Vermeer: Reception and Interpretation

The canonicity of Jan Vermeer's oeuvre was originally established within the general framework of modernist aesthetics. The specific concepts guiding critics were developed in the context of a reappraisal of Dutch painting in the nineteenth century, particularly in Germany and France. In this study, Christiane Hertel interprets the suppositions underlying Vermeer's canonization and also addresses the critical problem of locating his paintings in history.