About Johannes Vermeer Art is a Web site dedicated to the Dutch artist. The site is self‐ explanatory and easy to use, with the home page containing all the links needed to use the entire site. All of Vermeer’s works are included under the section called “oil paintings.” Here, each work is illustrated, and there are few more thumbnails to show detail. Also included is a discussion on the work, its execution and imagery.
Interesting portions of this site include “Press releases” and the “Vermeer forum”. “Press releases” includes mentions of Vermeer or his works that have appeared in the news with links to further information or the complete article. The only flaw here is that it is not regularly updated. The “Vermeer forum” is a group of discussion boards for people to post comments on various topics related to Vermeer such as his life, his paintings or the site itself.
Additional problems plague the site. The pages where the true content can be found are tedious to view. Both the “Biography” and “Iconography” sections contain some useful information, but the site’s author has arranged them in such a way that users get little information per page and are required to keep clicking “next” to see the rest of the information. The “Biography” alone takes six pages to view, even though it is very brief and could have easily been listed on one page.
Another drawback of the site is the focus on commercial endeavors. The second link on the page takes users to an area where they can buy reproductions of Vermeer works. Every page within the site has an ad enticing viewers to purchase their own oil painting reproduction of a Vermeer. The “Vermeer links” page is also questionable. The first two sections entitled “Museum” and “Informative” respectively point users to places where more information on Vermeer can be found. The next division, “Galleries,” might as well have been mixed in with the “Museum” portion. These three areas are useful for students or aficionados of Vermeer. The final and by far the largest section of links is dubbed “Miscellaneous” ‐ and that is just what it is. Some of the sites are relevant only because they deal with art. Others are hardly appropriate. Because of the size of this section and the lack of description, this collection of resources is unwieldy and therefore not useful. There are so many art links here that users could spend days looking at them all. While this is a commendable collection, many links are extraneous at best.
While admirable in its attempt to include images of all of Vermeer’s works, the site is brief in its content. A more complete biography can be found at Olga’s Gallery <http://www.abcgallery.com/V/vermeer/vermeerbio.html>. This discussion of the artist also contains links to his works. About Vermeer Art is recommended only for collections where Vermeer is just of passing interest.
