Monthly Archives: September 2015

Travels in Vermeer by Michael White

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I’d never even heard of this slim little book, Travels in Vermeer by Michael White, until the National Book Award Longlist for 2015 was released a few weeks ago. I suspected I would enjoy an art-themed travel memoir in the words of a poet, so I ordered it right away. And oh my goodness. What a revelation. I feel like I found an soulmate in art and travel.

travels in vermeer

 

 

This book is indeed “an enchanting book about the transformative power of art” (Kirkus Reviews). We join Creative Writing Professor Michael White on his year-long quest for peace, sobriety and healing following the death of his first wife and his divorce from his second. He’s a wreck, barely hanging on, but he’s soothed and inspired by the sight of Vermeer’s The Milkmaid at the Rijksmuseum.

 

 

Johannes Vermeer, The MIlkmaid

Johannes Vermeer, The Milkmaid (c. 1658-1661), oil on canvas, The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. Just study this painting, as Michael White did at the beginning of his book. The milk — the nail on the wall — the Delft tiles — the seeds on the bread — the dirty chipped walls — the ultramarine blue apron — the beautiful foreshortened arm grasping the handle of the pitcher. And what is that object in the lower right corner? A space heater/foot warmer, commonly understood to represent lust in Dutch genre paintings. (What? Whoa, this painting just got way more complicated.) I have seen this painting in person myself, and it’s true, it’s mesmerizing.

Michael White’s quest begins here, in front of The Milkmaid, when his scalp begins to tingle. “Why do I feel this sweet sensation of joy?” he asks, quoting from Elizabeth Bishop’s poem The Moose, which after describing the sight of a moose in the middle of a country road, also wonders:

Why, why do we feel

(we all feel) this sweet

sensation of joy?

White knows he must pursue this question, that his redemption and recovery might depend on it. Pouring over a Vermeer catalog on a park bench near the Rijksmuseum (that’s another thing deserving of wonder: the joys to be discovered in museum bookshops) White learns there are only 35 Vermeers in the world in only a handful of museums. He comes up with an itinerary that will take him from the Mauritshuis at the Hague, to the National Gallery in D.C., the Frick and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and the Kenwood House, Buckingham Palace and the National Gallery in London.

The only thing missing from this book is illustration. I get it, this isn’t a $75 art book for the coffee table, but I’m already picturing an expanded illustrated edition à la The Hare with Amber Eyes. A girl can dream. Maybe if it wins the National Book Award?

As it is, I had to be happy with Google and my iPhone. Each time White came to a new painting, I had to call it up and look along in order to fully appreciate the text. So I armchair-traveled along with White and studied these public domain/fair use images:

Johannes Vermeer, The Girl With a Pearl Earring (c. 1665), The Mauritius, The Hague

Johannes Vermeer, The Girl With a Pearl Earring (c. 1665), oil on canvas, The Mauritshuis, The Hague

Johanes Vermeer, The Art of Painting (16xx), oil on canvas, The Mauritshuis, The Hague

Johanes Vermeer, The Art of Painting (c. 1662-1668), oil on canvas, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Luckily for White, this painting was on loan to the Mauritshuis in the Hague at the time of his visit, saving him a separate trip to Vienna.

Johannes Vermeer, View of Delt (16xx), oil on canvas, The Mauritshuis, The Hague

Johannes Vermeer, View of Delft (c. 1660-1661), oil on canvas, The Mauritshuis, The Hague

Johannes Vermeer , Woman Holding a Balance (c. 1664), oil on canvas, Widener Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Johannes Vermeer , Woman Holding a Balance (c. 1664), oil on canvas, Widener Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Johannes Vermeer , Girl with the Red Hat (c. 1665/1666), oil on panel, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, National Gallery of Art. Washington, D.C.

Johannes Vermeer, Girl with the Red Hat (c. 1665/1666), oil on panel, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. As White points out in the book, this is a very small painting, only about 7 x 9 inches. And yet. Look at the chair — the scarf — the hat — and to me, the best of all, the highlight on her lip and her nose.

Johannes Vermeer, Officer with Laughing Girl (c. 1657), oil on canvas, Henry Clay Frick Bequest, The Frick Collection, New York

Johannes Vermeer, Officer with Laughing Girl (c. 1657), oil on canvas, Henry Clay Frick Bequest, The Frick Collection, New York. In the book, White tells us that his breath caught in his throat when he saw this painting: “The feeling isn’t Here is art, but Here is life.”

