Ivan Gaskell’s ‘Vermeer’s Wager’

In doing some research this morning for my Vermeer seminar, I stumbled across this book in the depths of my college’s art library, read the first two pages, and am very close to ordering it on Amazon.com. In Vermeer’s Wager: Speculations on Art History, Theory, and Art Museums, Gaskell studies the art world through lens of a single Vermeer painting, Woman Standing at a Virginal. Right up my alley! In fact, even the first paragraph of the introduction is a tantalizingly amazing premise for a class: “A prominent scholar who is a specialist in seventeenth-century Dutch art and who teaches at a university, but has privileged access to works of art, told me the following story. At the first meeting of each new seminar he brings a seventeenth-century Dutch painting into the room and introduces it to the seminar participants. He informs them that they will be spending the entire semester studying that one painting… The professor and his students [have] the advantage of being able to spend their weeks in intimate contact with an actual painting.” Ahh! What university is it, please, Mr. Gaskell? And the course number, while you’re at it? Anyway, I’ll write a review of his book later as I get into it, but for now, back to the books…