프릭 컬렉션 6월 '베르메르의 러브레터'

Vermeer’s Love Letters

Museum to Debut New Special Exhibition Galleries with Major Vermeer Loans from Rijksmuseum and National Gallery of Ireland

 

June 18 through September 8, 2025

The Frick Collection 

 

Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675), Mistress and Maid, ca. 1664–67, The Frick Collection/ The Love Letter, ca. 1669-70, Rijksmuseum/ Lady Writing a Letter, ca. 1670-72, National Gallery of Ireland  

 

New York (March 4, 2025) — In the first exhibition to be held in The Frick Collection’s new special exhibition galleries, three works by Johannes Vermeer will be presented from June 18 through September 8, 2025. The unprecedented installation Vermeer’s Love Letters centers on the Frick’s iconic Mistress and Maid, uniting it with two special loans: The Love Letter from the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, and Woman Writing a Letter, with Her Maid from the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. Presented together in a single gallery for the first time, this trio of works will offer visitors the opportunity to consider Vermeer’s exploration of themes of letter writing and epistolary exchange in the context of the seventeenth-century domestic settings for which the artist is renowned.

 

States Xavier F. Salomon, the Frick’s Deputy Director and Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator, “On the heels of the museum’s public reopening on April 17, it is fitting that we are debuting our new special exhibition galleries with a closer look at the work of Vermeer, one of the most popular artists in our collection. His Mistress and Maid is the final masterpiece that Henry Clay Frick acquired before his death, making this inaugural show a particularly appropriate tribute to his legacy as a collector.”

 

In taking up the motif of the exchange of letters, Vermeer and his contemporaries explored and imagined the inner lives and emotions of their painted subjects, often creating enigmatic narrative scenes. Of about three dozen surviving works by Vermeer, six are variations on this theme. The three works united in the exhibition share a particular focus on women in the domestic sphere: ladies and their maidservants. The complex relationships, tensions, and trust between these two social classes—domestic servants and their employers—is a topic linked to and exemplified by the writing, reading, and delivery of letters. The exhibition’s curator, Dr. Robert Fucci, distinguished scholar on seventeenth-century Dutch art from the University of Amsterdam, examines these ideas in the literary and artistic contexts of Vermeer’s time. The display of the three works brought together in Vermeer’s Love Letters captures the artist’s ability to portray themes of everyday life with nuance, variety, and drama.

 

Visitors to the Frick will also have the opportunity to enjoy the museum’s other masterpieces by Vermeer, Officer and Laughing Girl and Girl Interrupted at Her Music, displayed nearby in the museum’s recently restored permanent collection galleries. Five additional works by the artist can be seen a few blocks north at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, making this an extraordinary occasion for Vermeer enthusiasts in New York City.

 

ACCOMPANYING PUBLICATION

The exhibition catalogue by Fucci provides a close examination of the three paintings in this show and of the motif of letter writing in Vermeer’s oeuvre and the broader cultural context of the time. Through meticulous analysis, Fucci presents the thematic undercurrents that connect these masterpieces, shedding light on Vermeer’s legacy and his ability to capture moments of intimacy with unparalleled depth.

Vermeer’s Love Letters will be published on April 29, 2025, by The Frick Collection in association with Rizzoli Electa. The 112-page hardcover volume includes 60 color illustrations ($37.50, member price $30). It will be available for purchase in the Museum Shop and online at shop.frick.org.

 

 

*네덜란드 국립미술관 베르메르 특별전 이모저모

*Vermeer and the Masters of Genre Painting: Inspiration and Rivalry @내셔널갤러리(DC, 10/22-1/21, 2018)