 

Johannes Vermeer, Girl Interrupted in Her Music (c. 1658-61), oil on canvas, Frick Collection, New York

Johannes Vermeer, Girl Interrupted in Her Music (c. 1658-61), oil on canvas, Frick Collection, New York. White points out how poorly this painting has been preserved, something we would never know by looking at a digital image. (Right there, it makes me want to run to the Frick to see for myself.)

After the Frick, Michael White visits the five Vermeers at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and finally, he flies off to the last stop on his itinerary, London. Before that, though, White retreats into a contemplation of his two marriages, his battle for sobriety, his almost crushing love for his young daughter and his search for new love after divorce. He is in the perfectly vulnerable place to figure out just what Vermeer and his women are meant to teach him.

Johannes Vermeer, The Music Lesson (1662-1664), oil on canvas, The Royal Collection, England

Johannes Vermeer, The Music Lesson (c. 1662-1664), oil on canvas, The Royal Collection, England

 

Johannes Vermeer, Lady Standing at a Virginal (c. 1670-1673), oil on canvas, National Gallery, London

Johannes Vermeer, A Lady Standing at a Virginal (c. 1670-1673), oil on canvas, National Gallery, London

Johannes Vermeer, A Young Woman Seated at a Virginal (c. 1670-1672), oil on canvas, National Gallery, London

Johannes Vermeer, A Young Woman Seated at a Virginal (c. 1670-1672), oil on canvas, National Gallery, London

So.

Back to the essential question: Why? Why do we love to study these paintings? And what can this do for us, aside from offering momentary pleasure or joy? What is the point? White comes to his realizations (his “aha” if you will) toward the end of the book, weaving his memories and his losses into his obsession for Vermeer. There are paragraphs toward the end that were so lovely they took my breath away.

Here’s a small taste:

When Sophia was still an infant, I remember the inexhaustible wonder in her gaze. She’d stare so seekingly into my eyes for hours – first one eye, then the other eye, and then doze off before beginning again. . . . In those first months, the child is on a mission, it seems, to memorize the face of love. How astonishing to see and be seen, to be truly seen for the first time.

. . .

What if a painter painted virtually nothing but such moments? . . .

 

He goes on, but it’s too beautiful for me to repeat it here. I swear, it gave me goosebumps. All of a sudden, my love of art and travel and literature, my dedication to this silly little blog, it all makes sense. I want (we all want) that “sweet sensation of joy”  that such moments bring. I am seeking (we all are seeking) to know the world, to know and be known by our loved ones. And that is what art does.

As White said, “the feeling isn’t Here is art, but Here is life.”

I think you should read this memoir for yourself, you might just have “a moment” of your own. Because writing this good is as artful as a painting.

 

For Further Reading:

Jonathan Jansen’s Essential Vermeer, http://www.essentialvermeer.com

Katherine Weber’s novel The Music Lesson

Even if you’ve read Tracy Chevalier’s Girl With a Pearl Earring, you should check out her website, which will remind you how creatively she wove a number of Vermeer’s paintings into the narrative. It might make you want to read it all over again.

 

 

John Singer Sargent and the Vanderbilts

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It seems that everywhere I go, I bump into John Singer Sargent.

During my travels this summer, by way of a fortunate upgrade, I checked into the John Singer Sargent suite at the Inn on the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina. I planned to tour the Vanderbilt Estate the next day.

The view from the Sargent Suite at the Inn on Biltmore Estate.

The view from the Sargent Suite at the Inn on Biltmore Estate. The Estate itself is perched on a distant hill to the left of this frame.

 

Apparently, George Vanderbilt was America’s biggest patron of John Singer Sargent. I had no idea. But it makes sense. Sargent was an expert at cultivating the kind of wealthy friends and contacts who could afford an expensive commissioned portrait.

Just out of curiosity, I tried to research how much a Sargent portrait commission would have cost in the late 1880s and 1890s, the height of his portrait career. I read somewhere that Sargent was charging $100,000 per commission at that time, but it was not a reliable primary source. And would that be present value? (If you know, please comment below.)

In any event, Vanderbilt could obviously afford whatever Sargent was charging. He commissioned not one but several portraits of family and friends. And now I was going to get to see them all in their original setting. A mansion in the middle of the spectacular hills and mountains of North Carolina.

A framed page of information in my “Sargent Suite” told me which Sargent paintings I would be able to see in the Biltmore Estate and in exactly which rooms.

