvas. It is a place so full of rich textures and colours that it almost seems luxurious. It is his sacred place where he can work on his discoveries and be completely absorbed in his thoughts about the world. Look at the shine on the window and the globe. Look at the blue, yellow, and red pigments which despite of being many dark shadows, help creating a warm, bright atmosphere, help creating a prefect studio for our geographer. Therefore, The Geographer harmonizes space, colour, and light to convey a single human activity, a unified moment in time.

 

           He is dressed comfortably and informally, with his long hair pulled behind one ear. His youth is the reflections of what is still for discover, it is the light of discovery, the light of knowledge.

             Finally, we have to take into account that the seventeenth century was a time of discovery, when the charting of new and unexplored worlds was a dream realized not only by adventurers and traders but also by geographers and astronomers. So, may he be thinking about a discovery of utter importance? Is he maybe putting down his discovery on paper, so that other ingenious men might be informed?

            Well, considering this, imagine that with his skill, endless curiosity and open mind this man succeeded in making some of the most important discoveries of the history of geography. Imagine that he left everything behind him: country, family, friends, life itself; to adventure into the unknown. May be  after a long and zig-zag voyage, our man arrived to a land full of precious stones and all kinds of plants and fauna. Imagine that he could percieved the temperance and softness of the air, the clearness of the sky, and the fragrances sent forth from the unknown forests of that new land.

 

          Our geographer was delighted with the purity and suavity of the atmosphere, the crystal transparency of the sea, and the extraordinary beauty of the vegetation. He also enjoyed the beauty of the unknown kinds of fruits upon the trees that overhung the shores.  Suppose that it was like a lost paradise where he could look at animal and plant tissues, at mineral crystals and at fossils. Suppose that he had all the time in the world to enjoy all the precious things of that new landscape.

 

            Finally, imagine that after months of deep research he came back. As we see in the canvas one day in his chamber while making a reflection of everything he had seen, he decided to share his researches, he wanted them to widely circulate all over the world.

           

            These are just suppositions that have come out from our imagination. However, who knows if the model of this magnificent painting experienced an adventure similar to this?

Vermeer’s Palette

The number of pigments available to the 17th c. Dutch painter were few indeed when compared to those available to the modern artist. While the current catalogue of one of the most respected color producers (Rembrandt) displays more than a hundred pigments, less than 20 pigments have been detected in Vermeer’s oeuvre. Of these few pigments only ten seemed to have been used in a more or less systematic way. In Vermeer’s time, each pigment was different in regards to permanence, workability, drying time, and means of production. Moreover, many pigments were not mutually compatible and had to be used separately. The following study examines the history and origin of each pigment and how they were employed by Vermeer and his contemporaries as well as essential aspects of the artist’s palette.

All Known Vermeer’s Pigments

azurite, carmine, charcoal black, green earth, indigo, ivory black, lead white, lead-tin yellow, madder lake, red ocher, smalt, ultramarine, umber, weld, verdigris, vermillion  and yellow ocher.

It is extrremely unlikely that Vermeer had on his palette in any given work session all the pigments that were available to him. Painters were known to use specific palettes set out each day according the passage to be painted. The wooden palette to the left represents the seven principle pigments which Vermeer commonly employed; 1. white lead, 2. yellow ochre, 3. vermillion, 4. red madder, 5, green earth, 6. raw umber and 7. ivory balck.

 

http://www.essentialvermeer.com/palette/palette_vermeer’_palette.html

Vermeer’s Signatures

Of the thirty-four generally accepted Vermeer’s twenty-one bear legible signatures (the one on Diana and Her Companions has worn away–see below) and not all are not considered genuine. Three historical documents conserve his full signature; one is also signed by the artist’s wife, Catharina Bolnes.

The signatures of Johannes Vermeer and his wife Catharina Bolnes (right) on a deed of 30 November 1655, two years after their marriage, constitute the one the few physical, and we might add, touching testimonies of the couple’s union which bore Vermeer eleven children in all. Even if one does not agree with the premises of modern graphological analysis, it is difficult not to notice the striking differences between the two hands. The rather measured uprightness of Vermeer’s style contrasts with the sensual freedom of his wife’s.

