A Scientist’s Quest to Decode Vermeer’s True Colours


"When Frederik Vanmeert stands in front of a Johannes Vermeer painting, the temptation to go close is irresistible. In Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum, where he works as a heritage scientist, it’s not hard to satisfy this craving for intimacy; patrons are free to get personal with the art. Viewers of Rembrandt’s The Night Watch can approach within a metre of the canvas, while the museum’s four Vermeers, hanging nearby, offer an even more intimate experience. Viewers may, if the moment moves them, lean in within centimetres, though the security guard posted nearby will likely wag a disapproving finger. Still, even millimetres are an interminable chasm for Vanmeert. He’s seen Vermeer’s work in finer detail than most—at the microscopic level, down to the crystal latticework of the pigments that structure the language of the seventeenth-century Dutch painter’s artistic vision. ..."
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