Vermeer’s Love Letters: Frick’s Treasured Paintings

It's a real pleasure to be here and to be back in New York. Vermeer's brushwork, the detail, the slight visual clues in the images. But think about also how you relate to the artwork, because this is something that Vermeer is thinking about. That moment when you have a message that you have not yet opened, what does this letter, what I've been waiting for? The earliest of the three is probably the Frick's painting, The Mistress and Maid. This maid is handing a letter to the young woman of the house, but she's also handing it towards us in a sense. She has, with the slightest touch, put her hand to her chin. We don't see her face, which is also quite interesting. It's a very clever visual strategy to work in her reaction without making her face visible. And what I really love about this painting is the way that she's holding the pen. She's holding it at the end. She's not holding it in a way of writing. She was probably thinking. She was in the middle of finding her words when the maid comes in to deliver this letter. The next one is the Love Letter, a very beloved work in the Rijksmuseum. Much smaller in scale, but very innovative. Look at where we are. We are privileged viewers. And he uses a great deal of the canvas to structure that position. We get to witness a moment of real concern and uncertainty on this woman's face as she receives the letter. And quite wonderfully, and I would say even with a touch of humor, Vermeer has the maid with her hand on her hip, a smile on her face, a very reassuring gesture, a sort of see I told you so type of gesture. Marvelous in so many ways, the Dublin painting, and delightful in this sense, is that the woman is actively writing. We don't see her face again, but we have a very clear sense of her thought process, her focus. And what's wonderful about the maid in this sense, she's given equal visual weight once again, but she's standing by very patiently, looking out the window, giving her mistress the sort of space to form her thoughts as she's writing. It's an interesting sort of combination of figures because one is very active, the other is waiting. And it builds a sense, I would say, of time in this image. There's also a really lovely detail on the ground in front of the painting. We have what appears to be a crumpled letter. It does suggest that perhaps this is a letter that she has just read and that she is, shall we say, writing a response. We don't know the content. But that's also quite wonderful that these paintings give us a chance to fill in the blanks. We're given a chance to sort of reflect.