The Young Vermeer; The Revenge of a Forger and Shopping at the Museum

The Young Vermeer
For this presentation, the Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis in the Netherlands has brought together Vermeer’s early work: one painting from Edinburgh, one from Dresden and one from the Mauritshuis itself. These early works are quite different from the richly decorated interiors with attractive women you might expect from Vermeer. Instead they depict a mythological subject, a story from the Bible and a brothel scene, and they are all surprisingly large. Nonetheless, they all reveal the master’s hand and the seeds of his later style. They also show a young Vermeer already captivated by tranquillity and light, qualities that would later make him world-famous.

Vermeer’s Early Years
Vermeer was born in Delft in 1632. His father ran the Mechelen Inn on the Grote Markt and supplemented his income dealing in art. It is not known with whom Vermeer studied painting. No documents on the matter have yet come to light and Vermeer’s early work does not bear the hallmarks of any one artist in particular.

In 1653 the young Vermeer registered as a master-painter at the local guild. He began his career producing history paintings: scenes from the Bible and classical mythology. According to 17th-century academic theory, this was the highest form of painting. A history painter had to first absorb a story and then use his imagination, while a painter of still-lifes, for example, ‘only’ had to imitate the real world. 

The elevated status was likely to be another reason Vermeer chose to become a history painter. It seems, however, that other subjects held more appeal for him: he eventually switched to scenes of everyday life, which were probably also in greater demand.

The Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in the Netherlands presents Van Meegeren’s Fake Vermeers, an exhibition of the famous forgeries of  Han van Meegeren. Van Meegeren craftily exploited art historians’ desire to discover early works by Johannes Vermeer. During a famous court case in which Van Meegeren was accused of Nazi collaboration, he admitted that he had forged old master paintings, including several Vermeers. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen had acquired one of the fake Vermeer from Van Meegeren. The exhibition explores Van Meegeren’s technique, his masterpieces and his downfall.

Included are approximately ten forgeries by Van Meegeren  most in the style of Vermeer, although there are some forgeries of Frans Hals, Pieter de Hooch and Gerard ter Borch.

Van Meegeren’s life as a forger is further illuminated through a documentary film and objects from his studio.

Van Meegeren’s technique remains exceptional. For his masterpiece The Supper at Emmaus, Van Meegeren used a genuine seventeenth-century canvas and historical pigments. He bound the pigments with bakelite, which hardened when heated to produce a surface very similar to that of a seventeenth-century painting. This technique, combined with Van Meegeren’s choice of subject matter and composition, was an important factor in convincing so many people of the authenticity of his works. Van Meegeren created the missing link between Vermeer’s early and late works. The exhibition at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen sheds new light on Van Meegeren’s technique, resulting from new technical research undertaken by the Rijksmuseum.

The Flying Fox website has organized a Vermeer Painting Tracker. And for a museum shopping experience, consider a pair of pearl earrings to purchase at the Mauritshuis shop.

The descriptive text of the two exhibits has been taken from the museums’ websites.