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Home , A Lady Writing a Letter, Gerard ter Borch, Johannes Vermeer, Jonathan Lopez (writer), Man Writing a Letter, The Astronomer (Vermeer)

PRESS KIT

Vermeer and the Masters of Genre

Exhibition 22 February – 22 May 2017 Hall Napoléon

Press Contact Céline Dauvergne celine.dauvergne@.fr Tél. + 33 (0)1 40 20 84 66 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Press Release page 3

The Exhibition Layout page 5

Press Visuals page 12

The complete list of the exposed works is available on request: [email protected] 2 PRESS RELEASE Exhibition 22 February–22 May 2017 Hall Napoléon

Vermeer and the Masters of

The Musée du Louvre, in collaboration with the of Ireland in Dublin and the in Washington, is holding a landmark exhibition about renowned painter . For the first time since 1966, this event will bring together twelve of the master’s –a third of his total known body of work–providing an insight into the fascinating relationships the artist maintained with other great painters of the . Thanks to special loans from the most prominent American, British, German, and–naturally–Dutch museums, visitors will be able to see Vermeer in a new light. The exhibition does away with the legend of the reclusive artist living in his own inaccessible, silent world–without ever implying that Vermeer was just one painter of many. Indeed, his artistic temperament grew more distinct through encounters with other artists. Vermeer did more Johannes Vermeer, , than launch a new movement: he acted as an agent of metamorphosis. © Rijksmuseum “The Sphinx of Delft”: coined by French journalist and art critic Théophile Thoré-Bürger when he revealed Vermeer to the world late in the 19th century, this famous expression has served mainly to Organized in partnership with the promote an enigmatic image of the painter. The myth of the National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin and solitary genius has done the rest. Yet Johannes Vermeer (1632– the National Gallery of Art in 1675) did not attain his level of creative mastery in isolation from Washington. the art of his time. Through comparisons with the works of other artists of the Golden Exhibition curators: Blaise Ducos, Department of Paintings, Age–among them , , Jan Steen, Pieter Musée du Louvre, , de Hooch, Gabriel Metsu, Caspar Netscher, and Frans Mieris– Adriaan E. Waiboer, National the exhibition brings to light Vermeer’s membership of a network Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, and of painters specializing in the depiction of everyday life while Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., admiring, inspiring, and vying with each other. National Gallery of Art, The third quarter of the 17th century saw the ’s Washington. global economic power reach its apogee. Proud of their social standing, the Dutch elite demanded art that would reflect their This exhibition enjoys the support of primary prestige. This demand led to the emergence of a “new wave” of sponsor Kinoshita Group, as well as ING Bank genre painting in the early 1650s, with artists shifting their focus to and Deloitte. idealized depictions of domesticity in elegant society. The men and women portrayed in these masterfully-executed pieces display a PRACTICAL INFORMATION staged civility. Opening hours: every day from 9 a.m. Although the artists in question worked in different cities across to 6 p.m., except Tuesdays. Night the Republic of the United , their technique, and the opening until 9:45 p.m. on Wednesdays and Fridays. style, subjects, and compositions featured in their work showed Admission: €15 (permanent considerable similarities. The exceptional quality of their creations collections + exhibitions) can be partly attributed to the lively professional rivalry that existed Online ticket sales: www.ticketlouvre.fr between them. Further information: www.louvre.fr/en

Musée du Louvre External Relations Department Press Contact Anne-Laure Béatrix, Director Céline Dauvergne Adel Ziane, Head of Communications Subdepartment [email protected] Sophie Grange, Head of Press Division Tél. +33 (0)1 40 20 84 66 3 AT THE LOUVRE AUDITORIUM A Season devoted to the Dutch Golden Lectures Age at the Musée du Louvre February 23, 2017 at 12:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. Presentation of the exhibition (in French) Masterpieces from the Leiden Collection Blaise Ducos, Musée du Louvre The Age of February 22–May 22, 2017 March 2, 9, 16, and 30, 2017 at 6:30 p.m. Salles Sully To mark Thomas S. Kaplan’s donation to the Understanding Vermeer—“The Sphinx of Delft” Louvre of Ferdinand Bol’s painting Eliezer and A series of four lectures Rebecca at the Well, the Musée du Louvre is presenting a selection from the Leiden Collec- From “Drolleries” to Interior Scenes: the Birth and Beginnings of Dutch tion, one of the most comprehensive grou- Genre Painting pings of Dutch Golden Age pictures in private hands. Sabine van Sprang, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels (March 2) Drawing the Everyday

The Fabric of Society: Fashion in the Republic (1650–1680) in the Golden Age Bianca du Mortier, Rijksmuseum, (March 9) March 16–June 12, 2017 Rotonde Sully This major exhibition of drawings retraces the Johannes Vermeer’s Milkmaid development of the genre scene in the Nether- Blaise Ducos, Musée du Louvre (March 16) lands during the 17th century.

