There are always people who like to blame artists, Johannes Vermeer lived more than 350 years ago, he was very poor and had to take care of more than 10 children, only one art lover supported him financially, due to all this suffering he died very young, was the camera obscura really so important, he cannot defend himself anymore ! Anyhow he made great paintings, they are beloved in the entire world !
I'm a photographer and I've been researching the possibility that Vermeer used a camera obscura or similar devices in his works. If he did use an aid of some sort it does not matter- his art is timeless and amazing. Also note- I beleive there were other artists at the time which also used some kind of lensed apparatus. A lens may account for some of the effects in Vermeer's paintings but does not diminish his mastery.
Always be selling! Tim's Vermeer demonstrates clearly documented how a simple optical device would make paintings with qualities of Vermeer. No need for buying anything from you.
Real sunlight has an infinite number of nuances, reflections and shade transitions, and the human eye cannot pick out and streamline all of them. Lenses and mirrors simplify this chaos of rays and reflections, organize it and create a specific flat image that can be analyzed and copied. That is why all the painters did not paint from nature at that time when the philosophers tried to determine the methods of scientific knowledge of truth, and the artists explored ways of reflecting reality in art. Some saw in lenses and mirrors a way of transferring reality to the canvas (the idea of an art as "a mirror of nature"), others, on the contrary, viewed these methods as "artistic fakes" (the Baroque idea of "an elusive reality"). Lorrain, who worked at the same time as Vermeer, is known for looking at landscapes through a special "Claude glass" while painting. Rembrandt, like all the other Dutchmen, painted "tronies" while looking at himself in the mirror. You can also find the mirror play in Velazquez' paintings. Many artists of the 16th and 17th centuries have also "revealed" their secret by painting distorted images taken from convex lenses (from Parmigianino to Elinga and Hoogstraten). One important feature of Vermeer's paintings makes it clear that he used lenses. It is the imitation of in-focus and out-of-focus effects. For example, in the "The Lacemaker" (Louvre), focus is visible on the embroidery, while the girl's face and figure is painted "out of focus" (maybe Leonardo's "sfumato" was also attempt to imitate this effect?). Of course, we don't know much about lenses from the Leeuwenhoek period, but I think a careful study of them will shed light on the painters' technique of that time. Anyway, when such artists as Turner and Monet began to paint in the open air, they already sought to depict their impressions and fantasies, and not what they actually saw, because real light cannot be depicted.
What a totally idiotic theory, that Vermeer would wish to "simulate" the imperfect optical effects provided by the camera obscura. You cannot paint using a camera obscura only draw and there is no underdrawing in his work. The optical effects go much further than out of focus Lion finials on chairs. The most striking feature of Vermeer' work is the tonal range, it looks like a still from a video it is realistic not painterly. This cannot be "simulated". The human eye is not a light meter so looking at the low light image of a camera obscura and then transferring those values to a canvas is physically impossible. He did use optics, but it was not a camera obscura! A far more plausible explanation is shown in the video 'Tim's Vermeer" tim's vermeer trailer
There are always people who like to blame artists, Johannes Vermeer lived more than 350 years ago, he was very poor and had to take care of more than 10 children, only one art lover supported him financially, due to all this suffering he died very young, was the camera obscura really so important, he cannot defend himself anymore !
Anyhow he made great paintings, they are beloved in the entire world !
I'm a photographer and I've been researching the possibility that Vermeer used a camera obscura or similar devices in his works. If he did use an aid of some sort it does not matter- his art is timeless and amazing. Also note- I beleive there were other artists at the time which also used some kind of lensed apparatus. A lens may account for some of the effects in Vermeer's paintings but does not diminish his mastery.
Always be selling! Tim's Vermeer demonstrates clearly documented how a simple optical device would make paintings with qualities of Vermeer. No need for buying anything from you.
Umm, yeah, he did. No shame in that. It was a hi tech tool for his times.
Real sunlight has an infinite number of nuances, reflections and shade transitions, and the human eye cannot pick out and streamline all of them. Lenses and mirrors simplify this chaos of rays and reflections, organize it and create a specific flat image that can be analyzed and copied. That is why all the painters did not paint from nature at that time when the philosophers tried to determine the methods of scientific knowledge of truth, and the artists explored ways of reflecting reality in art. Some saw in lenses and mirrors a way of transferring reality to the canvas (the idea of an art as "a mirror of nature"), others, on the contrary, viewed these methods as "artistic fakes" (the Baroque idea of "an elusive reality"). Lorrain, who worked at the same time as Vermeer, is known for looking at landscapes through a special "Claude glass" while painting. Rembrandt, like all the other Dutchmen, painted "tronies" while looking at himself in the mirror. You can also find the mirror play in Velazquez' paintings. Many artists of the 16th and 17th centuries have also "revealed" their secret by painting distorted images taken from convex lenses (from Parmigianino to Elinga and Hoogstraten). One important feature of Vermeer's paintings makes it clear that he used lenses. It is the imitation of in-focus and out-of-focus effects. For example, in the "The Lacemaker" (Louvre), focus is visible on the embroidery, while the girl's face and figure is painted "out of focus" (maybe Leonardo's "sfumato" was also attempt to imitate this effect?). Of course, we don't know much about lenses from the Leeuwenhoek period, but I think a careful study of them will shed light on the painters' technique of that time. Anyway, when such artists as Turner and Monet began to paint in the open air, they already sought to depict their impressions and fantasies, and not what they actually saw, because real light cannot be depicted.
What a totally idiotic theory, that Vermeer would wish to "simulate" the imperfect optical effects provided by the camera obscura. You cannot paint using a camera obscura only draw and there is no underdrawing in his work. The optical effects go much further than out of focus Lion finials on chairs. The most striking feature of Vermeer' work is the tonal range, it looks like a still from a video it is realistic not painterly. This cannot be "simulated". The human eye is not a light meter so looking at the low light image of a camera obscura and then transferring those values to a canvas is physically impossible. He did use optics, but it was not a camera obscura! A far more plausible explanation is shown in the video 'Tim's Vermeer" tim's vermeer trailer