Johannes Vermeer | The Milkmaid
Johannes Vermeer | The Milkmaid
Want to see this artwork on your wall? Click here to use our free interior design service — fast and 100% free!
♡ Add to Wish List
- 100% hand-painted oil on canvas
- Delivered Framed & Ready to Hang!
- We stretch (Gallery Wrap) every canvas
- Hanging wire is attached to the back
- 100% Money Back Guarantee · Australian Owned
- Any questions? Please call us on 1300 90 21 53
About The Milkmaid by Johannes Vermeer
Vermeer painted The Milkmaid around 1658, when he was in his mid-twenties. A kitchen maid stands at a table by a window, pouring milk from an earthenware jug into a bowl. Nothing else happens. It is one of the most quietly absolute paintings in European art.
What is startling is the seriousness. Kitchen maids appear constantly in Dutch painting of the period, almost always as comic figures or as objects of male attention. Vermeer gives this one the solidity of a monument — broad shoulders, rolled sleeves, strong forearms, complete absorption in a task — and lights her with the same care a portraitist would give a burgomaster.
He was also unusually extravagant with materials. The apron and tablecloth are painted in natural ultramarine, ground from lapis lazuli imported from Afghanistan and at the time worth more by weight than gold. He used it not just for the highlights but through the shadows too, which almost nobody did. X-rays have shown he originally painted a wall map and a laundry basket behind her, then removed both, leaving the wall bare.
The Milkmaid at a glance
- Artist: Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675)
- Painted: c. 1658, Delft
- Movement: Dutch Golden Age
- Original: Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
- Medium: Oil on canvas, 45.5 × 41 cm
Common questions about The Milkmaid
Where is The Milkmaid?
The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, where it hangs in the Gallery of Honour alongside The Night Watch. It is one of only around 35 paintings securely attributed to Vermeer.
Who was the milkmaid?
Unknown. She was almost certainly a real household servant rather than a professional model, but no name survives and Vermeer left no records. She is a kitchen maid rather than a dairymaid — she is pouring milk for cooking, most likely into a bread pudding.
Why is the painting significant?
Because of how seriously it takes her. Dutch painting of the time normally treated kitchen maids as comic or erotic figures; Vermeer painted this one with the gravity and structural weight usually given to important men, and made the pouring of milk feel like the most consequential thing in the room.
What are the details on the floor and wall?
A foot warmer sits on the floor, and the skirting behind it is lined with Delft tiles, one of which shows Cupid. In seventeenth-century Dutch imagery both carried associations with love and desire — a quiet counter-current beneath an otherwise entirely domestic scene.
How big is The Milkmaid?
Small — 45.5 by 41 centimetres. Like most of Vermeer's work it is a modest object that carries far more presence than its size suggests.
Own a hand-painted Milkmaid
This is not a print. Every painting we sell is reproduced in oils on canvas, by hand, by professional artists — no giclée, no computer-generated technique.
Look closely at the bread in the basket and you find Vermeer's strangest technique. The crusts are rendered as dozens of small, distinct, raised beads of thick pale paint — pointillé — sitting proud of the surface so that real light in the real room strikes them and throws real micro-shadows. The bread appears to glitter because it physically does. That effect is not an image of texture; it is texture, and no flat surface can carry it, however high the resolution. Painted by hand in oils, the beads of paint are actual beads of paint again, and the crust catches the light in your room the way it catches it in Amsterdam.
- A range of sizes — choose yours above. The original is small and upright; the composition holds up well at intimate scale.
- Framed and ready to hang, gallery wrap, or rolled canvas if you would rather frame it yourself.
- 30-day money-back guarantee, no questions.
- Free delivery Australia-wide. Australian owned and operated, with a local contact you can actually reach.
Framing Options: You have 3 choices
Option 1. Choose an outer frame - see images below.
You only need to choose one and the painting will be sent to you framed and ready to hang.
* Below is an example of a customer who chose the Gold Ornate frame
Option 2: Choose a Gallery Wrap Stretched Painting.
If you want the frameless modern gallery wrap look then you only need to choose Stretched Gallery Wrap from the finish option dropdown.
You receive your stretched gallery wrap painting ready to hang - with a hanging wire attached behind.
The back of the Stretched Gallery Wrap looks like the image below - it has a hanging wire!
Option 3: Choose Canvas Only if you want to frame the painting yourself.
Your painting will be sent to you in an art tube - you can then frame it yourself or take it to your local framer.
Loved by our customers
The quality of the work is ten out of ten. The piece was affordable and the turnaround time was quite quick. What you see is what you get. I’ll definitely be getting my next painting from Direct Art Australia.
My wife already had a couple of pieces of custom ordered paintings she had collected throughout the last few years and with your large selection to choose from she found the perfect complimentary piece to finish off her room.
Great painting. Brightens up my living room.
Amazing piece…. even better than I expected. Thoroughly recommend Direct Art Australia.
This piece of art work exceeded our expectations. It was purchased for a 50th birthday gift for a lady who has everything! She was overwhelmed at the quality of the painting. Thank you art direct!
Product is as good or better than expected. Beautiful quality, very well packaged and delivered as promised. Very happy indeed with this artwork.