Reopening of the galleries devoted to northern Vermeer Forgeries European paintings from the 17th to the 19th , art historian and writer, New York (March 30) century After almost one year under renovation, a total of twenty rooms will reopen with a new pre- PRATICAL INFORMATION sentation of some 530 Dutch and Flemish Information: paintings, including works by Rembrandt, Ru- +33 (0)1 40 20 55 55, Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. bens, and Van Dyck. www.louvre.fr Tickets: In person: Auditorium ticket windows OTHER EXHIBITIONS Telephone: +33 (0)1 40 20 55 00 Valentin de Boulogne (1591–1632) Online: www.fnac.com Beyond February 22–May 22, 2017 Hall Napoléon Owner of the world’s largest collection of his works, the Louvre, in partnership with the Me- tropolitan Museum of Art, is presenting the RELATED WORK first monographic exhibition of the most signi- ficant representative of the Caravaggesque Exhibition catalogue movement in Europe. Vermeer and the Masters of Genre Painting Edited by Adriaan E. Waiboer, Blaise Ducos, and Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. Co-published by Musée du Louvre Éditions and Somogy Éditions d’Art. 448 pages, 300 illustrations, €39

Exhibition album Co-published by Musée du Louvre Éditions and Somogy Éditions d’Art. 48 pages, 50 illustrations, €8

Documentary Vermeer’s Revenge Directed by: Jean-Pierre Cottet and Guillaume Cottet Jointly produced by: ARTE France, Martange Production, Soho Moon Pictures, Musée du Louvre Johannes Vermeer, © 2005 Musée du Louvre / Angèle Dequier

4 THE EXHIBITION LAYOUT Text of the didactic panels of the exhibition

INTRODUCTION ‘The Sphinx of Delft’: this appellation, first coined in the nineteenth century, conjures up an image of Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675) as an enigmatic and solitary figure. This exhibition, by contrast, looks at Vermeer’s paintings not in splendid isolation but as part of a network which extends far beyond them. The Golden Age of elegant Dutch genre painting was the period from 1650 to 1680. This type of painting, called ‘modern’ in its day, depicted activities which are ‘everyday’ only in name. Through its artists’ opulent style the Republic of the United Provinces could lay claim to equal stature with the monarchies of the day. Vermeer was one of the masters of this style, alongside Gerrit Dou, Gerard ter Borch, Frans van Mieris, Gabriel Metsu, , and others, who were active in Leiden, , Amsterdam, and Delft, and acquainted with each other’s work. Their relations took the form by turns of homage, indirect allusion, and outright metamorphosis. Seen from this perspective, Vermeer’s creations acquire an additional layer of meaning, as a record of what he rejected and what he admired.

WEIGHING The beauty of Vermeer’s is inherent in the arrested gesture of an opulently dressed young woman seen in a dimly lit interior. The same qualities of balance and grace are present in Woman Weighing Coins by Pieter de Hooch, a painter who was active for several years in Delft. The similarities between the two canvases can only be explained by the fact that at least one of the painters was familiar with the other’s work. Vermeer seems to have drawn upon his fellow-artist’s matter-of-fact depiction of a woman weighing a group of coins. But here the scene becomes a subject for contemplation, for the female figure is portrayed against the background of the Last Judgement on the wall, a painting within the painting. The use of light to make a moral point, a particular way of enveloping people and objects in mystery and profound thought – this is pure Vermeer. The enigma of the connection between the two paintings, however, remains unresolved. De Hooch had moved from Delft to Amsterdam by the time they were painted, and we do not know when he showed his Woman Weighing Coins to Vermeer.

