Vermeer’s Love Letters: Vermeer Paintings on Display in New York

The Frick Collection

Henry Clay Frick (1849–1919) was an American industrialist—a robber baron, really—and a collector of old master paintings. Frick stipulated that after his death his home at 1 East 70th Street in Manhattan and the art collection it contained would be made available to the public as a museum. As a result, the Frick Collection became a crown jewel in a city that abounds with art.

The Frick Collection reopened earlier this year after a $220 million renovation over the course of five years. The last part of that reopening—the new Ronald S. Lauer Exhibition Gallery—is opening this week with an exhibit entitled Vermeer’s Love Letters. The exhibit features three paintings: Mistress and Maid, which has been part of the Frick Collection since it was acquired by Frick in 1919; The Love Letter, on loan from the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam; and Lady Writing a Letter, with her Maid, on loan from the National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin.

Classic Art in a Modern Space

The three paintings, each over 350 years old, are presented in a very modern arrangement in the inaugural use of this very modern exhibition gallery. They are centered on three temporary exhibition walls, each placed at a different distance from the back of the room. And as it turns out, placing these baroque masterpieces in a 21st-century space works quite well. The space is very well lit and roomy enough to allow the viewer to contemplate the paintings individually, or, depending on the crowd, with a view of all three. The viewer can thus appreciate both the similarities and differences in the works and ponder the enigmatic narratives of each of them.

Letters and Maids

Vermeer painted a total of six paintings involving women and letters. In his time, literacy in Holland was higher than in any other country in Europe. Literacy among women was perhaps triple what it was in the rest of Europe, and a source of national pride. It is not surprising that Vermeer would have been attracted to themes of women and letters.

In the three paintings, there are five letters to be found: two being written, two being delivered, and one lying crumpled on the floor. One could argue about whether or not they are all love letters, but without a doubt, the relationship between the maids and the educated young ladies they serve is a theme in each of the paintings.

In these three paintings, a maid is present and involved in the transfer of some correspondence. It appears as though Vermeer used the same model for the maid in each of the three paintings. It has been suggested that it might well have been Tanneke Everpoel, the maid who served in Vermeer’s household. Vermeer seems to have cast the maid in a knowing role—the maid seems to have some insight into the correspondence in each case and serves as an advisor to her employer.

Mistress and Maid—Part of the Frick Collection

Mistress and Maid is one of the three Vermeer paintings in the Frick Collection. It is the last of the three to be acquired by Frick, and apparently was his favorite of the three.

The lady’s bright yellow jacket is familiar to any Vermeer fan; it appears in five of his other paintings. By contrast, the maid’s costume is a drab-colored uniform that appears on other maids portrayed by Vermeer and his contemporaries.

The woman’s hand rests on a letter. She has been writing it before being interrupted by her maid delivering another letter to her. She appears alarmed by the delivery, as she sets down her quill, draws her left hand up to her chin, and turns toward the maid. The folds of her garment show that we are catching her just as she is turning to the other woman’s arrival with the letter.

Nothing about the painting would suggest that she is happy to be receiving this new bit of correspondence. Why is she troubled? Is she writing a letter to a lover just as she is receiving a letter from him? Or is the letter perhaps from someone else? How will that change what she is writing about? What is the maid saying to the woman to try to explain the delivery?

The maid is leaning forward, and her shoulders are slouched towards the letter, as though she has entered hurriedly and is handing it to her employer with some urgency. The maid knows who has delivered the letter and probably knows something of its content. She also knows what the lady has been writing, and to whom. She brings the letter itself but also provides wise counsel, making the lady aware that her unfinished correspondence may need to be updated after she has read the incoming letter.

The Love Letter—Visiting from Amsterdam

The Love Letter is another painting immediately recognizable as a Vermeer—the checkered floor, the same yellow jacket, the cittern that the seated woman has been playing, the Spanish chair in the alcove—all these props are familiar to us. And the overall theme is the same as the previous painting: A knowledgeable maid again surprises her employer with some incoming correspondence.

In the story that Vermeer tells in this painting, the letter has just arrived. It has interrupted the maid in her work. The laundry basket and sewing cushion sitting at her feet and the broom leaning against the door to the room await her attention. The maid brought the letter to her employer promptly; the housework can wait. The lady appears apprehensive, but the maid is calming. As is frequently the case, the household staff is more aware of the back story than the employer and can provide wise counsel.

