TIM’S VERMEER

US, 2013, 80 minutes, Colour.
Tim Jenison, Pension Jilette, Teller, David Hockney.
Directed by Teller.

From Pinball Machines to painting Vermeer.

Tim, that is Tim Jenison, has had a most colourful life. He describes himself as an inventor – and the first part of the film is most interesting in showing all the things he got up to with his inventing and repairing, from the above-mention pinball machines to all kinds of engines and flight and, in the last 10 years, examining the painting and techniques of the Dutch painter of the 17th century, Johannes Vermeer.

This documentary has been written and produced by his longtime friend, Pen Jilette, very well-known along with his partner in magic shows and entertainment, Teller, who directs the film (and is momentarily seen in some of the sequences). tJilette narrates the film.

What interested Tim Jenison about Vermeer’s paintings is not only their beauty, but the strength of their light. Examining many of the paintings and thinking about them, he wondered whether there was some kind of optical device that enabled Vermeer to capture the colours and, especially the full light (more like a shot on video and painting by other masters), and the extraordinary detail of the beautiful compositions as well as the characters, the Girl with the Pearl Earring being possibly the best known. For his project, he chose The Music Lesson – housed, in fact, in Buckingham Palace where, we see, the Queen was reluctant for him to see the painting but relented, giving him 30 minutes to study the painting but with no cameras or devices.

The film takes us step by step in Tim’s venture, Tim emphasising that he was in no way a painter. We see him talking to a number of artists, especially David Hockney, who had been studying the variety of devices that the 17th century painters, especially in Holland, could have been using, a century of telescopes, magnifying glasses and other instruments. Tim sets up a Camera Oscura, explaining how it works in capturing an image and then projecting it, upside down, on a wall. He experiments with the Camera, with a variety of lenses which enabled the image projected to become much larger. He then experiments with lenses without the Camera and finds that the images can be protected, quite large, on walls.

Tim also has conversations with an expert on the eye, who give some information about the connection between the retina and the brain, the capacities of the eye for focusing, on seeing light, more than the artist could have seen for his painting.

The latter part of the film shows Tim enlarging the original image, painting the whole work of art over a period of more than four months, painstaking detail, day by day. It is a huge undertaking, especially for an inventor rather than a painter. Ultimately he completes the work and invites the experts to have a look at it, David Hockney being particularly complimentary at his skill in being able to recreate the light as well as the intricate detail.

Tim says that there is no written record of any help that Vermeer might have had, even of apprenticeship with a contemporary artist. The artists remind Tim that while there might not be any written documents, the paintings themselves are documents which can be studied and speculated on. It would seem that Vermeer used some kind of ocular device – and preserved its anonymity much like the inventor does not like others to see what has been created, protecting the creation by secrecy, or, in these days, by patents.

Many would regret that they had no opportunities to study fine arts when they are at school – and found themselves usually behind in appreciation of paintings. This is a fine opportunity for their horizons to be opened, for the skill of the artist and the wonder of the achievement.