Here you can see some of the signatures he used:

 

http://www.essentialvermeer.com/signitures.html

Catharina and Johannes: Did Vermeer Ever Paint his Wife Catharina?

id Vermeer ever paint his wife Catharina Bolnes? Were his sitters professional models, friends or relatives? Although no evidence survives that would connect any Vermeer’s sitters to known individuals, the artist’s style of living and working habits suggests he may have used his wife, daughters, even a maid to pose for some of his paintings. Gerrit ter Borch, a fellow Dutch artist whose discreet genre interiors probably inspired some of Vermeer’s own compositions, frequently employed members of his own family as models, in particular his step-sister Gesina. Alejandro Vergara, who curated the Vermeer and the Dutch Interior exhibition (2003, Madrid) feels that “the tenderness with which Ter Borch portrays this woman on numerous occasions indicates his fondness for her.” From a practical point of view, not having to pay models for long hours of posing may have represented a significant economic advantage.

Critics have dedicated only passing comments about the identity of Vermeer’s sitters. Other than the lack of historical evidence, the scarcity of in-depth inquiry in regards may be due to the fact that it is generally believed that Vermeer’s interiors are not biographical statements: that is, they are not portraits. Consequentially, the eventual individual identity of the sitters is of little importance to our understanding of Vermeer’s art since it was irrelevant to Vermeer’s artistic intentions.

In any case, critics have seen Catharina’s likeness in one painting or another. The most frequent candidates are the Girl Reading a Letter by an Open Window,  Woman in Blue Reading a Letter, and Woman Holding a Balance (see images below). She has the same high brow, straight nose and wide-spaced eyes and also appears to be pregnant in two of the pictures. In less than two decades, Catharina is know to have bore Johannes 15 children, a few of which did not survive infancy. However, modern scholarship has not come to agreement to the fact that these, or any other women in Vermeer’s paintings, were portrayed while they were carrying children. (see Were Some of the Women in Vermeer’s Paintings Pregnant?) Pregnant women were probably not considered beautiful from a an esthetic point of view and pregnant women in Dutch 17th c. painting occur only rarely. Would Vermeer, who seemed entirely content to work within the established framework of contemporary themes and compositions, have addressed such an unconventional  theme such as that of a pregnant women?

Another candidate is the young woman dressed in the characteristic lemon yellow morning  jacket who looks out directly at the viewer from A Lady Writing. It has been noted that the painting, more than others, “possesses a singularity and mood that points to it being a portrait.”¹ Arthur Wheelock, in the Johannes Vermeer catalogue, wrote: “The problem of identifying the sitter, however, seems insurmountable. The most likely candidate is that she is his wife, Catharina Bolnes, who, having been born in 1631, would have been in her early-to-mid thirties when Vermeer painted the work. While it is difficult to judge the age of models in painting, such an age does seem appropriate for this figure. Little else, however, confirms this hypothesis.”

 

Woman Holding a Balance

Woman in Blue reading a Letter.

Woman reading a letter by an open window

Catharina Bolnes and Johannes Vermeer

Even though we know nothing of Catharina’s character,  we do some facts about her childhood, her troubled family life and her marriage with Vermeer which have been gathered from documents drawn up by contemporary notaries. Recently, the novel and film Girl with a Pearl Earring has portrayed Catharina in an very unpleasant light. She is characterized as a jealous, selfish, superficial and spoiled young woman. Perhaps worse, she is sadly incapable of understanding her husband’s art to the point that she attempts to destroy one of her husband’s finest paintings in a hysterical fit of envy. However, in a recent interview Arthur Wheelock, curator of Northern Baroque Painting of the National Gallery, organizer of the historic 1995/1996 Vermeer exhibition as well as author of important publications on the Delft master has noted: “the film was quite beautiful, but I had a hard time with the characterization of Mrs. Vermeer. She was portrayed as a very unpleasant individual. And there’s nothing at all remotely to suggest that in what we know about her. She was a model for a lot of his work. I don’t think the picture is fair to her memory.” (to read Mr. Wheelock’s interview, click here). ²

Writer and London Times columnist Simon Jenkins has penned a strongly critical article entitled Johannes Vermeer, you’ve been framed (to read Jenkin’s article, click here) in which he attempts to picked apart the premise of the novel and film. Jenkins is extremely unsatisfied with both the portrayal of Vermeer and his wife as well as with the idea that Griet, the author’s fictitious young maid, had posed for Vermeer’s masterwork Girl with a Pearl Earring. He argues that the negative images of Catharina and Johannes Vermeer “are doomed to be forever fixed in the public imagination as the ‘true’ Vermeer.” According to Jenkins that is wholly at odds with all that scholars have gleaned of Vermeer’s home life…” and that “there is not a shred of evidence that Johannes and Catharina were unhappily married.” Jenkins is convinced that Vermeer’s youngest daughter, Maria, posed for the Mauritshuis masterpiece.

