WEBVTT - Selects: Seven - No, Wait, Five - Mysteries of the Art World 0:00:01.000 --> 0:00:03.440 Hey, everybody, it's me joshuam. For this week's select I've 0:00:03.520 --> 0:00:07.560 chosen our episode on art Mysteries. It's a great one. 0:00:07.920 --> 0:00:10.360 Chuck and I are secretly jazzed by art history, it 0:00:10.440 --> 0:00:12.760 turns out, and this episode is the best of any 0:00:12.800 --> 0:00:15.680 we've done on the subject. May also be the only 0:00:15.720 --> 0:00:18.239 one at any rate. It's a good episode, and I 0:00:18.280 --> 0:00:19.640 think you'll enjoy it. 0:00:19.680 --> 0:00:27.520 So enjoy. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production 0:00:27.800 --> 0:00:31.480 of iHeartRadio. 0:00:35.040 --> 0:00:37.720 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and 0:00:37.760 --> 0:00:40.960 there's Charles w Chuck, Brian over there, and Jerry's here somewhere. 0:00:41.040 --> 0:00:44.800 So this is Stuff you should know, the Art World edition. 0:00:46.760 --> 0:00:50.559 Yeah, you know what, I just realized. We record these 0:00:50.560 --> 0:00:56.480 in two's and we just recorded the Pog's episode, right, 0:00:56.720 --> 0:01:01.440 And you didn't say welcome to the podcast. I didn't 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:04.240 have missed opportunity for a great dad joke. 0:01:05.080 --> 0:01:07.200 That sounds like something I would skip though, even had 0:01:07.240 --> 0:01:09.399 I thought of it, or I don't know that I 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:10.039 would have pulled. 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:11.640 The trigger on I think or I could see you 0:01:11.720 --> 0:01:14.919 pulling the trigger and then making fun of yourself. 0:01:15.600 --> 0:01:18.000 Right, But I would have just been engaged in self 0:01:18.040 --> 0:01:19.880 loathing for the rest of the podcast. 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:23.680 Well retroactively, I'm gonna say, I hope everyone enjoyed the podcast. 0:01:25.480 --> 0:01:27.520 Now let's talk about art mysteries. 0:01:28.680 --> 0:01:31.759 I love this one, man, this is great. This reminds 0:01:31.800 --> 0:01:35.039 me of a Stuff you Should Know episode from years back. 0:01:35.160 --> 0:01:35.840 For some reason. 0:01:36.000 --> 0:01:38.800 Well, it's because we don't do these top lists anymore. 0:01:39.640 --> 0:01:41.520 Are part of it, you know, very famously we used 0:01:41.520 --> 0:01:44.440 to have top tens on our old House Stuffworks website, 0:01:44.959 --> 0:01:49.880 of which usually there were maybe seven decent entries, so 0:01:50.040 --> 0:01:52.320 we never did I don't think we ever did a 0:01:52.320 --> 0:01:54.680 full ten on anything. Maybe somebody could probably correct this, 0:01:54.800 --> 0:01:58.600 but this one actually came in at seven. They didn't 0:01:58.600 --> 0:02:00.600 even try, and I don't even and we may do 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:02.760 like five of these. We haven't even figured it out yet. 0:02:03.000 --> 0:02:05.080 We'll see. We're gonna play it fast and loose. I 0:02:05.120 --> 0:02:07.040 think that's another reason why it reminds me of an 0:02:07.080 --> 0:02:11.840 old Stuff you Should Know episode. Yeah, Fast and loose. 0:02:13.040 --> 0:02:15.360 First you got the fast, then you got the loose. 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:20.360 But never furious because he wants to be mad. I 0:02:20.400 --> 0:02:24.000 don't know they should have called out series Fast and Loose. 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:28.480 That I think I've heard it before that that series 0:02:28.560 --> 0:02:31.920 is the highest grossing movie franchise in the history of 0:02:31.960 --> 0:02:33.559 film like worldwide. 