Eros2.0001_Vermeer

Eros2.0001_Vermeer

OGCMA s.v. "Eros"
Rijksmuseum website

Johannes Vermeer, 1632-1675, "The Milkmaid," oil on canvas, about 1657-1658, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, SK-A-2344.

The Rijksmuseum website lists (with links; click above) some two dozen publications explicating this remarkable painting.

The classical mythological reference is very slight: notice the image of Eros/Cupid in the delft tiles on the wall's base? This allusion may effectively read an erotic interpretation into this quiet domestic scene. A visually similar painting, Vermeer's "Young Woman Standing at a Virginal" (Eros2.0002_Vermeer), seems to develop the erotic theme more overtly than this painting, about one decade later (ca. 1670?).

A woman in a yellow bodice and blue skirt pours milk from a jug into a bowl on a table laden with bread.

Vermeer's painting is remarkable especially for its management and depiction of light. The classical mythological usage is interesting, but not the most persistently noted feature of this painting.

The tiles in the detail shown below enhance the presence of Eros in Vermeer's painting. Detail of The Milkmaid: a foot warmer with a glowing ember inside, and several blue and white Delft tiles on the wall behind it

See a similar tiles in the same role in Eros2.0002_Vermeer A white Delft tile with blue illustrations of Cupid and floral motifs in the corners, dating from the late 17th century

OGCMA slides are designed by Roger T. Macfarlane for use in Classical Civilization 241 courses at Brigham Young University.
The present resource contains information assembled for The Oxford Guide to Classical Mythology in the Arts, 1300 - 1990's, edited by J. Davidson Reid (Oxford 1994), and it is used with express permission from Oxford University press.
Address concerns or inquiries to macfarlane@byu.edu.