In effect, even though there is no historical evidence that speak directly of the nature of Vermeer’s relationship with his wife, surviving archival documents would on the contrary seem to suggest that Johannes and Catharina had been a reasonably good, if not finely matched couple. The had 15 children (some of them did not survive infancy) a rare occurrence in 17th c. Netherlands where most couples had only two or three children. While the burden of so many children may have certainly made itself felt, their choice to have an unusually large family must have been taken mutually since other couples who desired so evidently managed to keep their families within limits. Simon Schama³ has shown family planning was avidly practiced by the 17th-century Dutch, Catholics included. When questioning himself on the singularity of Vermeer’s marriage to Catharina, John Michael Montias, in his seminal study of Vermeer’s extended family Vermeer and His Milieu, suggests that it was love which attracted the two and goes on to note that “  ‘ Romantic love ‘ was not unknown in mid-seventeenth century Holland. Indeed, it was thought to be a source of artistic aspiration.”

If  the public were to come to believe that the portrayal of Catharina as an antagonist to her husband’s life and work was accurate, a deep injustice will have been dealt to both of their memories. Unfortunately, archival documents indicate quite clearly that Catharina had suffered a great deal before her marriage and after the death of Johannes. Her childhood memories were “full of violence, fits of temper and tears. Her father, after 13 years of  being married, had become an ogre. Maria’s (Catharina’s mother) relatives and neighbors were to testify that they saw him insulting his wife, kicking her, pulling her naked from her bed by her hair when she was sick, attacking her with a stick when she was pregnant, and chasing her out of the house. On one occasion, Catharina aged nine, ran to some neighbors in fright, yelling that her father was about to kill her sister Cornelia.”³

After childhood, her tragedy did not end. Johannes died leaving her an enormous debt and numerous children to care for with no one to help except for her mother Maria Thins. Notary documents offer us another glimpse into her hardships as she later struggled desperately to keep her husband’s masterpiece, The Art of Painting and another work, from the hands of her creditors. One would at least suspect that she had acted so because of her love of her husband and her pride in his work. Perhaps the brief years with Johannes were the most happy ones.

http://www.essentialvermeer.com/women’s_faces/catharina.html

A Chronology of Vermeer’s Life

The number of surviving documents which regard Vermeer, his art and his family are very few indeed. Although historians have only recently determined a bit more clearly Vermeer’s artistic stature within his society, very little is known of his immediate family and almost nothing of Vermeer the man. The following is an outline of Vermeer’s brief personal and civic life.

1591 Vermeer’s father Reynier Jansz. (c. 1591-1652) was born on Beestenmarkt number 14 in a house called Nassau. His parents were the tailor Jan Reyersz. who had moved from Flanders to Delft by 1597 and Cornelia (alias Neeltge Goris, who died 1627). Neeltge Goris was active as “uijtdraegster” or second hand goods dealer, liquidating estates of deceased people. Reynier’s interest in dealing in second hand paintings may have been encouraged by his mother’s activity since paintings were often part of estates.

1615 Vermeer’s father, then a silk weaver, marries Digna Baltens (d.1670) in Amsterdam.

1620 The couple baptizes, Geertruijt, their first child.

c. 1627-1630 Reynier Janz. – who since 1652 called himself Vos – rents an inn on the Voldersgracht in Delft called “The Flying Fox” (De Vliegnde Vos). The reason for the change of name is unknown.

1631 Reynier Janz. Vos becomes a member of the Saint Luke’s Guild as a “Master Art Dealer.” This title allows him to buy and sell paintings.

1632 Baptism of Johannes Vermeer as “Joannis” in the Nieuwe Kerk on October 31, Johannes becomes Reynier’s second son.

1640 Reynier signs himself in a deposition as “Vermeer,” again, the reason for the change in name is uncertain.

1641 Reynier Janz. Vos buys the house and inn called “Mechelen” on the Grote Markt, in Delft.

1652 On October 12 Reynier Janz. Vos is buried in Delft.

1653 April 5, Johannes Vermeer registers his intentions to marry Catharina Bolnes, the youngest daughter of Maria Thins and Reynier Bolnes. The night before, the well-known Delft painter Leonard Bramer and a Captain Melling state that Maria Thins has refused to give her consent in writing but states that “she would suffer the (marriage) banns be published and would tolerate it.”

