Oh! If only the “Girl With the Red Hat” could speak. In Johannes Vermeer’s painting, she’s turned around in her chair, gazing directly at us. Natural light streams across the side of her face, highlighting her open mouth and that mischievous glint in her right eye, as if she’s known for centuries what curators, scientists,…

Since 1742, visitors have delighted in seeing Johannes Vermeer’s “Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window” at the Old Masters Picture Gallery in Dresden, Germany. But the scene is not the same as it was when the painting first left Vermeer’s studio around 1659.  In 1742, the elector of Saxony and king of Poland,…

Standing by an open window, a young lady is engrossed in reading a letter. On a table in the foreground, a bowl of fruit seems to have been toppled, spilling some of its contents onto a colorful and richly woven “rug.” Perhaps, the lady toppled the bowl in her haste to read the letter she grips…