Pieter de Hooch, Woman with a Balance, Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Johannes Vermeer, Woman with a Balance, Washington, National Gallery of Berlin, Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Gemäldegalerie / Property of Kaiser Art, Widener Collection © Washington, National Gallery of Art Friedrich Museumsverein © BPK, Berlin, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Jörg P.Anders

5 LOVE LETTERS Since they lived in the most thoroughly urbanised country of 17th-century Europe, it is not surprising that very many Dutch citizens could read and write. This was not true of Louis XIV’s France, for example, which was essentially rural. The artists who produced genre paintings focused on one specific type of reading and writing, namely the exchange of love letters. It is hard to overestimate the challenge that the depiction of reading and writing offers the painter, who must represent silence, concentration, and the passage of time. A lucky invention in this respect, and one which has enriched the , was the idea of positioning the key elements in two separate planes. In the foreground of his painting Vermeer has placed a crumpled letter, thrown down on the floor. In an economy of means typical of his work, the whole story of the painting radiates from this simple object. In the same way, the young women who gaze into mirrors seem to be offering subtle variations on the themes of silence, the gaze, and meditation.

Gabriel Metsu, A Man Writing Gabriel Metsu, A woman reading a a Letter, Dublin, National letter, Dublin, National Gallery of Gallery of Ireland, Sir Alfred Ireland, Sir Alfred and Lady Beit, and Lady Beit, 1987 (Beit 1987 (Beit Collection) © Dublin, Collection) © Dublin, National National Gallery of Ireland Gallery of Ireland

Johannes Vermeer, , with her Maid,, Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland, Sir Alfred et Lady Beit, 1987 (Beit Collection). © Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland 6 MARKS OF RESPECT Of all the different subjects favoured by the masters of genre painting, that of the visit may have generated the greatest number of variations – or perhaps we should call them transpositions, interactions, or marks of respect. The (spur-of- the-moment, hoped-for, or unwelcome) ‘visits’ exhibited here constitute a veritable echo-chamber. Seeing these paintings shown in proximity, nebulously linked together, we recognise that their painters must have had access to each other’s works. As elsewhere, it is Ter Borch who seems to have set the ball rolling. His compositions were then taken up and reconfigured by his fellow-artists. Ter Borch’s satin fabric seems to be the star performer, the leitmotiv of all these paintings, an obsession shared by all his rivals. Netscher, Metsu, and Van der Neer seem to have gone on living only in the hope of painting a dress even more beautiful than anything Ter Borch could create. These scenes of various types of visit form a counterpoint to the scenes depicting beautiful young women, motionless, absorbed in dressing and adorning themselves.

APHRODISIACS One increasingly well-known subject, the meal of oysters, suggests a reading between the lines. As usual, Ter Borch begins the trend in Deventer, with the portrait of a couple: the man is trying to win over the woman, and the white wine prefigures the pleasures to come. In Leyden, Van Mieris adopted the same composition. Steen, a friend of Van Mieris active in Warmond in the , includes this tête-à-tête within a larger interior scene. These paintings express the temperament of each artist as much as they depict varieties of behaviour: Ter Borch is haughty and flawless; Van Mieris is masterful, compressing a world of aggressiveness into a miniature; and Steen, vaguely disquieting, places his figures against a background of some unspecified shady activity.

PARROTS A beautiful parrot links three virtuoso paintings – notice the treat the young woman is offering her pet bird. In Leiden, Van Mieris was Dou’s pupil, but here he departs from the art of his master: while Dou seeks to recreate a story set in a precious niche, Van Mieris raises the pastime of an elegant lady to the level of poetry. His figure, looking at her African grey parrot, is as fine as any princess from any of the courts of Europe. Netscher, in , paints a page in the dimly lit background, in a play on Dou’s ideas. The cushion – a lace-maker’s cushion – placed in the centre of the Van Mieris version was another way of imbuing his painting with echoes of Vermeer.

WITHOUT VERMEER? The network of genre painters active in Holland after 1650 did not depend solely on Vermeer. Not everything began with him, and not everything led to him. For example, the professional connections between Jan Steen and Frans van Mieris, Pieter de Hooch and Gerard ter Borch, or ter Borch and , should be borne in mind. The complex of motifs and compositions, though invented in different places by different masters, defies expectation. These variations, stylistic leaps applied to the same , deviations within and from a recurring theme, together sketch an entire community of artists. To see this unfold without Vermeer being present offers one way of reflecting, contrapuntally, on the nature of his art.

Caspar Netscher, A Woman Feeding a Parrot with a Page, Washington, National Gallery of Art © Washington, National Gallery of Art 7 RESPONSIVE STRINGS A Young Woman Seated at a Virginal combines the elements that imbue Vermeer’s art with grace: youth, carefully calibrated distance, a kind of meditation that seems at home only in beautiful interiors. The theme of music (harmony, duet, or solo) suggests romance in all its forms, and Vermeer makes no attempt to evade this. He chooses to portray an emotionally mysterious figure, eliminating extraneous detail and leaving the young woman – and the viewer – open to competing interpretations. It is this perhaps that constitutes Vermeer’s particular contribution to the representation of music-related subjects. His predecessors had played with other approaches: the figure of a page bringing drinks, or carrying an instrument, passes among paintings made by different hands; the soloist is seen sometimes standing, sometimes kneeling, in profile or with his head turned; the singing-master may be more or less importunate. Ter Borch and Dou seem to have been this theme’s inventors, while the pinnacle of refinement in this respect is reached by Van Mieris.

