Diálogos Transdisciplinares em Girl with a Pearl Earring: a Arte ...

Andries des Tombes (1818-1902) comprou-a em Haia, por menos que nada.
Embora estivesse em péssimas condições, o Conselheiro para as Artes do Dutch
Ministry of Internal Affairs, Victor de Stuers, reconheceu que era um Vermeer.
Mais tarde, Des Tombes enviou a tela para Antuérpia para ser restaurada. Após
algumas exposições públicas da obra, Des Tombes acabou por deixar em
testamento a doação de 12 quadros para o Mauritshuis, em Haia, incluindo Girl
with a Pearl Earring, onde está desde 1902.
The history of the acquisition of the Vermeer has by now become legendary. Des
Tombes purchased Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring in 1881 at a sale at the
Venduhuis der Notarissen in the Nobelstraat in The Hague for 2 guilders with a
30 cent premium. Unfornately, the invoice, which was given to the Mauritshuis in
19944, has disappeared without a trace. Thanks to a notice in the former daily Het
Vaderland of 3 March 1903, in which the bequest was made public (pasted in the
Mauritshuis’ witting album), we know that Victor de Stuers had recognised the
painting as a work by Vermeer. De Stuers was Des Tombes’s neighbour – his
collection in his residence at 24 Parkstraat was also open to all interested parties –
and the two gentlemen had gone together to the auction preview. Des Tombes
and De Stuers agreed not to bid against each other. After its acquisition, the badly
neglected canvas was sent to Antuerp, where it was ‘restored’ by the painter Van
der Haeghen. In the Des Tombes family, however, the story was that Des Tombes
and his friend De Stuers had seen a painting that ‘seemed rather beautiful but was
too dirty to evaluate properly’. In this version, it was only after the picture had
been cleaned that the signature become visible, making clear the identity of the
painter. After Des Tombes death on 16 December 1902 (his wifr had died the
year before and their marriage had remained child less) it turned out that he had
secretly bequeathed 12 paintings to the Mauritshuis, including Vermeer’s famous
Girl with a Pearl Earring (Buvelot: 2004, vol. 17).
Quando a Girl with a Pearl Earring foi legado ao Mauritshuis em 1902 por Des
Tombes, a imprensa da época relembrou que o quadro fôra adquirido por apenas
dois florins e, informando que o valor atual atingia mais de quarenta mil florins. O
quadro rapidamente ganhou enorme popularidade e foi batizado de “Mona Lisa do
Norte”, pelo investigador de arte holandesa Ludwing Goldscheider, em Jan
Vermeer. The Paintings: Complete Edition, para quem o famoso quadro de
Vermeer era o mais bonito dos dois. Goldscheider certamente tinha a intenção de
chamar a atenção para a elusiva qualidade de ambos os quadros e a indecifrável
expressão das suas modelos (qtd. in Wheelock, Jr.: 1995, 35-38).