Vermeer and Polish Poetry (NL Embassy in PL)

Have you been to the Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam? The exhibition includes 28 of the 37 known paintings by the 17th-century Dutch master: the largest collection of Johannes Vermeer’s works ever brought together in a museum. His paintings have long since captured peoples’ imaginations, however.  For example, several Polish poets have been inspired to write verses about Vermeer’s works. Two well-known authors who did so are Adam Czerniawski and Adam Zagajewski. The latter wrote a number of poems about or featuring Vermeer, such as “Vermeer’s Little Girl”, which describes the famous “Girl with a Pearl Earring”.

Johannes Vermeer, ‘View of Delft’, ca. 1660-1661.

Moreover, both Czerniawski and Zagajewski composed poems about Vermeer’s “View of Delft”: a panorama of the city where the painter lived and worked, made in ca. 1660-1661. Czerniawski’s poem dates from 1969. It begins as follows:

“In The Hague there is a view of Delft,
In The Hague there is a perspective of Delft,
All it takes to see Delft,
Is to reach the first floor of the Mauritshuis,
Where the panorama is not obstructed by
A hill or a broad chestnut tree.”

The poet speaks of two views of Delft: the modern one, which is made of “steel and glass”, and the 17th-century one, captured on canvas. In the rest of the poem, Czerniawski considers his own relationship with – and desire to witness – these two “Delfts”, and tries to describe both the painting and the city itself.

The poem by Zagajewski dates from 1983. It is much shorter:

“Houses, waves, clouds, and shadows
(dark-blue roofs, brown bricks):
at last, you have become but a glance.

The uncontrolled, calm eyes of objects,
glittering with blackness.

You will outlive our admiration, our tears,
and our noisy, despicable wars.”

In but a few sentences, Zagajewski presents the painting as an everlasting ideal, which observes the ever-changing, cruel world.

We wish a lovely time to those of you who are fortunate enough to have a ticket for the exhibition, where you can see Vermeer’s “View of Delft” for yourselves. Don’t worry if you didn’t get a ticket: you can see the painting in the Mauritshuis in The Hague after the exhibition in Amsterdam ends. And who knows, maybe you will be inspired to write your own poems!

*I originally wrote this post for the social media outlets of the Dutch Embassy in Poland. This was post no. 43.

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