Frans Van Mieris, The Duet, Schwerin, Ludwigslust, Güstrow, Johannes Vermeer, A woman sitting at a Virginal, Londres, The National Staatliche Museen © BPK, Berlin, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / image Gallery © National Gallery, London Staatliches Museum Schwerin

SERIES Painted by Samuel van Hoogstraten before his departure for England in 1662, Dutch Interior, also known as The Slippers, is the only work in the exhibition to be empty of human presence. The picture – an intriguing paradox – typifies these painters’ ability to evoke a narrative. Keys, slippers lying on the floor, a burnt-down candle, and a door opening to the (invisible) exterior, all indicate a very recent departure. The chronology of such works encourages us to believe that this one was the source of other paintings of series of connecting rooms. Jan Steen places a skull on the floor not far from the slippers that he reuses for his own purposes: the painter known for his ribald subjects turns here towards contemplation. Pieter de Hooch was another painter who loved to nest spaces within other spaces.

Samuel Van Hoogstraten, The Slippers, Paris, Musée du Louvre © RMN- Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Tony Querrec

Jan Steen, A Woman at her Toilet, Londres, Trust © Royal Collection Trust/ Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2016 8 NIGHT AND DAY Should we be surprised that Vermeer’s Astronomer and Geographer are both shown in broad daylight? The originality of this choice becomes obvious only when we look at other pictures of scholars in their studies, where they are working in the dark. Gerrit Dou, Vermeer’s predecessor in this respect, depicts the scholar as a figure not yet distinct from the alchemist, half-quaint and half-crank. Vermeer, by contrast, gives us a modern thinker. It is the light of reason which illuminates the scene. The instruments (the astrolabe, arbalest, and globe), as well as the kimono-style dressing gown, evoke the growing cosmopolitanism of Dutch culture. The variations on a theme presented by and are atypical of Vermeer, but both can be read as marking a departure from tradition. In the end, neither The Astronomer nor The Geographer are portraits: they are types, not only of occupations but of social class. The interiors and the clothes they wear mark the figures as members of the elite.

Gerard Dou, Astronomer by Candlelight, The J. Paul Getty Museum © Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum

Johannes Vermeer, The Astronomer, Paris, musée du Louvre, département des Johannes Vermeer, The Geographer, Francfort, Städelsches Kunstinstitut Peintures © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Franck Raux © Städel Museum - ARTOTHEK 9 TWO WOMEN The Louvre’s Lacemaker, like the Rijksmuseum’s Milkmaid, are often prey to misreading and to debatable interpretation. The first has been identified as a working woman doing her job, while the second is said to be subtly provocative. In fact, The Lacemaker depicts an upper-class young woman engaged in an activity comparable to the practice of music, while it seems that the sturdy individual delineated against a whitewashed wall, absorbed in making bread pudding, is primarily meant as a nourishing figure, akind of allegory of plenitude and health, a secular Virtue aglow with the grace conferred by the light. In both cases, Vermeer’s works must be understood in relation to similar small paintings by his fellow-artists. The works exhibited alongside his do suggest connections, but above all they speak to the genius of Vermeer. It was not by combining features borrowed from these models, but rather by subtraction, that his painting developed.

