In the painting, A Maid Asleep by Johannes Vermeer, the only thing that is more uncertain than this girl’s future employment as a maid was Vermeer’s intention with the painting.

At one point this painting had a tipped over glass, a man standing in the doorway, and a dog. But he threw that all away (actually just painted over it) in favor of this sleeping maid, making the viewer have to guess what Vermeer’s angle was with this piece. In all likelihood he didn’t even know what he wanted. X-rays of the painting indicate that a man and dog were removed, as previously mentioned, but also that the man had on two different hats, one larger than the other. “The larger hat is seen from the front, indicating that at one stage the man was coming toward the viewer,” while the other hat indicated that he was leaving. But then Vermeer changed his mind entirely, got rid of the man and messed up the still life on the table in the foreground. He made it messy in order to communicate the fact that someone has just left the room, not that someone is expected, which changes the vibe of the piece entirely. All of this is complicated by the fact that the painting above the maid’s head (or what we can see of it) depicts a Cupid’s leg and a theatrical mask. Make of that what you will.

This is Vermeer’s first shot at the style he was so famous for: domestic interiors. At the time that this piece was made, all the Dutch painters were creating work centered around “the misbehavior of unsupervised maidservants.” Once Vermeer gave it a try, he decided that he was pretty good at it. So good in fact that the Met catalogue entry claims that, “Vermeer transfigured an ordinary scene into an investigation of light, color, and texture that supersedes any moralizing lesson.” There you have it folks. Vermeer is a genius.