Black Vermeer

Here's the most unusual image I've come across today: an unknown artist's modern version of Johannes Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring (ca 1665) as a black girl. It's part of ReSignifications: Imagining the Black Body and Re-Staging Histories, a multi-media art exhibition at the Villa La Pietra and The Bardini Museum in Florence, Italy. CLICK to see some male nudes and read the highfalutin waffle. I'm afraid this new version doesn't do it for me. Vermeer's girl has a haunting fragility that somehow captures human mortality. CLICK to view the original masterpiece. The black girl is pretty enough, but that's all: a pretty girl with an over sized heart-shaped earring that merely gets in the way. The pose is all that remains of the original.