0:02:34.000 --> 0:02:36.760 Yeah. You know what's funny is at one point we 0:02:36.760 --> 0:02:39.320 were this is years ago, we were talking with Ludicrous 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:43.440 about doing something with a network, and I, uh, because 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:45.960 he's he's a local guy here in Atlanta. And I 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:49.000 talked to our boss and said, what's he what's he 0:02:49.080 --> 0:02:51.680 doing these days? Like I haven't heard any music? And 0:02:51.760 --> 0:02:55.600 he went, he makes fast and furious movies, Like that's 0:02:55.639 --> 0:02:59.359 his job now, yeah, because he's just getting rich off 0:02:59.360 --> 0:03:02.760 of making these movies, like I can't even imagine. 0:03:02.880 --> 0:03:05.880 And plus also, I mean they're pretty it's pretty involved 0:03:05.960 --> 0:03:08.799 movie making. I would guess, like I'm sure because there's 0:03:08.840 --> 0:03:12.200 so many stars involved that, you know, the shooting schedule 0:03:12.200 --> 0:03:15.720 for each one isn't necessarily you know, a year long 0:03:15.800 --> 0:03:17.920 endeavor or anything like that, and they probably have it 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:21.360 down to like a pretty fast science by now. But like, 0:03:21.400 --> 0:03:23.040 I would think that would eat up a pretty decent 0:03:23.080 --> 0:03:25.520 amount of your time shooting one of those films every 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:29.239 few you know, a couple of times, well, I guess 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:30.040 every few years. 0:03:30.120 --> 0:03:31.079 I only saw one of those. 0:03:31.120 --> 0:03:34.760 I think, Man, I'm slowly like degenerating into Bob Newhart. Man. 0:03:34.920 --> 0:03:36.320 Have you known man good. 0:03:37.400 --> 0:03:39.960 Yeah, you could degenerate into worse things than that. But 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:43.560 I mean, like I've really I'm really hitting that new 0:03:43.600 --> 0:03:44.640 Heart note these days. 0:03:44.640 --> 0:03:46.840 I've noticed that's a great note. I love it. I've 0:03:46.840 --> 0:03:49.320 always wanted Bob Newhart as my podcasting partner. 0:03:49.400 --> 0:03:53.880 So well, you've you've there, you go, You've got it. 0:03:54.760 --> 0:03:57.360 All right, number one on the list. You want to 0:03:57.400 --> 0:03:59.240 talk a little uh cut of Asio. 0:04:00.440 --> 0:04:05.920 So Caravaggio is my new favorite painter. Oh yeah, not 0:04:06.000 --> 0:04:11.360 just because he was a scummy lowlife swordsman from the murderer. 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:19.159 He was a gambler, He had weapons charges against him 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:23.000 while he was alive. He was not a good guy 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:27.599 by any stretch of the imagination. Very troubled person is 0:04:27.640 --> 0:04:30.479 a really polite way to put it. But if you 0:04:30.720 --> 0:04:33.839 look at his art, like I had no idea, I've 0:04:33.880 --> 0:04:36.080 seen like so many works of his art and I 0:04:36.120 --> 0:04:38.320 never pieced together that they were the same person. And 0:04:38.360 --> 0:04:41.000 then when I really started to read some criticism of 0:04:41.000 --> 0:04:43.440 his work, I'm like, oh my god, this guy he's 0:04:43.520 --> 0:04:45.919 considered one of the fathers of modern art, and this 0:04:46.000 --> 0:04:48.599 guy was painting at the beginning of the seventeenth century, 0:04:48.640 --> 0:04:53.440 the early sixteen hundreds, and just like POGs, he burned 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:57.360 hot and bright and fast and furious. 0:04:57.720 --> 0:05:02.240 Actually sadly, Oh, that's right, that wasn't even forced. Nice work, 0:05:02.279 --> 0:05:09.400 Bob so. Michelangelo Marisi de Caravaggio was an Italian Baroque painter. 0:05:11.080 --> 0:05:14.240 He at one point in sixteen oh six killed a 0:05:14.279 --> 0:05:19.320 man name Ramuccio Tomasani and said, I got to get 0:05:19.320 --> 0:05:22.360 out of here because I'm in big trouble now, and 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:26.000 went to went away from Rome and fled to Malta, 0:05:26.880 --> 0:05:32.120 where he had a pretty brief but I guess, notable stay. 0:05:32.200 --> 0:05:35.520 He was only there about six months and kind of 0:05:35.600 --> 0:05:38.400 hiding out and quickly hooked up with the Knights of 0:05:38.480 --> 0:05:42.120 Malta and was briefly one of the Knights of Malta, 0:05:43.480 --> 0:05:45.760 like for a month. Yeah, and painted one of his 0:05:45.839 --> 0:05:51.320 most famous paintings there, the oil on canvas twelve feet 0:05:51.400 --> 0:05:54.960 by seventeen feet, the Beheading of John the Baptist. 0:05:55.760 --> 0:05:58.279 Yeah, it was an altarpiece for the Order of Saint John, 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:01.200 also known as the Knights of Malta. They were going 0:06:01.240 --> 0:06:04.119 to again put this behind the altar in their church 0:06:04.720 --> 0:06:08.840 on Malta, and it was actually his little entry fee. 0:06:08.880 --> 0:06:12.080 They charged an entry fee usually money to their initiates. 0:06:12.560 --> 0:06:16.720 But they accepted, Yeah, but they accepted this altars giant 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:20.880 painting of Saint John the Baptist being beheaded, and it 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:23.760 was actually, I mean, as far as the Caravaggio goes, 0:06:23.839 --> 0:06:26.760 especially toward the end of his life, it's actually fairly 0:06:26.839 --> 0:06:31.280 tame because there's not you know, like jets of blood 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:33.719 spurting out. It's a pool of blood that's being shown. 0:06:35.040 --> 0:06:39.200 He paints some really violent stuff and like you said 0:06:39.200 --> 0:06:42.320 that that kind of that. He was a master of 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:47.280 light and shadow. It's called kira scuro and he used 0:06:47.320 --> 0:06:50.520 it to really dramatic effect, including in that painting, and 0:06:50.560 --> 0:06:52.720 in fact, one of the other paintings that you might 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:57.679 have seen of his chuck it's called Judith beheading Holofernes. 0:06:58.040 --> 0:06:58.680 Have you seen it? 0:06:58.720 --> 0:07:00.280 I have so. 0:07:00.440 --> 0:07:05.240 Judith, the woman who's in that painting, the woman who 0:07:05.400 --> 0:07:09.680 modeled for that for Judith, that was the woman that 0:07:09.720 --> 0:07:12.520 he killed. Bernuccio TOMASONI over. 0:07:13.640 --> 0:07:16.440 Right, did you know that I did? 0:07:17.440 --> 0:07:17.560 Oh? 0:07:17.640 --> 0:07:17.920 You did? 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:18.360 Okay? 0:07:18.560 --> 0:07:21.200 Well? At anyway, they really in this House of Works 0:07:21.280 --> 0:07:23.120 article they called it a petty squabble and that that 0:07:23.160 --> 0:07:24.280 really doesn't tell the story. 0:07:24.880 --> 0:07:27.440 Yeah, another explanation I saw was that it was over 0:07:27.480 --> 0:07:31.560 a tennis wager. And this is real tennis, not lawn tennis, 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:36.520 and real tennis is kind of like this kooky mix 0:07:36.640 --> 0:07:43.400 between squash and racquetball and tennis, and it's all indoors 0:07:43.440 --> 0:07:47.480 and there's like horse sheds basically involved that you can 0:07:47.560 --> 0:07:50.120 play off the roofs of It's really interesting stuff. And 0:07:50.160 --> 0:07:52.720 he used to play that a lot too. But so 0:07:52.800 --> 0:07:55.840 it was either over a wager or it was over 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:56.760 this woman. 0:07:57.760 --> 0:08:00.800 Her name was what was it, Judith. 0:08:01.080 --> 0:08:05.080 No Felidae Fellide I believe was the actual woman's name 0:08:05.240 --> 0:08:08.160 who modeled for Judith. So he ends up on Malta, 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:12.080 he becomes a knight, and when he becomes this night 0:08:12.120 --> 0:08:14.880 he paints his altarpiece and he signs his name in 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:17.360 the pool of blood, which you're like, well, he's an artist. 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:20.880 That seems like something an artist would do, not Caravajio. 0:08:21.000 --> 0:08:23.600 This is actually the first and only work of his 0:08:23.760 --> 0:08:26.040 that he ever signed, which a lot of people are like, Okay, 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:27.720 wait a minute, let's examine this. 0:08:28.200 --> 0:08:30.040 Yeah, And it kind of took a while for it 0:08:30.120 --> 0:08:34.840 to be even very visible because it underwent some restorations 0:08:34.880 --> 0:08:37.800 over the years and in the nineteen fifties they did 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:41.959 a restoration where they really could see the signature and 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:44.360 what it said I don't know about for the first time, 0:08:44.360 --> 0:08:52.000 but like super clearly at least, and it said F period, god, 0:08:53.200 --> 0:08:55.959 F mitche lang m I, C H E, l A 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:00.400 n G. And then you know, of course, everyone it's like, well, 0:09:00.440 --> 0:09:02.880 what does this mean because there is no F in 0:09:02.960 --> 0:09:06.520 his name. It's not like his initial. Is he saying, 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:12.679 you know, hey, screw Michelangelo, myself, screw me, or I'm screwed. No, 0:09:12.679 --> 0:09:14.960 no one really said that. They thought the F. They 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:17.480 are a couple of different theories. Thought it was shorthand 0:09:17.520 --> 0:09:22.280 for fratter or which means brother because he was one 0:09:22.320 --> 0:09:24.439 of the knights, and maybe he just meant like brother 0:09:25.040 --> 0:09:28.439 Michelangelo or whatever. And then some other people said, no, 0:09:28.559 --> 0:09:33.560 maybe it means stands for fesset fecit, which is Latin 0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:38.240 for did, translating basically into I did it, and it's 0:09:38.240 --> 0:09:40.520 spelled out in blood, kind of confessing to his crime. 0:09:41.800 --> 0:09:44.160 Right, So that's kind of like where the mystery comes in. 0:09:44.360 --> 0:09:48.680 Was he confessing to the crime of murdering Renuccio Tomusoni? 0:09:50.720 --> 0:09:54.000 From what I saw, most I can't say most, but 0:09:54.200 --> 0:09:57.199 the art historians and critics that I saw basically said no, 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:01.280 he almost certainly wasn't doing that. For one, everybody knew 0:10:01.320 --> 0:10:03.920 that he did it. He'd already been convicted in absentia, 0:10:04.400 --> 0:10:06.720 so it's not like he was confessing to it. Although 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:09.120 you can make the case that he was confessing in 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:12.000 the Catholic sense of the word, you know what I mean. 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:19.280 Like before God, yeah, exactly, or de Bear's That painting 0:10:19.320 --> 0:10:21.880 still hangs at Saint John's co Cathedral in multitude. 0:10:22.520 --> 0:10:24.760 Okay, yeah, yeah, well, I mean it was the altar piece, 0:10:24.800 --> 0:10:26.439 like they like, it was a big deal that they 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:28.120 got their hands on it, because he was a celebrated 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:31.200 painter at the time, already in his lifetime. But the 0:10:31.320 --> 0:10:34.680 other interpretation that he was saying f as in Freighter 0:10:34.800 --> 0:10:42.080 or Brother Michelangelo about himself, that's probably the likelier version 0:10:42.160 --> 0:10:45.520 because he was at the time seeking a pardon from 0:10:45.520 --> 0:10:49.280 the Pope so he could return to Rome, and by 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:52.720 saying like, I'm in this holy order, I'm basically like 0:10:52.800 --> 0:10:57.240 a Catholic holy man now a leader of the church, 0:10:57.840 --> 0:10:59.960 because the Order of Saint John, the Knights of Malta 0:11:00.080 --> 0:11:04.200 of inducted me. He was basically shouting it loud and 0:11:04.240 --> 0:11:08.960 proud by signing that one particular very holy painting that 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:09.400 he did. 0:11:09.600 --> 0:11:13.000 But they said, nice, try, buddy, and they kicked him 0:11:13.040 --> 0:11:17.080 out for being a quote foul and rotten member end quote. 0:11:17.120 --> 0:11:17.800 So it didn't work. 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:21.360 A month after a month, dude, he lasted a month 0:11:21.520 --> 0:11:23.600 in the Order of Saint John. And it's not like 0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:27.959 they ran around willy nilly inducting people like. They basically 0:11:29.720 --> 0:11:34.559 had no idea that they had. What was Vic's last 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:38.600 name in The Shield, victay Beck, No, not victay Back. 0:11:39.200 --> 0:11:41.320 I don't know. I didn't watch The Shield, Oh. 0:11:41.200 --> 0:11:42.679 You didn't know. It was good. I rewatched like the 0:11:42.760 --> 0:11:45.880 last seven episodes the other night, over a couple of nights. 0:11:45.920 --> 0:11:48.760 It still holds up actually, But anyway, they didn't realize 0:11:48.760 --> 0:11:51.720 that they had inducted him, the guy from the Shield, 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:54.480 and they figured it out pretty quickly. So he made 0:11:54.520 --> 0:11:58.160 his way back from Malta to I believe sicily on 0:11:58.200 --> 0:11:59.800 his way to Rome, and I think he actually got 0:11:59.800 --> 0:12:03.800 a harden and got into yet another squabble, another sword fight, 0:12:04.320 --> 0:12:09.360 and sustained some wounds and between infected wounds, they think 0:12:09.360 --> 0:12:14.080 he got a staff infection lead poisoning. He apparently had 0:12:14.120 --> 0:12:16.760 gone rather mad from being exposed to the paints that 0:12:16.800 --> 0:12:21.240 he painted with and then sun exposure sunstroke on the 0:12:21.240 --> 0:12:26.480 beach in Tuscan. He finally killed him, and so it goes, Yes, 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:28.880 it does. But his paintings are still just amazing. I 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:30.160 can look at him all day, you know. 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:32.560 Yeah, me too. I like this. I like this stuff. 0:12:33.160 --> 0:12:39.040 I do too. So that's a Caravaggio. How about Vermire, Well, 0:12:39.040 --> 0:12:41.600 I think we should take a break. Oh gosh, and 0:12:42.200 --> 0:13:04.200 we'll be back right after this. All right, we had 0:13:04.240 --> 0:13:09.080 a great cliffhanger with Vermire. Vermire, the very famous Dutch 0:13:09.200 --> 0:13:13.959 artist Johannes Vermire, had a very famous painting, a lot 0:13:13.960 --> 0:13:16.920 of very famous paintings, but one in particular that has 0:13:17.040 --> 0:13:19.600 had a bunch of names over the years. In fact, 0:13:19.600 --> 0:13:21.760 it did not get the name Girl with a Pearl 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:25.240 ear Ring until the twentieth century. It was called everything 0:13:25.320 --> 0:13:29.559 from a Girl with a turban to Girl with an Earring, 0:13:30.080 --> 0:13:32.959 had lots of different names because it was not officially 0:13:33.559 --> 0:13:37.360 titled by Vermir nor dated, even though they think it 0:13:37.400 --> 0:13:40.679 was around sixteen sixty five. Yeah, he was just like 0:13:40.720 --> 0:13:44.400 this dude who lived in Delft in the Netherlands and 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:48.640 never left his hometown and had a wife in fifteen 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:54.720 kids fifteen yeah, fifteen kids, and it just kind of painted. 0:13:55.000 --> 0:13:59.160 And he made probably a comparatively small number of works. 0:13:59.160 --> 0:14:01.960 I think around third six are attributed to him, and 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:04.760 there's a theory that as many as a fifth of 0:14:04.800 --> 0:14:09.560 those were done by his oldest daughter Maria. But he's 0:14:09.679 --> 0:14:13.160 kind of like this enigma at the time, not just personally, 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:16.920 but also the stuff he was painting. There was a 0:14:17.760 --> 0:14:20.360 huge movement among the Dutch painters at the time that 0:14:20.400 --> 0:14:26.400 they would paint like these, you know, horrific hellscapes or 0:14:26.760 --> 0:14:30.720 there was a lot of like obvious narrative and symbolism 0:14:30.880 --> 0:14:33.560 just all over the paintings. There was just a lot 0:14:33.600 --> 0:14:36.000 going on. Vermire went a different way where he would 0:14:36.000 --> 0:14:42.120 almost peek in on very normal daily life and capture 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:46.600 like these these really just kind of boring or otherwise 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:50.160 mundane moments. But he did it in a way that 0:14:50.160 --> 0:14:53.880 that this guy was like the master of light. He 0:14:53.960 --> 0:14:57.600 makes he makes Thomas Kinkaid look like puke as far 0:14:57.640 --> 0:15:00.800 as like you know, light mastery. 0:15:00.920 --> 0:15:04.000 So girl with a pearl earring. Everyone has seen it, 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:06.320 Like I said, it's very famous it's a young girl 0:15:07.120 --> 0:15:10.160 looks to be sort of like mid teenage years, looking 0:15:10.160 --> 0:15:13.680 over her shoulder. She's wearing a dress. She's wearing that turban. 0:15:15.160 --> 0:15:18.560 Very prominent ear rings, large pearl earrings, and pearls factored 0:15:18.600 --> 0:15:20.360 into quite a few of his works over the years. 0:15:20.960 --> 0:15:22.920 And it's one of those paintings where the eyes follow 0:15:22.960 --> 0:15:25.760 you supposedly, which we've talked about in one of our 0:15:25.840 --> 0:15:27.960 short stuff episodes. 0:15:27.960 --> 0:15:28.880 On Mona Lisa. 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:32.520 I think, so, yeah, it's, you know, the effect of 0:15:32.600 --> 0:15:35.880 the eyes following, which doesn't happen in all paintings with eyes. 0:15:36.000 --> 0:15:38.360 Oh no, the Mona Lisa's eyes actually don't follow you. 0:15:38.400 --> 0:15:40.200 I think that was the big reveal of that one, 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:40.640 was it? 0:15:41.360 --> 0:15:43.800 Yeah? All right, So he paints his painting, and then, 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:46.880 of course the mystery of this one is who is 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:50.120 this person. There has been speculation that it might be 0:15:50.120 --> 0:15:53.840 a mistress. A lot of people think it was his 0:15:53.960 --> 0:15:57.880 daughter Maria, who would have been about fifteen or sixteen, 0:15:58.080 --> 0:16:03.080 and like you said, who some people believe painted about 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:06.040 a fifth of the works attributed to him, because about 0:16:06.080 --> 0:16:10.120 a fifth of his collected works aren't. I mean this 0:16:10.160 --> 0:16:13.080 sounds mean to say, but they aren't as they aren't 0:16:13.120 --> 0:16:16.000 up to snuff compared to his other works, so they 0:16:16.040 --> 0:16:17.880 sort of stand out from the rest, so they think 0:16:17.920 --> 0:16:19.840 that they may have been Maria's good paintings. 0:16:19.880 --> 0:16:22.160 Still, yeah, there's still a lot better than anything I 0:16:22.200 --> 0:16:22.520 could say. 0:16:22.600 --> 0:16:24.760 Yeah, it's not like there were stick figures, you know, 0:16:24.840 --> 0:16:25.480 out of nowhere. 0:16:26.040 --> 0:16:27.760 They're like this, Vermere seems off. 0:16:28.520 --> 0:16:31.240 But you know, if you've there was a nineteen ninety 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:34.960 nine novel from Tracy Chevalier, The Girl with a Pearl Earring, 0:16:35.000 --> 0:16:39.240 and then the two thousand film adaptation starring Scarlett Johansson, 0:16:39.760 --> 0:16:42.440 who was perfectly cast. She looks, you know, quite a 0:16:42.440 --> 0:16:44.520 bit like The Girl with a Pearl ear Ring. But 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:46.960 this was historical fiction. If you've seen that movie and 0:16:47.000 --> 0:16:50.160 you're like, no, she was the family's maid's assistant and 0:16:50.280 --> 0:16:53.840 love interest to Vermire, that was just I don't even 0:16:53.840 --> 0:16:56.000 think that was based on anything. It's just historical fiction. 