Published to accompany the once-in-a-lifetime exhibition at the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, this is the first major study on Vermeer's life and work for many years.

Vermeer's intensely quiet and enigmatic paintings invite the viewer into a private world, often prompting more questions than answers. Who is being portrayed? Are his subjects real or imagined? And how did he create such an unrivalled sense of intimacy?

Bringing together diverse strands of the Dutch master's professional and private worlds, this is the first major authoritative study of Vermeer's life and work for many years, throwing light on all thirty-seven of his paintings.

With a wide selection of contextual illustrations, commentaries and up-to-date research by distinguished international Vermeer scholars, here is the definitive volume on the most admired of all seventeenth-century Dutch masters, one of the world's greatest artists.

With contributions by
Bart Cornelis, National Gallery, London
Bente Frissen, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Sabine Penot, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
Pieter Roelofs, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Friederike Schuett, Staedel Museum, Frankfurt am Main
Christian Tico Seifert, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh
Ariane van Suchtelen, Mauritshuis, The Hague
Gregor J.M. Weber, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Marjorie E. Wieseman, National Gallery of Art, Washington