"Tim's Vermeer" A Penn & Teller Film
One of the most persevering people of all time. This week's film club was a documentary about Tim Jenison's try to discover Vermeer's lost technique. Johannes Vermeer was a famous painter due to his high level of detail paintings. Most and if not all, had a lot of detail that only a camera could capture. There were many theories of how Vermeer did his paintings but the the most convincing one is Tim's comparator mirror, which is a mirror that you can see the whole painting by moving your head up and down, left and right, this giving you the ability to compare your colors with the original image. The documentary itself shows Tim's persevering attitude to replicate on of his most famous painting, " The Music Lesson". Which shows a high level of detail that definitely only a camera can capture. At the end he discovered the most accurate technique and replicate the painting, which took him over 5 years.
Even though he came up with the mirror, and the magnifying glass to paint, the art world still not consider him a painter nor achieve his discover on Vermeer's Paintings. The reason of this might be the fact that he is actually not a painter, he's more of an inventor and had little to no experience in the art department.
Personally I think he should be considered an artist due to the fact that he care for every detail of the picture and try to replicate the same one, or at least the technique , as well as VFX Artist do. We also try to get every detail accurate and most of the time we try to replicate the actual world instead of creating a new one.
Honestly he put a huge effort in this project, and he look for every single detail to replicate the room, the objects, the lighting, even the floor and wall. I think that for someone that puts this much effort in a project, particulary this one that includes art, should be recognized as an asrtist.
What do you think?
Vermeer's Technique:
