Johannes Vermeer (1632鈥�1675) is one of the most beloved painters in the world. But when an enterprising French journalist and art critic set out to recover his work in the mid-nineteenth century, both his name and achievement were virtually forgotten. Vermeer鈥檚 Afterlives tells the remarkable story of how one of the great masters of the Dutch Golden Age was lost to obscurity until the rise of art history as a new discipline introduced his work to modern audiences and asks why his art compels so many other artists to respond with works of their own.
Ruth Bernard Yeazell traces the cultural ascendency of this extraordinary painter, whose enigmatic subjects and quiet, introspective interiors, transfigured by light and color, continue to captivate viewers far removed from his native Delft. We meet the critics who first welcomed Vermeer into the canon along with the painters who sought to imitate him, the forgers who tried to pass off their work as his own, and the contemporary artists who openly repurpose it. The enquiry concludes by looking at Vermeer鈥檚 paintings through the eyes of the poets and novelists who have attempted to translate his silence into words and give voice to the stories he left untold. Along the way, Yeazell interrogates the changing assumptions that govern art history, while demonstrating how paintings live on not only in later paintings but in poetry, fiction, photography, and film.
Marking the 350th anniversary of Vermeer鈥檚 death, this beautifully illustrated book explores the variety of ways in which Vermeer鈥檚 art has been interpreted through the centuries and shows how his paintings take on afterlives of their own in the imaginations of those who view them.
Ruth Bernard Yeazell is Sterling Professor of English at Yale University. Her books include Picture Titles: How and Why Western Paintings Acquired Their Names and Art of the Everyday: Dutch Painting and the Realist Novel (both 快色直播). Her work has appeared in leading publications such as the London Review of 快色直播 and The New York Review of 快色直播.
"Beautifully illustrated. . . . [Vermeer’s Afterlives is] an authoritative, insightful work of art history."鈥�Kirkus Reviews starred review
"[Ruth Bernard Yeazell] marshals rigorous analysis to show how the artists, filmmakers, writers, and critics who carried forward Vermeer’s “afterlives” have expanded, innovated, and sometimes transformed the meaning of his work. Serious admirers of the painter will want this on their bookshelves."鈥�Publishers Weekly
“Ruth Bernard Yeazell provides a revelatory new account of a fascinating and multifaceted subject: the reception of the seventeenth-century Dutch painter Vermeer from the period of his putative ‘rediscovery’ in the 1860s through to the present day. The book covers not only the nuances of scholarship on Vermeer, but also the responses of artists, filmmakers, poets, and novelists. Yeazell’s deft and imaginative treatment makes these varied responses come alive and shows why Vermeer’s art has proved so compelling to modern audiences.”—Elizabeth Prettejohn, author of Modern Painters, Old Masters: The Art of Imitation from the Pre-Raphaelites to the First World War
“The story of the rediscovery of Johannes Vermeer in the mid-nineteenth century, and the subsequent fascination with his art until the present day, is at the core of Ruth Bernard Yeazell’s engaging and important book. Yeazell explores the various ways Vermeer’s paintings, which seem so perfect in their colors, compositions, and subject matter and yet reach deep into the emotional core of human life, inspired the imagination of artists, novelists, poets, and filmmakers. Yeazell’s book is a compelling in-depth study of Vermeer’s long-lasting impact on popular culture and the various ways in which artists and writers appropriated his imagery in their own creative works.”—Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., author of Vermeer: The Complete Works