Top left: Gerard Dou, A kitchen Maid pourring water into a jar, Paris, Top right: Johannes Vermeer, The Milkmaid, Amsterdam, musée du Louvre, département des Peintures © RMN-Grand Palais Rijksmuseum © Amsterdam, The Rijksmuseum (Musée du Louvre) / Tony Querrec Bottom left: Johannes Vermeer, The Lace Maker, Paris, musée du Bottom right: Nicolas Maes, A Young Woman sewing, Londres, Louvre, département des Peintures © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Mansion House, The Harold Samuel Collection © Guildhall Art Louvre) / Gérard Blot Gallery, City of London / Harold Samuel Collection / Bridgeman Images 10 SILHOUETTES Vermeer was not unaware of the attractiveness and distinction of a female silhouette seen from behind, an image that is eternally mysterious. He was not the only one: Gerard ter Borch, Pieter de Hooch, and Jacob Ochtervelt all introduced a young woman into one picture or another, sometimes slipped in as part of a group, sometimes in a tête-à-tête, but ultimately always alone. The challenge for the artist was to invent ways to single out the woman who drew everyone’s eye, whether she was deposited on the edge of the picture, firmly installed at its centre, or attracting attention with her priceless dress. The artists’ different temperaments are strikingly visible: De Hooch likes explicit narratives, Ochtervelt plays with languishing troubadours, while Ter Borch distils the paradoxes of a dignified subject permeated with ambiguity. Looking at them, we easily see how Dutch collectors could have progressed from conversations on art to the art of conversation. Gerard ter Borch, Galant Conversation (« The Paternal Admonition »), IN THE STYLE OF… Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum © Amsterdam, The Rijksmuseum The genre scenes in which the daily lives of the Dutch urban elite were skilfully depicted became very popular. In the 1660s, these amazing works drew other painters along in their wake. These began by choosing soldiers or peasants for their subjects. In Rotterdam, Hendrick Sorgh depicted a lute-player who is unimaginable without De Hooch or Vermeer. His style constantly evokes the painting of the Leyden artists. Quiringh van Brekelenkam abandoned his shoemakers and tailors for an atmosphere closer to the style of Metsu or Ter Borch. In , Cornelis Bega, one of the virtuosi of his generation, must have seen Van Mieris’ Duet. Modernity gave these three painters the chance of their careers.

BETWEEN HISTORY PAINTING AND GENRE PAINTING At the age of almost forty, the master of Delft was questioning the very idea of genre in painting. In The Allegory of the Catholic Faith, Vermeer inserted the chief item in the lexicon of history painting – an abstract figure embodying an idea – into the setting of an opulent genre scene. Instead of elegant young women or musicians we find the figure of a Virtue ruling the world, here symbolised by a globe. We recognise that this is Faith, victorious over heresy (the serpent). The interior portrayed suggests the ‘hidden churches’ of Holland, in which Catholics (like Vermeer) were allowed to worship in private. The chalice, crucifix, large open missal, and crown of thorns all evoke a liturgical ceremony. In the background, the painting of Christ on the Cross, adapted from a work by the Flemish painter Jacob Jordaens, reiterates the call to pious meditation. The curtain-like tapestry Johannes Vermeer, The Allegory of the Catholic Faith, New York, The functions as a metaphor for Christian revelation – but perhaps Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Friedsam Collection, legs Friedsam, 1931 © The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Dist. RMN- artistic revelation as well. Grand Palais / image of the MMA

11 Exhibition Vermeer and the Masters of Genre Painting 22 February – 22 May 2017 Hall Napoléon PRESS VISUALS

The use of the visuals was negotiated by the Louvre Museum, they can be used before, during and until the end of the exhibition (February 22 - May 22, 2017), and only in the context of the promotion of the exhibition Vermeer and the Mas- ters of Genre Painting The images with a * are subject to specific conditions of use : Maximum reproduction format : 1/4 of inside page. Number of reproduction authorized by magazine, newspaper or magazine : 4 Please mention the photo credit and send us a copy of the article to the address: [email protected].

*1_Pieter de Hooch, Woman with a Balance, ca. 1664. Oil on 2_Johannes Vermeer, Woman with a Balance, ca 1664. Oil on canvas. 61 x 53 cm. Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, canvas. 40.3 x 35.6 cm. Washington, National Gallery of Art, Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Gemäldegalerie / Property of Kaiser Widener Collection © Washington, National Gallery of Art Friedrich Museumsverein © BPK, Berlin, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Jörg P.Anders

Musée du Louvre Direction des Relations extérieures Press Contact Anne-Laure Béatrix, directrice Céline Dauvergne Adel Ziane, sous-directeur de la communication [email protected] Sophie Grange, chef du service presse Tél. + 33 (0)1 40 20 84 66 12 3_Gabriel Metsu, A , 1664-1666. Oil 4_Gabriel Metsu, A woman reading a letter, 1664-1666. on panel. 52 x 40.5 cm. Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland, Oil on panel. 52.5 x 40.2 cm, Dublin, National Gallery of Sir Alfred and Lady Beit, 1987 (Beit Collection) © Dublin, Ireland, Sir Alfred and Lady Beit, 1987 (Beit Collection) © National Gallery of Ireland Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland

