HOW TO PAINT YOUR OWN VERMEER

a two-part painting project by Jonathan Janson

 

Combining decades of art historical research and professional painting experience, Jonathan Janson has done what no art historian or no painter could do—he has revealed the way Vermeer painted.

HOW TO PAINT YOUR OWN VERMEER answers the three most important questions posed by a growing number of artists today who look to the past for inspiration:

1. How did Vermeer and the Old Masters create their masterpieces?
2. What kind of education allowed these great artists to produce such extraordinary works?
3. How can today's painter most efficiently emulate their methods and materials?

 

HOW TO PAINT YOUR OWN VERMEER weaves together a vast array of hard-to-find specialist publications, the results of up-to-date scientific research and 30+ years of first-hand observation and painting practice to create a comprehensive guide to seventeenth-century painting procedures with particular reference to the superlative technique of Johannes Vermeer.

All information is presented in a clear, straightforward manner so that artists of all experience levels can take immediate advantage of it in their own studios utilizing materials that are available at any well-furnished art-supplies store.

The book and CD-rom are sold separately.

the Book

How to Paint Your Own Vermeer: Recapturing Materials and Methods of a Seventeenth-Century Master is a 289 page book which investigates every aspect of Vermeer's methods and materials.

In the first section, each passage of Vermeer's method is examined and framed within its historical context allowing today's painter to grasp not only the correct materials and procedures, but the rationale behind well-established artistic and technical concepts of Dutch seventeenth-century painting, including the fundamental four-step method common among  accomplished European Masters. Grounding, underdrawing, underpainting, working-up, glazing, palette, brushes and mediums are just a few of the topics explored in depth.

The second section contains valuable insights into the crucial stylistic components which make a Vermeer a Vermeer, such as color, composition, perspective, the camera obscura, studio equipment and much more.

HOW TO PAINT YOUR OWN VERMEER can be read by anyone who wishes to explore the mysterious relationship between  technique and artistic expression.

Click here to preview one of the key chapters of the book.

The CD-ROM

Following the methods and materials described in How to Paint Your Own Vermeer, the CD-rom contains over 180 high-quality digital images which exhaustively document the painting of a hypothetical Vermeer created by the author. While the book permits you to comprehend the intricacies of Vermeer's daily painting practices and background information, the CD-rom  allows you see that information put into practice. The easy-to-use browser format documents the fundamental phases of the painting process with comments on each progressive image.

In How to Paint Your Own Vermeer: A Painting in Progress, the viewer may observe the painting as it progresses step-by-step from the stretching of the canvas to the final touches through high-quality images arranged in sequential order.

Click here to preview four images of the CD-rom.