Richelieu · paintings worth a closer look

Give a small painting a little room in your visit. Up here, among Northern European and early French paintings, a quiet action can hold your attention as firmly as a crowded scene. Try it with The Lacemaker, by Johannes Vermeer, a Dutch painter working in the seventeenth century. The picture is only about the size of a small book. Look at the coloured threads nearest you: their edges soften into a blur. Then let your eyes settle on the woman's work, where the forms become more precise. Light comes from the right. That change in sharpness helps draw you into her concentration, almost as though your own eyes were adjusting to the task. We do not know who the woman was, or whether lace-making was her profession. You can still recognise the absorbed attention of someone using her hands. Carry that way of looking into another painting here. Find where the light falls, notice which detail stays sharp, and see how the painter directs your attention before you have read a single word.