‘Girl With A Pearl Earring’ Owner Has Separation Anxiety, Asks Fans For Remakes
Photo 213878060 © Giorgio Morara | Dreamstime.com
The Girl with a Pearl Earring has lived a pretty cushy life on the wall of the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague. Despite being painted in the 1600s by Johannes Vermeer, she continues to draw visitors with her curious gaze and subdued elegance.
“We don’t know exactly what the magic of the Girl is, but the fact is that she has become an icon of painting and a symbol of beauty,” the museum admits. “Thousands of people are inspired by the Girl, dress like her or even dress things like her.”
Alas, come February, the Mauritshuis will have to part with its prized piece for a moment. The Girl with a Pearl Earring will travel to Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum, where she will take refuge for eight weeks as part of the largest Vermeer exhibition in history.
Reeling from the impending separation, the Mauritshuis has called upon art lovers to reimagine the beloved artwork in their unique, oft-bizarre, styles, and it wants these temporary replacements to fill her place.
The museum plans to have the fan remakes up on rotation, via a digital display, on the empty space left by the vacated Vermeer portrait. It will also keep some stand-ins in picture frames all over the walls of the same room.
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The tributes will have an exhibition of their own entitled My Girl with a Pearl, named after an Instagram account the establishment has been running for years to commemorate works inspired by the masterpiece. The show will run from February 6 through June 4, coinciding with Rijksmuseum’s February 10 retrospective.
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“We are going to miss the Girl with a Pearl Earring tremendously,” describes Paul Schuiling, cultural partnerships advisor at Nationale-Nederlanden. “But at the same time, we see that so many people are inspired by this world-famous painting. That is why the Mauritshuis and Nationale-Nederlanden are calling on creative talent to send in their beautiful variations. That way, we give that talent a stage in this special place.”
The museum, which closed submissions on January 15, promises to showcase “as many Girls together as possible, from home and abroad.” No entry is too outlandish; the institution has accepted paintings, drawings, photos, embroidered or knitted works, sculptures, and beyond.
“In a son or daughter, in buttons, an onion or a sardine can,” all art forms are welcome, hints the Mauritshuis—a suggestion that the public has taken as a challenge. In their submissions labeled with the #mygirlwithapearl hashtag, they’ve pictured the subject in beads, as animals, and even in AI art, a sign of the times.
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One creator who has used Avatar as a muse writes: “I worry about the world and how it’s going. I let her cry for the world, for the people, and for the earth. We should, in my opinion, take way care of one another. Be kind.”
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Artists of selected works, some of them shown below, will receive two free tickets to the museum to see their creations up close.
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The Dutch portrait itself has been reinterpreted several times over until it landed on its current name. It is believed that the masterpiece was once called Girl with a Turban and was originally described as “painted in the Turkish fashion.” In 1696, a little over two decades after Vermeer’s death, it was found in a catalog with the description, “Portrait in Antique Costume, uncommonly artistic.”
What does your Girl with a Pearl Earring look like?
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"Girl With a Pearl Earring," by Vermeer, re-imagined in collaboration with AI. 😮#aiart #collaboration #aipainting #painting #vermeer #mygirlwithapearl #brooklyngirl #digitalart #rowynndumont #metaverse #art #experimentation pic.twitter.com/8dJJHgMfQ0
— rowynn - Artist Philosopher (NYC) (@rowynn) January 13, 2023
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[via CNET and Artnet News, images via various sources]
