Vermeer’s Revelations

At the Rijksmuseum, the light levels are low, the walls dark, and every painting has room to breathe. Visitors drop their voice as if in church. But for all the reverence his work now enjoys, and for all the moment-stretched-to-eternity quietude that his paintings project, the afterlife of Vermeer has been a rough ride, bouncing from local prominence to obscurity to cinematic stardom courtesy of Colin Firth. Vermeer’s work was at the center of the most stupendous forgery scandal of the 20th century, as well as its most spectacular art theft. (The Concert, stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in 1990 and not seen since, is a palpable absence in Amsterdam.) Vermeer, the man, has been depicted as a paradigm of Calvinist restraint, a passionate Catholic convert, and a model of empiricism. Almost four centuries after his birth, experts remain at odds about his intentions, his methods, and which paintings he actually made.