53 an indication of widely spaced tacking points placed at intervals of 12 to 16 centimetres along the tacking margins.10 We can surmise that there were five tacking points on the horizontal edges and seven tacking points along the vertical edges. The tacking points in the corners lie conspicuously close to the (subsequently cut-off) outer edges of the canvas. If ones adds up the distances between the inferred tacking holes to these outer tacking holes, one arrives at a hypothetical canvas format approximately 6 centimetres longer on each side. This suggests that, at the time of stretching and immediately prior to sizing and priming, the original canvas format was 6 centimetres longer. The strong vertical distortion of the textile, which continues up to 15 centimetres towards the centre of the painting, could be an indication that this canvas was not prepared by a so-called witter,11 the specialist commercial primer documented in Holland in the 17th century.12 Such broad primary cusping is evidence that the sizing and priming occurred individually, and that the canvas was not cut to measure from a larger, already prepared strip of fabric. It cannot be ascertained whether the fabric was affixed to a narrow wooden framework using wooden pegs, as was the case with the still-preserved original tacking margins of the Guitar Player (c. 1670–72, London, Kenwood House), or whether the wide spacing of the tacking holes suggests the use of the so-called Dutch stretching method, in which canvases were pulled taut by cords that were laced through tacking holes and wound around somewhat larger strainers.13 The format of today’s picture was cut out of the prepared canvas exactly, so that no tacking edges remained. On all four sides, the limits of the ground layer have been cut off, too. The foot of the roemer now revealed as standing very close to the lower edge of the image raises the question as to whether the original format of the picture was somewhat larger. Analysis of the canvas structure has revealed nothing to suggest that this was the case. In fact, a comparison of the lengths of the cusping marks on the upper and the lower side shows that they are generally of similar length, and that they do not become noticeably shorter at the bottom, which would have been an indication that the work had been shortened along the bottom edge (figs. 4 a+b; see X-radiograph in the Atlas). The Ground For the Girl Reading a Letter, as for A Maid Asleep (c. 1656/57, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art)14 created around the same time, Vermeer chose, probably after initially sizing the canvas,15 a light or “warm” grey colour for the ground, typical of this period. In addition to filling and flattening over the canvas pores, this mainly served the function of providing a reflective surface of underpaint for the colours that would be applied on top. After experimenting with coloured grounds – yellowish-brown in the early Diana and Her Companions (1653/54, Den Haag, Mauritshuis),16 a double ground with a reddish-toned upper layer in Christ in the House of Mary and Martha (1656/57, Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland),17 and a bright whitish primer in The Procuress18 in Dresden – he settled on lightgrey grounds from about 1657 (fig. 5). By removing the overpainting, the layer of ground on the upper marginal strip of the Girl Reading a Letter is now clearly visible. In 1968 Kühn had already demonstrated the presence of chalk and a quantity of lead white in the smooth ground layer, Fig. 4 a Johannes Vermeer, Brieflesendes Mädchen am offenen Fenster, Canvas structure analysis, wave map report by Rick Johnson and William Sethares 2017, horizontal thread angels Fig. 4 b Canvas structure analysis, wave map report by Rick Johnson and William Sethares 2017, vertical thread angels Fig. 5 Johannes Vermeer, Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window, detail, upper-right edge with priming
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