The framed information in the John Singer Sargent Suite at the Inn on Biltmore Estate

The framed information in the John Singer Sargent Suite at the Inn on Biltmore Estate

 

The extravagance and luxury of the Biltmore Estate is so over-the-top that you can easily become numb and cynical. I mean, check out these photos — an American Downton Abbey, if not more so:

IMG_0804 unnamed unnamed-1 unnamed-2

The Estate can seem like a museum, a castle, an impossibility in America, but the portraits of the Vanderbilt family made it seem as if real people actually lived there. Really rich people, but still. I spent more time during my tour of the Biltmore Estate in front of the Sargent paintings than I did in any other room.

Photographs are not permitted inside the Biltmore Estate, but here are public domain images of the paintings I saw.

John Singer Sargent, George W. Vanderbilt

John Singer Sargent, George W. Vanderbilt (1890) , oil on canvas, The Tapestry Room in The Biltmore House, Asheville, North Carolina. What a surprising portrait. I love the shockingly bright red pages of the book, a color that would only be repeated, more muted,  in the lips and in the shadows above the eyelids. I see a pale young intellectual with well-groomed fingernails, certainly not an alpha-male captain of industry. In fact, George was the grandson of the shipping baron Cornelius Vanderbilt, and never did care for the family business. He preferred the arts, philanthropy and designing the Biltmore Estate. He did not marry until he was 40 years old, eight years after the date of this portrait. There were and still are rumors he was gay, despite the fact that he married and fathered one daughter, Cornelia.

 

 

JSS MrsVanderbiltSr

John Singer Sargent, Mrs William Henry Vanderbilt (1888), the Tapestry Room of the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina. This is George’s imposing mother, Maria Louisa Kissam, painted before George started building the Biltmore.

 

John Singer Sargent, Mrs. Walter Bacon,

John Singer Sargent, Mrs. Walter Rathbone Bacon (1896), the Oak Room at the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina. Virginia Purdy Bacon was George’s cousin on his mother’s side, the youngest granddaughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt. She and her husband were some of George Vanderbilt’s closest friends. She looks like fun.  She was raised in Bordeaux and married an American railroad tycoon, after which she divided her time between Bordeaux, Scotland and New York City. She became a philanthropist and art dealer, but is perhaps best known for sitting for both John Singer Sargent and Anders Zorn. The two artists had a contest to see who could capture her the best, and Sargent admitted that Zorn had won. The Zorn portrait is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (check it out here).

 

 

 

 

 

 

John Singer Sargent, Mrs. Benjamin Kissam (1888), oil on canvas, the Oak Room at the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina

John Singer Sargent, Mrs. Benjamin Kissam (1888), oil on canvas, the Oak Room at the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina. Mrs. Kissam was George’s aunt on his mother’s side. It’s fun to compare the portraits of the aunt and the mother to  the portraits of George and his cousin Virginia. You can sense the progress of time within one generation of Vanderbilts.

George Vanderbilt also commissioned the portraits of Biltmore’s architect and landscape designer, Frederick Law Olmsted and Richard Morris Hunt. Their portraits hang prestigiously in the Second Floor Hall of Biltmore Estate.

John Singer Sargent, Richard Morris Hunt (1895), the Second Floor Hallway of the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina.

John Singer Sargent, Richard Morris Hunt (1895), the Second Floor Living Hall of the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina.

John Singer Sargent, Frederick Law Olmsted (189 ), oil on canvas, Second Floor Hallway of the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolinia

John Singer Sargent, Frederick Law Olmsted (1895), oil on canvas, Second Floor Living Hall of the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina.

To my own surprise, the  portrait that fascinated me the most was not even a John Singer Sargent. It was a Boldini. Giovani Boldini can sometimes be a little too over-the-top for me, but this one of George Vanderbilt’s young wife Edith seemed just right. She must have had a lot of flair.

Edith Stuyvesant Dresser married George Vanderbilt in Paris in 1898. They were only married 16 years; George would die of a heart attack in 1914 at the age of 51. Their daughter was only 14 years old at the time of his death. Cornelia would get married in an elaborate wedding at the Biltmore in 1924.

Giovani Boldini, Mrs. George Vanderbilt (1911), oil on canvas, the Tapestry Gallery of the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina.  Wow, what a portrait. The brushwork is dazzling. I’ll bet Edith loved it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Resources and for further reading:

John Singer Sargent Gallery, George W. Vanderbilt’s Biltmore at JSSgallery.org

The Biltmore Blog: A Fashionable Lady, Corneilia Vanderbilt’s Wedding

Interested in Boldini? Here’s a prior post about his portrait of Madame de Florian and the novel The Paris Apartment by Michelle Gable

Interested in more about John Singer Sargent? Check out this post about John Singer Sargent and Madame X in Paris.