April 20, Johannes Vermeer and Catharina Bolnes get married in Schipluiden, a small village south of Delft.

April 22, Vermeer and the painter Gerard Terborch sign a document in Delft.

December 29, Vermeer is registered as a member of the Saint Luke’s Guild.

1655 December 14, Vermeer and his wife sign a document.

1656 Vermeer pays the remaining sum of the master’s fee in the Saint Luke’s Guild. Vermeer signs one of his first known paintings, The Procuress.

1657 Maria Thins, in the first draft of her testament, leaves to Vermeer’s daughters jewels and the sum of three hundred guilders to Vermeer and Catharina.

Vermeer borrows the sum of two hundred guilders from Pieter Claesz. van Ruijven, a wealthy Delft citizen who may have purchased more than twenty of Vermeer’s works.

1660 Vermeer and his wife bury a child in the Oude Kerk. The same document states that at the same time, Vermeer and his wife were living in the house of Maria Thins on the Oude Langendijk in Delft.

1662 Vermeer is appointed one of the headmen of the Saint Luke’s Guild. This fact has been interpreted as a testimony of the high esteem in which the artist was held at the time. However, when Vermeer was elected headmaster, many of the painters resident in Delft had left for the more prosperous Amsterdam and so his election may have had less significance than has usually been thought.

1663 A French diplomat and art connoisseur, Balthasar de Monconys, visits Vermeer in Delft, in his diary he notes that he was unable to see any paintings there and had to visit the house of a baker, where he saw a painting with a single figure. De Monconys remarked that the price paid was far too high.

1664 In a death inventory of the English sculptor, Jean Larson, who lives in the Hague, is listed “a head by Vermeer.”

1665 Pieter van Ruijven and his wife Maria Knuijt leave five hundred guilders to Vermeer in their last will and testament. This kind of a bequest is very unusual and testifies a close relationship between Vermeer and Van Ruijven.

1667 Vermeer’s name is mentioned in Dirck van Bleyswijck’s Description of the City of Delft as the successor of the deceased Carl Fabritius.

Maria Thins empowers Vermeer to collect various debts owed to her and to reinvest the money according to his will and discretion.

Another of Vermeer’s children is buried in the Nieuwe Kerk in Delft.

1668 Vermeer probably paints the Astronomer.

1669 Vermeer probably paints the Geographer.

Vermeer’s mother leases the inn Mechelen to a shoemaker for three years.

Pieter Teding van Berckhout, who was from an important family in the Hague, visits
Vermeer twice and enters in his diaries his impressions.

Vermeer and his wife bury another child in the Oude Kerk.

1670 Vermeer is appointed for a second time headman of the Saint Luke’s Guild.

Vermeer’s mother is buried in the Nieuwe Kerk in Delft, February 13.

Geertruijt Reynier Vermeer, Vermeer’s sister, is buried in the Nieuwe Kerk in Delft.

Vermeer inherits Mechelen from his mother, July 13.

1672 Vermeer leases Mechelen to an apothecary for six years.

Vermeer travels with two other headmen to the Hague in order to appraise a collection of disputed Italian paintings. They testify before a notary that the works are “great pieces of rubbish and bad paintings.”

1673 Another child of Vermeer’s is buried in the family grave in the Oude Kerk.

1674 Vermeer’s name appears on the register of the Delft militia.

1675 Vermeer borrows one thousand guilders from an Amsterdam merchant.

Maria Thins empowers Vermeer to collect and administer money owed to her son.

Vermeer is buried in the Oude Kerk, 16 December. He leaves an impoverished widow and eleven children, ten of whom are still minors.

1676 An inventory of movable objects from Vermeer’s estate is compiled.

Anthonie Leeuwenhoek, inventor of the microscope and famous scientist from Delft, is appointed executor of Vermeer’s estate.

Catharina Bolnes petitions the high court of Holland and Zeeland to issue letters of cession to her creditors taking into account her disastrous financial condition brought on by the war with France. Her request is granted.

1677 2 and 5 February Leeuwenhoek appears before the Lords Aldermen of Delft to settle Vermeer’s debt with Jannetje Stevens, who then transfers back to Vermeer’ estate twenty-six paintings in the possession of Jan Coelenbier. A public sale of the paintings is planned.

Maria Thins notifies that The Art of Painting (‘ de Schilderconst’ ) was transferred to her by her daughter and that the painting should not be included in the sale of Vermeer’s estate in the Guild Hall of Saint Luke.

