Tim's Vermeer

blansky · Dec 9, 2015

I'm not sure if this has been discussed here before, but the movie Tim's Vermeer is a fascinating look at one persons opinion that the reason Vermeer's paintings look more like photographs than many of the other old masters' work, is because he was using technology to "cheat".

Here is a Charlie Rose interview on the subject: http://www.charlierose.com/watch/60333671

markbarendt · Dec 9, 2015

How cool is that, gives a guy hope he (meaning I) could paint.

dasBlute · Dec 9, 2015

cheating or not, the result and the painstaking efforts he took are well worth seeing the movie for... two thumbs up

gone · Dec 9, 2015

There's no such thing as cheating. Any way you get the image is just fine. Who is it that decides how something has to be done?

You could fit what Rose, Teller and Jenison know about art into a thimble. Vermeer was one of the greatest painters who ever lived. Period. His use of colour and chiaroscuro is without equal (unless you count Caravaggio, who was too heavy handed for my tastes). His "Girl With a Pearl Earring" is one of the greatest masterpieces you will ever view, even in it's current sorry condition. Vermeer captured the elusive moment. The lighting in many of his works is just magical, and that could not be copied w/ a camera obscura. It was exactly what he saw in an instant.

This whole thing reminds me of college professors that couldn't write if their lives depended on it, but make a tidy living critiquing real writers.

MartinCrabtree · Dec 9, 2015

^^^^^^

Agreed.

blansky · Dec 9, 2015

momus said:
There's no such thing as cheating. Any way you get the image is just fine. Who is it that decides how something has to be done?

You could fit what Rose, Teller and Jenison know about art into a thimble. Vermeer was one of the greatest painters who ever lived. Period. His use of colour and chiaroscuro is without equal (unless you count Caravaggio, who was too heavy handed for my tastes). His "Girl With a Pearl Earring" is one of the greatest masterpieces you will ever view, even in it's current sorry condition. Vermeer captured the elusive moment. The lighting in many of his works is just magical, and that could not be copied w/ a camera obscura. It was exactly what he saw in an instant.

This whole thing reminds me of college professors that couldn't write if their lives depended on it, but make a tidy living critiquing real writers.

Just wondering did you see the movie? Because the camera obscura was not the major factor discussed. And the fact they know nothing about art was the first thing they talked about.

And the "cheating" was not their term but one used by artists to describe what Hockney talked about in his book.

If you haven't seen it, it's worth a look at despite your feelings on the matter. Because it seems you misunderstand the premise, even if you disagree with the conclusion.

Joe VanCleave · Dec 9, 2015

I saw the film a while ago and was fascinated by it. I also have Hockney's book and took to his theory as well.

I'm not sure if both views couldn't be true, to some degree, with some artists having used concave mirror projections in the case of Hockney's, as well as this comparator method. And it doesn't mean that famous artists didn't employ genuine skill and artistry, it might just imply that these were their methods of visualizing the world projected upon a canvas, a pre-visualization technique.

~Joe

HiHoSilver · Dec 9, 2015

Now the Mrs. wants to see the movie also.

MartinCrabtree · Dec 10, 2015

One can often reverse engineer things. Doesn't mean the process is the same as the original. It's been proven scientifically race car drivers see differently than most. Who's to say a great artist doesn't as well? Second guessing hundreds of years later with a totally different outlook means little when the truth is lost to history. Maybe? maybe not. That simple.

blansky · Dec 10, 2015

MartinCrabtree said:
One can often reverse engineer things. Doesn't mean the process is the same as the original. It's been proven scientifically race car drivers see differently than most. Who's to say a great artist doesn't as well? Second guessing hundreds of years later with a totally different outlook means little when the truth is lost to history. Maybe? maybe not. That simple.

Not sure if you saw it either, but to me the movie was a detective story, a cold case story.

It was basically a response to David Hockney's book about his opinion that painters have often had "help".

So it's just an opposing thesis to the common one that states Vermeer was a genius with light which I'm guessing you ascribe to.

The movies thesis is:

1. If Vermeer's work looks like a photograph mainly because of his gradation of light or exquisite transition from specular highlight to shadow mainly on faces and round objects and

2. his work was one of the only ones that were able to achieve that, why is that?

3. then maybe he used a technology to achieve that....

So Tim, the subject of the movie and a engineering type nerd sets out to try to figure it out. And in doing so reaches a conclusion to his thesis, and to try to prove his thesis, decides to paint a "Vermeer". And since he has no art or painting background, he starts from scratch and the movie follows his progress as he paints his "Vermeer".

MartinCrabtree · Dec 10, 2015

I did witch the video. I disagree with the conclusion.

markbarendt · Dec 10, 2015

My wife and I just finished the video, simply amazing!

Drew Bedo · Jan 3, 2016

An interesting tid-bit I ran across.

There is discussion in the movie about never finding any optical gear, lenses or mirrors, in Vermeer's inventory when he died. The optician and microscope maker, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, was Vermeer's friend and the executor of his estateand a strange bird in his own right. The theory is that Leeuwenhoek took back any optical gear he ahd Vermeer developed for painting.

From Wikipedia's article on Vermeer:
"The detailed inventory of the artist's belongings drawn up after his death does not include a camera obscura or any similar device.[38] However, Vermeer was in close connection with pioneer Lens maker Antoni van Leeuwenhoek and Leeuwenhoek was his executor after death."

BetterSense · Jan 3, 2016

People forget that painting was a trade. Painting was technology. Calling it cheating is like saying integrated circuits are cheating vs. vacuum tubes. It's only after things are technologically irrelevant that it's possible to "cheat".

cliveh · Jan 3, 2016

I don't know about Vermeer, but I would suggest Jan van Eyck was using a very crude direct positive chemical photographic process (see Talbots Lusotype, variant of, and I can't prove it), which probably faded as he painted over it.

Sirius Glass · Jan 3, 2016

Fascinating. That explains how he could paint the reflections in convex mirrors.

Tim's Vermeer

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