REMEMBERING WALTER LIEDTKE

WALK OF FAME

BY: KATIE METHOT

This week’s Person of Note highlights the incredible career of Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) curator Walter Liedtke. Sadly, Liedtke passed away on February 3rd  2015 after the Valhalla train crash in New York. His passing has sparked an outpour of tributes, with those who knew him or were admirers his work sharing stories about how he affected them. To glance through a few of the memories shared, it is obvious that Walter was very much loved.

Walter Liedtke in front of Peter Paul Rubens's Rubens, his Wife Helena Fourment and their son Frans. ca. 1635. Oil on Wood (source: Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Liedtke joined the Met after receiving a post-graduate Mellon Fellowship. He then became a curator of European Paintings in 1980. For the next thirty-five years, Liedtke developed exhibitions featuring Dutch and Flemish paintings. One of his most notable exhibitions was Vermeer and the Delft School (2001), which brought together fifteen of Vermeer’s thirty-four attributed paintings.  The exhibition displayed paintings by thirty artists, in addition to a selection of tapestries, ceramics, and silverware. The scope of the objects framed Vermeer’s work in the context of seventeenth-century Holland. The exhibition was successful in attracting 555,000 visitors during its three month run and resulted in the publication of the most comprehensive catalogue survey of the arts in Delft. 

Although I never personally met Liedtke, I was a great admirer of his exhibitions and publications. As an undergraduate art history student, my first experience with a ‘real-life’ Vermeer was at the Met at Liedtke’s 2009 exhibition Vermeer’s Masterpiece: The Milkmaid. The exhibition celebrated the four-hundredth anniversary of Henry Hudson’s voyage from Amsterdam to Manhattan, bringing one of Vermeer’s most celebrated works to America for the first time since 1939. This exhibition explored aspects of international trade in the Netherlands and its affect on the Dutch Golden Age. Liedtke’s passion for Dutch and Flemish art was apparent in his exhibitions and in his writing. His fondness for the Met’s collection was noted by the Director Thomas P. Campbell. In his tribute to Liedtke, Campbell wrote, "he knew those pictures like old friends, and described them with an intimacy and spirit that was mesmerizing."

Johannes Vermeer. A Maid Asleep. 1657. Oil on Canvas. Metropolitan Museum of Art (source: Wikipedia)

Outside of the Met, Liedtke and his wife Nancy raised horses at their farm in Westchester County. After the announcement of his passing the Met posted a podcast where Liedtke described his personal connection to Dutch painting. As a child, he would respond to visual patterns rather than narrative structures. He was intrigued by "the play between perception and making a picture" which may have led to his early interest in Vermeer. Liedtke described Vermeer's work as "complicated and simple, at the same time." While the pictures seem simple on the surface, his compositions were the product of careful study and observation. Liedtke believed the tranquility of Vermeer's paintings appeal to modern audiences because of the busyness in our everyday lives.

Many people who have mourned Liedtke's passing never met him, but felt connected to him through his work at the Met. He will be sorely missed, but has left an incredible legacy and lasting impact on those with whom he shared his love of art. 

If you are interested in exploring Liedtke's catalogue for Vermeer and the Delft School, it is available online through Met Publications here. 

TUESDAY NEWS DAY: TIM'S VERMEER

BY: BRITTNEY SPROULE

Johannes Vermeer's The Music Lesson (1662-65)

      This weekend, I came across an article in Vanity Fair about a recent documentary called Tim's Vermeer. The documentary was created by the magician duo Penn & Teller and tells the story of their friend Tim Jenison. Jenison is a San Antonio Texas native who became obsessed with discovering exactly how Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer was able to paint the photo-realistic images he is so famous for, hundreds of years before the invention of the photograph. In the documentary, Jenison is confident he has solved the mystery behind Vermeer's artistic"genius" and decides to test his findings by using this new information to reproduce a Vermeer painting himself, by hand. Specifically, Vermeer's The Music Lesson (above). The kicker is, Jenison is an engineer who has made his fortune creating video production software and hardware, and has never painted in his life.

 

Trailer for Tim's Vermeer (2013)

      It may come as no surprise that prior to Jenison, art historians have addressed the mystery of Vermeer's exceptional ability to portray such lifelike images in his paintings, suggesting that it is very possible that Vermeer used optic devices (i.e. lenses, camera obscura) to help him see from perspectives and capture light and colour in ways the naked eye alone cannot comprehend. Two of the foremost advocates for this controversial position (both of whom are featured in the film) are London architecture professor Philip Steadman (in his book Vermeer's Camera: Uncovering the Truth Behind the Masterpieces) and prominent artist David Hockney (in his book Secret Knowledge: Rediscovering the Lost Techniques of Old Masters).

Prof. Philip Steadman on optical devices, Tim's Vermeer

      Without giving too much away, Jenison becomes inspired by the controversial work of Steadman and Hockney and manages to rig up an optical device that functions, in what he believes, to be a similar fashion to the kind of optic device Vermeer may have used. Jenison then decides to completely reconstruct the scene from The Music Lesson -- and we're talking completely here, in the sense of reconstructing the scene with painstaking historical and mathematical accuracy, from making window glass by hand to building a harpsichord -- and ultimately, when this is finished, he sits down to paint his own Vermeer using the optic device he created (which consisted of technologies/materials that would have been plausible to use in the 17th century).

 This video shows (much better than I can explain) 

how Jenison's simple optic device works 

and just how effective a tool it is.

      Conveniently enough, I discovered that Tim's Vermeer is actually currently playing at the TIFF Bell Lightbox. Thus, I had the fabulous opportunity to actually catch this film, along with a few Musings cohorts, before posting! I highly recommend you check this film out. It is fascinating, unbelievable, and actually quite funny all at the same time. You can't help but love Jenison and feel for him during the painstaking process he undergoes in order to recreate the physical scene from The Music Lesson and then actually paint it. Before I wrap this post up, there are a few things I'd like to throw out on the table for possible discussion...

      One of the main issues that members of the art community have with the suggestion that Vermeer used optic devices while painting is that this is somehow "cheating." What are your thoughts on this matter? Is using technology to enhance art or inspire new artistic processes (which is what Vermeer likely did with his lenses, and I'm sure he wasn't the only one to do so) cheating?

      As Jenison proves, these devices certainly do not make the painting process any easier or less time consuming. So, can we still consider this cheating? Personally, seeing Jenison go through Vermeer's painting process himself makes me appreciate Vermeer's work even more. Does the discovery of these methods now render Vermeer paintings meaningless or valueless, now that we know it may not have been pure "genius" that allowed him to paint this way, but the use of man-made tools? Does this make you appreciate the works of the Old Masters like Vermeer any less? Can science and art/creativity exist on the same plane and perhaps even inspire each other?

Tim Jenison in the process of painting his Vermeer

I could go on posing a million questions to you based on what I encountered watching this film, but I think I'll leave the floor open from here. Please go check this film out if you have the time. Or even just spend a few minutes perusing the related YouTube videos. You won't regret it. Even if you don't buy into what Jenison is doing, I think you will still be transfixed or, at the very least, entertained.

Enjoy!