Leeuwenhoek denies the legality of the transfer.

The sale of the paintings takes place in the Guild Hall, March 15.

1680 27 December, Maria Thins is buried and her daughter Catharina Bolnes inherits her possessions.

1687 Catherina died in Delft during a visit to her daughter Maria Vermeer and Johannes Cramer at their house the Blue Hand on Verwersdijk. She was given her Last Sacraments on December 30 and is buried three days later.Her relatives could afford to pay twelve pallbearers. She had still five children under 25 who were still unmarried.

http://www.essentialvermeer.com/chronology.html

The Geographer

This article belongs to Shaila Olmos.

This painting has been choosen by Shaila Olmos for The English for specific purposes subject.

The Geographer

Very much like the geographer we find in this marvellous painting, it seems that Vermeer was a very patient and attentive painter and a rather contemplative observer. Many of his works show his mastery making especial a simple and silent moment, apart from revealing those deep qualities of such moments.

 

At first sight, it may seem that the geographer is just a man who studies the Earth but if we examine the canvas carefully, we will realize that he is an expert in navigation and topography, a man who is aware of vast distances, aware of the heights of mountains and the endless of oceans. He does not just deal with the territory but also with maps, carefully constructed images of the world.

 

We might think that he has been travelling around the world; therefore, he is a man of deep knowledge that after having experienced different situations and discovered new sides of the world, now, he knows every corner of the Earth without leaving his chamber. He is there, in his room deeply concentrated in his thoughts and problems, which are represented in his notebooks, at the same time he shows how skilful he is with his nautical charts and maps, with his dividers. It is not only an intellectual activity but also a manual one.

 

Behind this man of deep, deep knowledge, there is an orderly world of cartographic objects — rectangles, a globe, shadows projected by sturdy furniture — and before him, is a rumpled rug, curled maps, one of which has fallen to the floor. He is trying to create order from a kind of disorder. The globe, the books on top of the cupboard and the map on the wall and floor are part of other men’s knowledge, which our geographer uses in his own inquiries. He is up there in his studio, charting, measuring, counting, categorizing, naming, recording etc.

 

He is looking towards the window. However, he is not disturbed by something he sees outside. His facial expression and his posture indicate that he has just arrived at some important insight following a phase of concentrated contemplation.

 

The light comes in trough the window hitting different surfaces in the room. This flow coming from left to right brings alive the canvas. It is a place so full of rich textures and colours that it almost seems luxurious. It is his sacred place where he can work on his discoveries and be completely absorbed in his thoughts about the world. Look at the shine on the window and the globe. Look at the blue, yellow, and red pigments which despite of being many dark shadows, help creating a warm, bright atmosphere, help creating a prefect studio for our geographer. Therefore, The Geographer harmonizes space, colour, and light to convey a single human activity, a unified moment in time.

 

He is dressed comfortably and informally, with his long hair pulled behind one ear. His youth is the reflections of what is still for discover, it is the light of discovery, the light of knowledge.

Finally, we have to take into account that the seventeenth century was a time of discovery, when the charting of new and unexplored worlds was a dream realized not only by adventurers and traders but also by geographers and astronomers. So, may he be thinking about a discovery of utter importance? Is he maybe putting down his discovery on paper, so that other ingenious men might be informed?

Well, considering this, imagine that with his skill, endless curiosity and open mind this man succeeded in making some of the most important discoveries of the history of geography. Imagine that he left everything behind him: country, family, friends, life itself; to adventure into the unknown. May be after a long and zig-zag voyage, our man arrived to a land full of precious stones and all kinds of plants and fauna. Imagine that he could percieved the temperance and softness of the air, the clearness of the sky, and the fragrances sent forth from the unknown forests of that new land.

Our geographer was delighted with the purity and suavity of the atmosphere, the crystal transparency of the sea, and the extraordinary beauty of the vegetation. He also enjoyed the beauty of the unknown kinds of fruits upon the trees that overhung the shores. Suppose that it was like a lost paradise where he could look at animal and plant tissues, at mineral crystals and at fossils. Suppose that he had all the time in the world to enjoy all the precious things of that new landscape.

 

Finally, imagine that after months of deep research he came back. As we see in the canvas one day in his chamber while making a reflection of everything he had seen, he decided to share his researches, he wanted them to widely circulate all over the world.

These are just suppositions that have come out from our imagination. However, who knows if the model of this magnificent painting experienced an adventure similar to this?