Johannes Vermeer's luminous paintings are loved and admired around the world, yet we do not understand how they were made. We see sunlit spaces; the glimmer of satin, silver, and linen; we see the softness of a hand on a lute string or letter. We recognise the distilled impression of a moment of time; and we feel it to be real. We might hope for some answers from the experts, but they are confounded too. Even with the modern technology available, they do not know why there is no evidence of any preliminary drawing; why there are shifts in focus; and why his pictures are unusually blurred. Some wonder if he might possibly have used a camera obscura to capture what he saw before him. The few traces Vermeer has left behind tell us little: there are no letters or diaries; and no reports of him at work. Jane Jelley has taken a new path in this detective story. A painter herself, she has worked with the materials of his time: the cochineal insect and lapis lazuli; the sheep bones, soot, earth, and rust. She shows us how painters made their pictures layer by layer; she investigates old secrets; and hears travellers' tales. She explores how Vermeer could have used a lens in the creation of his masterpieces. The clues were there all along. After all this time, now we can unlock the studio door, and catch a glimpse of Vermeer inside, painting light.

The iconic paintings of the 17th century Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer have been the source of admiration and controversy ever since they were rediscovered in the 19th century. Amazingly, there is still no agreement amongst experts as to how they were produced.

PIXELS & PAINTINGS “The discussion is firmly grounded in established art historical practices, such as close visual analysis and an understanding of artists’ working methods, and real-world examples demonstrate how computer-assisted techniques can complement traditional approaches.” —Dr. Emilie Gordenker, Director of the Van Gogh Museum The pioneering presentation of computer-based image analysis of fine art, forging a dialog between art scholars and the computer vision community In recent years, sophisticated computer vision, graphics, and artificial intelligence algorithms have proven to be increasingly powerful tools in the study of fine art. These methods—some adapted from forensic digital photography and others developed specifically for art—empower a growing number of computer-savvy art scholars, conservators, and historians to answer longstanding questions as well as provide new approaches to the interpretation of art. Pixels & Paintings provides the first and authoritative overview of the broad range of these methods, which extend from image processing of palette, marks, brush strokes, and shapes up through analysis of objects, poses, style, composition, to the computation of simple interpretations of artworks. This book stresses that computer methods for art analysis must always incorporate the cultural contexts appropriate to the art studies at hand—a blend of humanistic and scientific expertise. Describes powerful computer image analysis methods and their application to problems in the history and interpretation of fine art Discusses some of the art historical lessons and revelations provided by the use of these methods Clarifies the assumptions and applicability of methods and the role of cultural contexts in their use Shows how computation can be used to analyze tens of thousands of artworks to reveal trends and anomalies that could not be found by traditional non-computer methods Pixels & Paintings is essential reading for computer image analysts and graphics specialists, conservators, historians, students, psychologists and the general public interested in the study and appreciation of art.

In Light as Experience and Imagination from Medieval to Modern Times, David S. Herrstrom synthesizes and interprets the experience of light as revealed in a wide range of art and literature from medieval to modern times. The true subject of the book is making sense of the individual’s relationship with light, rather than the investigation of light’s essential nature, while telling the story of light “seducing” individuals from the Middle Ages to our modern times. Consequently, it is not concerned with the “progress” of scientific inquiries into the physical properties and behavior of light (optical science), but rather with subjective reactions as reflected in art, architecture, and literature. Instead of its evolution, this book celebrates the complexity of our relation to light’s character. No individual experience of light being “truer” than any other.

This book is not only a fascinating biography of one of the greatest painters of the seventeenth century but also a social history of the colorful extended family to which he belonged and of the town life of the period. It explores a series of distinct worlds: Delft's Small-Cattle Market, where Vermeer's paternal family settled early in the century; the milieu of shady businessmen in Amsterdam that recruited Vermeer's grandfather to counterfeit coins; the artists, military contractors, and Protestant burghers who frequented the inn of Vermeer's father in Delft's Great Market Square; and the quiet, distinguished "Papists Corner" in which Vermeer, after marrying into a high-born Catholic family, retired to practice his art, while retaining ties with wealthy Protestant patrons. The relationship of Vermeer to his principal patron is one of many original discoveries in the book.

