The painting Girl with a Pearl Earring is
one of Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer's masterworks
and, as the name implies, uses a pearl earring
for a focal point. It has been in the collection
of the Mauritshuis gallery in The Hague since
1902.
Background
The painting is signed "IVMeer" but not dated.
It is unclear whether this work was commissioned,
and, if so, by whom. In any case, it is probably
not meant as a conventional portrait.
The image is a tronie, the Dutch 17th-century
description of a ‘head’ that was not meant
to be a portrait. After the most recent restoration
of the painting in 1994, the subtle color
scheme and the intimacy of the girl’s gaze
toward the viewer have been greatly enhanced.
During the restoration, it was discovered
that the dark background, today somewhat mottled,
was initially intended by the painter to be
a deep enamel-like green. This effect was
produced by applying a thin transparent layer
of paint, called a glaze, over the present-day
black background. However, the two organic
pigments of the green glaze, indigo and weld,
have faded.
On the advice of Victor de Stuers, who for
years tried to prevent Vermeer's rare works
from being sold to parties abroad, Arnoldus
Andries des Tombe purchased the work at an
auction in The Hague in 1881, for only two
guilders and thirty cents. At the time, it
was in poor condition. Des Tombe had no heirs
and donated this and other paintings to the
Mauritshuis in 1902.
In 1937, a very similar painting, Smiling
Girl, at the time also thought to be by Vermeer,
was donated by collector Andrew W. Mellon
to the National Gallery of Art in Washington,
D.C. Now widely considered to be a fake, the
painting was claimed by Vermeer expert Arthur
Wheelock in a 1995 study to be by 20th-century
artist and forger Theo van Wijngaarden, a
friend of Han van Meegeren.
In 2012, as part of a traveling exhibition
while the Mauritshuis was being renovated
and expanded, the painting was exhibited in
Japan at the National Museum of Western Art,
Tokyo, and in 2013-2014 the United States,
where it was shown at the High Museum in Atlanta,
the de Young Museum in San Francisco and in
New York City at the Frick Collection. Later
in 2014 it was exhibited in Bologna, Italy.
In June 2014, it was returned to the Mauritshuis
museum, where it was given a more prominent
place than before.
References in fiction
Tracy Chevalier wrote a historical novel,
also entitled Girl with a Pearl Earring, fictionalizing
the circumstances of the painting's creation.
In the novel, Johannes Vermeer becomes close
with a fictional servant named Griet, whom
he hires as an assistant and has sit for him
as a painting model while wearing his wife's
pearl earrings. The novel inspired a 2003
film and 2008 play of the same name. The 2003
film stars Scarlett Johansson as the girl
with the pearl earring, Griet. Johansson was
nominated for various awards including a Golden
Globe Award and a BAFTA Award for Best Actress
in a Leading Role.
The painting also appears in the 2007 film
St Trinian's, when the girls devise to - and
successfully do - steal and fence the painting,
to raise funds to save the school.
See also
Dutch Golden Age painting
List of paintings by Johannes Vermeer
References
Further reading
Liedtke, Walter A.. Vermeer and the Delft
School. Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN 9780870999734. 
External links
In-depth view of the Girl with a Pearl Earring
An investigation into the illumination of
Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring