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:01.320 Yes, from what I've seen, the art critics and historians 0:17:01.360 --> 0:17:04.800 basically tend to think that there was no person that 0:17:04.840 --> 0:17:05.760 this was modeled on. 0:17:05.840 --> 0:17:06.080 There. 0:17:06.359 --> 0:17:09.560 It wasn't even necessarily his daughter. In fact, it was 0:17:10.640 --> 0:17:14.320 kind of a trend at the time, a painting called 0:17:14.320 --> 0:17:18.080 a trony, which was an imaginary figure, a person who 0:17:18.119 --> 0:17:21.320 didn't actually exist, and the point was to kind of 0:17:21.400 --> 0:17:27.639 show off things like costumes and jewelry, which is ostensibly 0:17:27.720 --> 0:17:30.560 the point of that painting. But the thing is the vermire, 0:17:31.720 --> 0:17:36.160 the face that he did and the place that he 0:17:36.200 --> 0:17:39.080 put her. Like we were talking about how she gets 0:17:39.119 --> 0:17:41.159 compared to Mona Lisa. She's called the Mona Lisa of 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:44.440 the North. Mona Lisa is like sitting back in the painting. 0:17:44.960 --> 0:17:46.840 The girl with the pearl earring is like right in 0:17:46.880 --> 0:17:50.399 the foreground, like right, there's very little between you and her, 0:17:50.920 --> 0:17:52.920 and she's turned around and her mouth so open, which 0:17:52.920 --> 0:17:57.240 apparently was very unusual for painting Dutch painting at the time, 0:17:57.960 --> 0:17:59.679 and it looks like she's going to say something. I 0:17:59.680 --> 0:18:04.160 guess that is what entrances people with this, this image 0:18:04.200 --> 0:18:06.400 that you know, what's she going to say? What did 0:18:06.440 --> 0:18:09.280 he capture her about to say? You know, it looks 0:18:09.320 --> 0:18:12.280 like she's turning around like, oh, and you know this 0:18:12.400 --> 0:18:13.760 other thing I hadn't told. 0:18:13.600 --> 0:18:19.240 You maybe she was an improv comedian. And she was, yes, yes, 0:18:20.480 --> 0:18:22.440 you never know, but this is a mystery that'll never 0:18:22.480 --> 0:18:25.200 be solved, which sometimes I like those kind of mysteries 0:18:25.200 --> 0:18:26.240 when it comes to stuff like this. 0:18:26.920 --> 0:18:28.960 Yeah, And I saw that argued as well that it 0:18:29.000 --> 0:18:31.080 was like, you know, if we knew who she was, 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:33.600 it would just it would we would lose a lot 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:34.600 of the interest in. 0:18:34.520 --> 0:18:36.000 It, and we would have found out by now. 0:18:36.040 --> 0:18:39.800 I think, yes, yeah, and you're right, we probably won't 0:18:39.800 --> 0:18:42.359 ever know. But because of this so like, it wasn't 0:18:42.400 --> 0:18:46.760 like very well thought of, or nobody really thought much 0:18:46.800 --> 0:18:49.160 of it until nineteen ninety five in the National Gallery 0:18:49.240 --> 0:18:52.399 used it as the poster for their big exhibit. But 0:18:52.520 --> 0:18:54.240 since then a lot of people have really kind of 0:18:54.280 --> 0:18:56.800 examined it. And I hadn't noticed this before, but I 0:18:56.800 --> 0:18:58.560 saw it, pointed out Chuck. If you look at the 0:18:58.600 --> 0:19:01.719 pearl earring, first of all, it's improbably large, is how 0:19:01.760 --> 0:19:04.720 I saw it described, like that the ear couldn't physically 0:19:04.760 --> 0:19:09.480 hold up a pearl that size. But then secondly, it's 0:19:09.520 --> 0:19:13.280 really basically made with two brushstrokes. Both of them are 0:19:13.280 --> 0:19:16.600 reflecting light. One is from the light source and then 0:19:16.600 --> 0:19:19.560 the lower one is reflecting the light off of the caller. 0:19:20.080 --> 0:19:22.240 And it's pretty amazing that, you know, we talk about 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:24.359 this the girl with the pearl earing, and this pearl 0:19:24.400 --> 0:19:28.600 itself is is like a kind of a cultural icon too. 0:19:28.800 --> 0:19:32.159 And it's basically just two brushstrokes, which is kind of 0:19:32.160 --> 0:19:34.159 goes to show how great Vermir was. 0:19:34.359 --> 0:19:34.800 Amazing. 