In a major analysis of pictorial forms from the late Middle Ages to the Enlightenment, Christopher Braider argues that the painted image provides a metaphor and model for all other modes of expression in Western culture—particularly literature, philosophy, religion, and science. Because critics have conventionally explained visual images in terms of verbal texts (Scripture, heroic poetry, and myth), they have undervalued the impact of the pictorial naturalism practiced by painters from the fifteenth century onward and the fundamentally new conception of reality it conveys. By reinterpreting modern Western experience in light of northern "descriptive art," the author enriches our understanding of how both painted and written cultural texts shape our perceptions of the world at large. Throughout Braider draws on works by such painters as van der Weyden, Bruegel the Elder, Steen, Vermeer, Rembrandt, and Poussin, and addresses such topics as the Incarnation of the Word in Christ, the elegiac foundations of Enlightenment aesthetics, and the rivalry between northern and southern art. His goal is not only to reexamine important aesthetic issues but also to offer a new perspective on the general intellectual and cultural history of the modern West. Originally published in 1993. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Presents an advanced overview of Digital Signal Processing and its applications to exploration seismology, for electrical engineers, geophysicists and petroleum professionals.

Frank Wynne's remarkable book tells the story of Han van Meegeren, a paranoid, drug-addicted, second-rate painter whose Vermeer forgeries made him a secret superstar of the art world. During van Meegeren's heyday as a forger of Vermeers, he earned the equivalent of fifty million dollars, the acclaim of the world's press, and the satisfaction of swindling Hermann Göring himself, trading the Nazi commander one of his forgeries in exchange for the return of hundreds of looted Dutch paintings. But he was undone by his very success, thriving so noticeably during World War II that when it ended, he was arrested as a Nazi collaborator. His only defense was to admit that he himself had painted the Old Masters that had passed through his hands-a confession the public refused to believe, until, in a huge media event, the courts staged the public painting of what would be van Meegeren's last "Vermeer." I Was Vermeer is a gripping real-life mystery that exposes the life and techniques of the consummate art forger; the fascinating work of the experts who try to track down the fakes; and the collusion and ego in the art establishment that, even today, allow forgery to thrive. Wry, amoral, and plotted like a thriller, it is the first major book in forty years on this astonishing episode in history. Frank Wynne is a writer and award-winning literary translator. Born in Ireland, he has lived and worked in Dublin, Paris, Amsterdam, London, and Buenos Aires, and currently lives in San José, Costa Rica. He has translated more than a dozen novels, among them the works of Michel Houellebecq, Frédéric Beigbeder, Pierre Mérot, and Ahmadou Kourouma. A journalist and broadcaster, he has written for the Sunday Times, the Independent, the Irish Times, Melody Maker, and Time Out.

Johannes Vermeer, one of the greatest Dutch painters and for some the single greatest painter of all, produced a remarkably small corpus of work. In Vermeer's Family Secrets, Benjamin Binstock revolutionizes how we think about Vermeer's work and life. Vermeer, The Sphinx of Delft, is famously a mystery in art: despite the common claim that little is known of his biography, there is actually an abundance of fascinating information about Vermeer’s life that Binstock brings to bear on Vermeer’s art for the first time; he also offers new interpretations of several key documents pertaining to Vermeer that have been misunderstood. Lavishly illustrated with more than 180 black and white images and more than sixty color plates, the book also includes a remarkable color two-page spread that presents the entirety of Vermeer's oeuvre arranged in chronological order in 1/20 scale, demonstrating his gradual formal and conceptual development. No book on Vermeer has ever done this kind of visual comparison of his complete output. Like Poe's purloined letter, Vermeer's secrets are sometimes out in the open where everyone can see them. Benjamin Binstock shows us where to look. Piecing together evidence, the tools of art history, and his own intuitive skills, he gives us for the first time a history of Vermeer's work in light of Vermeer's life. On almost every page of Vermeer's Family Secrets, there is a perception or an adjustment that rethinks what we know about Vermeer, his oeuvre, Dutch painting, and Western Art. Perhaps the most arresting revelation of Vermeer's Family Secrets is the final one: in response to inconsistencies in technique, materials, and artistic level, Binstock posits that several of the paintings accepted as canonical works by Vermeer, are in fact not by Vermeer at all but by his eldest daughter, Maria. How he argues this is one of the book's many pleasures.

Lawrence Gowing's classic study has long been treasured for the painterly sensibilities he brought to this greatly loved body of work. Finally the text is available again, with a new foreword and fresh reproductions of Vermeer's paintings.