We went today to the Fitzwilliam Museum to see for the first time (but definitely not the last) Vermeer’s Women: Secrets and Silence. A rather wonderful exhibition, astonishingly gathering four Vermeers in the same room, with another twenty-eight pictures from the Dutch ‘Golden Age’, mostly small intimate pictures of women at home. It’s just the right size of exhibition to take in without feeling overwhelmed. A delight, affecting, and all quite free too. If you are in reach of Cambridge, do see it.
As years go by, I seem to find more and more (quite untutored) pleasure in looking at pictures. A quiet philosophical voice sometimes wonders why: can any reader of this blog recommend something insightful to read on why we can find the old masters so affecting?
Dear Peter
You might be interested in my colleague Philip Steadman’s 20 year fascination with Vermeer and in particular his reconstructions of Vermeer’s interiors (http://www.vermeerscamera.co.uk/roomhome.htm).
Semir Zeki, also at UCL, undertakes a “neurobiological appraisal of Vermeer and Michelangelo” in his Inner Vision: An Exploration of Art and the Brain.