5_Johannes Vermeer, A Lady Writing a Letter, with her Maid, 6_Johannes Vermeer, A Lady Writing, ca. 1665-1667. Oil on ca. 1670, Oil on canvas, 72.2 x 59.7 cm. Dublin, National panel. 45 x 39.9 cm, Washington, National Gallery of Art, don de Gallery of Ireland, Sir Alfred et Lady Beit, 1987 (Beit Harry Waldron Havemeyer et Horace Havemeyer, Jr., en mémoire Collection) © Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland de leur père, Horace Havemeyer © Washington, National Gallery of Art

13 7_Gerard Ter Borch, A Woman ar a Mirror, ca. 1651-1652. *8_Frans van Mieris, A Woman examining Herself in a Oil on panel. 34 x 26 cm. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum Mirror, ca. 1662, Oil on panel. 30 x 23 cm. Berlin, Staatliche © Amsterdam, The Rijksmuseum Museen zu Berlin, Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Gemäldegalerie © BPK, Berlin, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Jörg P. Anders

*9_Johannes Vermeer, Young Woman with Pearls, 1663-1664, 10_Caspar Netscher, A Woman Feeding a Parrot with a Oil on canvas. 51.2 x 45.1 cm. Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Page, 1666. Oil on panel, 45.7 x 36.2 cm. Washington, Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Gemäldegalerie © BPK, Berlin, Dist. National Gallery of Art RMN-Grand Palais Jörg P. Anders © Washington, National Gallery of Art

14 * 11_Frans Van Mieris, The Duet, 1658, Oil on panel, 12_Johannes Vermeer, A woman sitting at a Virginal, ca. 1671- 31.5x24.6cm, Schwerin, Ludwigslust, Güstrow, Staatliche 1674. Oil on canvas. 51.5 x 45.5cm. Londres, The National Galle- Museen © BPK, Berlin, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / image ry © National Gallery, London Staatliches Museum Schwerin

13_Samuel Van Hoogstraten, The Slippers, ca. 1655-1662, 14_Jan Steen, A Woman at her Toilet, 1663. Oil on canvas. Oil on canvas, 103x71cm, Paris, Musée du Louvre 65.7 x 53 cm. Londres, Royal Collection Trust © Royal © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Tony Querrec Collection Trust/ Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2016 Each use must be approved by Sophie Lawrenson, Press Officer : [email protected]

15 15_Pieter de Hooch, A Woman Nursing an Infant with a Child and a 16_Gerard Dou, Astronomer by Candlelight, ca. 1665. Dog, ca. 1658-1660. Oil on canvas. 67.8 x 55.6 cm. San Francisco, Fine Huile sur panneau. 32 x 21.2 cm (cadre cintré). Los Arts Museums of San Fransisco, Palace of the Legion of Honor Angeles, The J. Paul Getty Museum © Los Angeles, J. Paul © Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco Getty Museum

17_Johannes Vermeer, The Astronomer, 1668. Oil on canvas. 18_Johannes Vermeer, The Geographer, 1669. Oil on canvas. 51.5 x 45.5 cm. Paris, musée du Louvre, département des 51.6 x 45.4 cm. Francfort, Städelsches Kunstinstitut Peintures © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Franck Raux © Städel Museum - ARTOTHEK

16 19_Gerard Dou, A kitchen Maid pourring water into a 20_Johannes Vermeer, The Milkmaid, ca. 1657-1658. Oil on jar, 1640s, or early 1650s. Oil on panel. 36 x 27.4 cm. canvas. 45.5 x 41 cm. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum © Amsterdam, Paris, musée du Louvre, département des Peintures The Rijksmuseum © RMN-Grand Palais (Musée du Louvre) / Tony Querrec

21_Nicolas Maes, A Young Woman sewing, 1655. Oil on panel 22_Johannes Vermeer, The Lace Maker, ca. 1669-1670. Oil on 55.6 x 46.1 cm. Londres, Mansion House, The Harold Samuel canvas mounted on panel. 24.5 x 21 cm. Paris, musée du Louvre, Collection © Guildhall Art Gallery, City of London / Harold département des Peintures © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Samuel Collection / Bridgeman Images Gérard Blot

17 23_Gerard ter Borch, Galant Conversation (« The Paternal Admonition »), ca. 1654. Oil on canvas. 71 x 73 cm. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum © Amsterdam, The Rijksmuseum

*24_Johannes Vermeer, The Allegory of the Catholic Faith, ca. 1670-1672. Oil on canvas. 114.3 x 88.9 cm. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Friedsam Collection, legs Friedsam, 1931 © The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / image of the MMA

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