For 350 years everyone remembers girl with a pearl earring as a perfect girl in darkness – but what Johannes Vermeer actually painted behind her was quietly erased by time. In this investigation we look closer at the green curtain that turned black, the hidden layers under the paint, and the pearl that was never a pearl.
Johannes Vermeer – Girl with a Pearl Earring, c.1665
Oil on canvas, Mauritshuis, The Hague. One of the most famous paintings in Western art – and one of the most misremembered.
We break down the vermeer girl with a pearl earring surface myth, the pigment analysis from the Mauritshuis, the missing eyelashes, the cracked background and why time itself lied to you.
#Vermeer #GirlWithAPearlEarring #ArtHistory
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