Woman with a Water Jug is a genre portrait painting by Dutch Golden Age artist Johannes Vermeer. It was created in 1660. This work is located in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, New York.
Analysis of Woman with a Water Jug
This small-scale painting, measuring just 18 by 16 inches, or 45cm by 40 cm, is a testament to Vermeer’s unparalleled skill in capturing domestic scenes with extraordinary detail and luminosity on a modest canvas.
Here we see a young woman in the traditional clothing of the Dutch Golden Age, in a domestic scene, with a silver water jug and plate, which sits atop a table with a red tablecloth, with a Persian style pattern of blues and yellows.
The woman is looking out an open stained glass window, and the map behind her hints that her husband or father is a merchant traveler, who has possibly just left for a voyage, or she is expecting him to return soon.