\ATXsh255 Jan Vermeer originally worked as an innkeeper, devoting himself occasionally to dealing i
n works of art. In 1653 he enrolled in the guild of painters in Delft. His early work shows the influence of Caravaggio followers in Utrecht, as well as Rembrandt (\i The Procuress\i0 , 1656, Dresden, GemΣldegalerie; \i Christ in the House of Mary and Ma
rtha\i0 , Edinburgh, National Gallery; \i Diana and the Nymphs\i0 , The Hague, Mauritshuis; \i Drowsing Girl\i0 , New York, Metropolitan Museum). After these early paintings, Vermeer quickly defined the unique characteristics of his own style, evident in
such celebrated pictures as the \i Girl Reading a Letter\i0 (Dresden, GemΣldegalerie), \i The Music Lesson\i0 (New York, Frick Collection), \i The Milkmaid\i0 (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum), \i Woman Reading in Blue\i0 (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum), and \i The
Lacemaker\i0 (Paris, Louvre).\ATXsh4607 \par
\ATXsh255 Called ôthe painter of the silent life of things,ö Vermeer used a clear and essential style to produce meticulous and sharp descriptions of reality, whether that of human figures or of objects. Ve
rmeer is principally a painter of interiors. Most of his pictures are of women at work or reading in the setting of their homes. In these rooms the light creates a pattern of reflections, glowing, and shadows, conjuring up an enchanted atmosphere and a s
ense of expectation, or of suspension in time. The same atmosphere holds sway in his views of the outside world, like in \i Alleyway\i0 (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum) and \i View of Delft\i0 (The Hague, Mauritshuis). The works of the later part of his career
are characterized by more complex schemes of composition and stronger contrasts of light and color, in addition to containing elements of an allegorical characterû\i The Painting Lesson\i0 (Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum), \i The Geographer\i0 (Fran
kfurt, StΣdelsches Kunstinstitut), and \i The Astronomer\i0 (1668, Paris, Louvre). Ignored for a long time, VermeerÆs work was reappraised by the exponents of French realism in the mid-nineteenth century and by critics and writers like ThΘophile Gautie
r, the Goncourt brothers, and Marcel Proust.\ATXsh4607