0:19:35.520 --> 0:19:40.400 Have you ever seen Tim's Vermure the documentary? I have not, Oh, Chuck, 0:19:40.440 --> 0:19:43.400 You've got to see it. It's directed by Teller from 0:19:43.440 --> 0:19:46.480 Penn and Teller, which makes you think, like, how did 0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:49.520 he direct if he doesn't talk, you know, but he 0:19:49.640 --> 0:19:54.679 somehow did. I think it's about what that's just a 0:19:54.680 --> 0:19:58.680 bit and it's about It's about a guy who basically 0:19:58.680 --> 0:20:03.960 figured out that Vermire somehow projected images that he built 0:20:04.080 --> 0:20:06.919 in real life onto a canvas and then painted him 0:20:06.960 --> 0:20:10.280 that way, and he actually replicates a Vermir like perfectly. 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:14.040 It's really just one of the better documentaries you'll ever see. 0:20:14.400 --> 0:20:14.840 Very cool. 0:20:15.600 --> 0:20:17.760 Yeah, so what do you think? 0:20:18.080 --> 0:20:22.639 On to rafae yel, Yeah, so the mystery here and 0:20:22.720 --> 0:20:24.920 this is one of our This actually has a Simpsons 0:20:24.920 --> 0:20:29.800 crossover as well, which is kind of fun because Raphael 0:20:30.560 --> 0:20:33.200 painted a very famous painting called Portrait of a young 0:20:33.280 --> 0:20:38.720 Man and is largely described as one of the most famous, 0:20:38.760 --> 0:20:41.199 if not the most famous, pieces of art to go 0:20:41.280 --> 0:20:45.320 missing during the plundering of great art in World War 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:49.600 Two by Hitler in The Gang. And this is a 0:20:49.640 --> 0:20:53.080 crossover with the Simpsons in that in the Fighting Hellfish 0:20:53.119 --> 0:20:58.360 episode when Grandpa Abe and Burns are stealing art, this 0:20:58.400 --> 0:21:00.920 is one of the paintings Portrait of a young Man. Oh, 0:21:01.000 --> 0:21:04.160 it's one of the paintings that they stole. Wow, which 0:21:04.200 --> 0:21:06.360 shows that you know Simpsons writers back then at least, 0:21:06.359 --> 0:21:10.160 we're definitely doing their work, like their research work. Because 0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:11.120 that's a nice little easter egg. 0:21:11.160 --> 0:21:14.600 I think, yeah, totally. Doesn't it even talk? Doesn't it 0:21:14.640 --> 0:21:18.240 say something like someone's guilty conscience or something. I don't 0:21:18.240 --> 0:21:19.119 remember making that up. 0:21:19.160 --> 0:21:20.639 I don't know. I don't remember. I mean, it's been 0:21:20.640 --> 0:21:22.000 a long time since I've seen that one. But it 0:21:22.040 --> 0:21:23.880 was one of the great episodes, I think. 0:21:24.760 --> 0:21:27.359 So the Portrait of the young Man, which they think 0:21:28.040 --> 0:21:31.119 was a Raphael self portrait, and actually we have no 0:21:31.200 --> 0:21:33.720 idea what the colors were because the only photographs we 0:21:33.760 --> 0:21:36.119 have of it were in black and white. But he 0:21:36.200 --> 0:21:40.760 used to hang in the Prince's zar Torski Museum in Poland, 0:21:41.800 --> 0:21:45.919 along with two other really important paintings, Leonardo's Lady with 0:21:45.960 --> 0:21:49.879 an Ermine, which is a scout stoat. I can't remember 0:21:50.160 --> 0:21:53.879 kind of a weasel like animal and then Remembrant's landscape 0:21:53.880 --> 0:21:58.000 with the Good Samaritan, and all three of those and 0:21:58.080 --> 0:22:01.679 everything else, and the princes Are Museum were swiped by 0:22:01.680 --> 0:22:04.119 the Nazis when they came to Poland and placed in 0:22:04.200 --> 0:22:07.399 the office of a guy named Hans Frank, who was 0:22:07.440 --> 0:22:10.520 the head of the government for the Nazis in Poland. 0:22:10.600 --> 0:22:13.800 Right, Yeah, and you know, they almost they almost got 0:22:13.800 --> 0:22:17.439 these hidden away successfully when Poland was being invaded. They 0:22:17.520 --> 0:22:19.959 knew that the art was going to be plundered, and 0:22:20.040 --> 0:22:23.000 so those three paintings were actually rescued by the prince 0:22:23.640 --> 0:22:27.679 and hidden away in a house in a place that 0:22:27.760 --> 0:22:32.320 I can't even pronounce, Sienawa. I'm not sure what that is. 0:22:32.400 --> 0:22:36.439