Woman Playing a Lute near a Window – (Jan Vermeer) Previous Next


Artist:

Style: Baroque

Topic: Buildings Music Women Woman

Technique: Oil

Woman with a Lute, also known as Woman with a Lute Near a Window, is a painting created about 1662–1663 by Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer and now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The painting depicts a young woman wearing an ermine-trimmed jacket and enormous pearl earrings as she eagerly looks out a window, presumably expecting a male visitor. "A musical courtship is suggested by the viola da gamba on the floor in the foreground and by the flow of songbooks across the tabletop and onto the floor," according to a web page about the work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art website. The tuning of a lute was recognized by contemporary viewers as a symbol of the virtue of temperance. The oil on canvas work is 20 1/4 inches in height and 18 inches in width (51.4 x 45.7 cm).

This artwork is in the public domain.

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