Vermeer frequently includes a painting-in-the-painting to give us a hint about the story. In this case, he has given us two. The upper painting shows a hiker at the edge of a wood. The wanderer is so far up in the scene that his presence is almost obscured by the curtain. Perhaps the distance between that traveler and the woman receiving the letter in the painting is a reflection of the distance between her and the writer of the letter. The theme of separation is similarly reflected in the seascape of the lower painting, hearkening to the seafarer separated from his lady in port. Both of the paintings tell us that the writer of this letter is some distance from home.

The Love Letter is in a style called doorkijkjes—a peek through a doorway. We are voyeurs, secretly looking through the doorway at this scene. We know something of this tension. We have received letters (or more likely an email or a text message) from someone we have not seen for some time; someone writing to us from some distance. When the message arrives, we have a sense of apprehension, perhaps even a feeling of foreboding. But the maid is reassuring. She knows who the letter is from and thinks highly of the writer. “Read it,” she says to the lady, with a gentle, confident smile. “It is good.”

Lady Writing a Letter, with her Maid—Visiting from Dublin

In Lady Writing a Letter, with her Maid, Vermeer gives us another story with a lady, her maidservant, and a letter, but in this case, the lady is writing a letter rather than receiving it.

The painting is again immediately recognizable as Vermeer’s, as it contains many features seen in his other paintings. The sunlight coming from the window at the left of the painting, the stained glass, the painting-within-the-painting, the checkered floor, the lacquered pearl earrings, the tapestry draped over the table—we have seen them all before. Vermeer’s studio probably didn’t actually have a checkered floor, but he seems to be fascinated with them, perhaps because of his interest in the accurate portrayal of perspective. He also uses the patterned floor to point the viewer’s attention to a particular feature of the composition, in this case to the maid.

Important to understanding this painting is what he shows on the floor, between the table and the viewer. Here we find a crumpled-up letter, a stick of sealing wax, a broken red seal, and an object that has been interpreted by some as a small book—perhaps a letter-writing manual or perhaps a letter wrapper.

The inclusion of this small still-life on the floor of this otherwise impeccable interior tells a story. Has the woman brushed aside a first draft of her letter? No. The inclusion of the red seal in the debris tells us the letter on the floor is one she has received, not one that she has written.¹ She opened a sealed letter, was unhappy with its contents, crumpled it up, and brushed it and its seal aside along with a few other items from her desk. She is now hurriedly drafting a response to whatever distressing news she has received. I would argue that in spite of the title of the exhibit at the Frick, this is not a love letter she is penning. She is not happy with what she has read. Her stiff posture suggests she is writing something a bit more somber than a love letter.

The painting on the wall is The Finding of Moses. What is Vermeer telling us about the letter by including that particular image? The Old Testament story tells of the decree that all Hebrew boy babies should be thrown in the Nile and killed, and of one mother setting her son adrift in a basket in hopes that he might be found and saved. And saved he was, by none other than the daughter of the Pharoh who issued the awful decree. The baby grew up to be the Old Testament hero, Moses. The story of The Finding of Moses has many themes, most notably one of abandonment.

Vermeer put this painting on the wall to suggest to us that the story is also one of abandonment. The letter was delivered by someone who had been sitting in the now-empty chair facing the letter writer. The chair, without upholstery on the back, was designed to be against a wall. The visitor took the chair from its place and used it for his brief visit to deliver the letter. He then pushed the chair aside and left.

The maid has not yet tidied up after his departure. She is peeking out the window, following the man walking away across the marketplace. The lady is now quickly penning a response to let him know of her displeasure at his lack of commitment to their relationship.

And what is the role of the maid in this story? She is certainly an important participant. Vermeer employs a couple of devices to convey this: the floor tiles point to her, and the corner of the frame of the painting on the wall intersects behind her, essentially placing her sunlit face within a frame. The maid has been a witness to the delivery of the letter and is more aware of what is going on than is the lady. The look on her face says, “There he goes; I could see that one coming…”

If that were to happen today, a hasty text message or email would be dispatched. In Vermeer’s time, the response would be a quickly penned letter. But the story is the same, whether in the 17th century or the 21st: unpleasant messages need replies, but there may be a bit of folly in too hasty a response.

The Trio of Paintings at the Frick

This exhibit gives the viewer the opportunity to see all three of these masterpieces side-by-side in a single room for the first time ever—the paintings are usually found in three different countries. The opportunity of peeking in at these three women with their three maidservants all at once allows us to get a sense of Vermeer’s ideas about women and love letters, but also about the complex relationship between upper-class young ladies and their maids. And it is a rare treat to view Vermeer’s storytelling abilities.

Vermeer’s Love Letters is on view at the Frick Collection in New York City until August 31, 2025.