on Persian rugs;   how modern their conception
of space - they understood it in the seventeenth
century; we are only just beginning to re-understand
it in the twentieth –     see how they mesh the vines
w/ the the tendrils, the flowers with space, utilizing
these linked forms to create wholeness  & radiance;
Delacroix spoke of the Greek coin being built from
the center out;         Vermeer has painted in this way,
according to the principles of mass; How beautifully
they are drawn –   Vermeer does not just make a leaf
and place it in the design, he relates space and leaf;
[in the painting of Vermeer: 'Allegory on the New Testament']
That drapery – it is abstract – observe how this shape between
a shepherd and the tree curves around the center space
while the tree counter-curves opposite it,  cutting an egg
shape...the spaces on the carpet that carry no figuration
are, in fact, shapes of vital importance in building the whole...
Yes, Johannes Vermeer in the 17th century paints in thin layers
                – there is no waste effort – and those small dots – no,
                they are not like Seurat's,
          although they contain all the light
            the pointillist may wish for,
concentrated, hovering before the object,
but not obliterating it...     Vermeer is not
                                           a sun painter, but rather a moon-painter –
like Uccello – that's good, it is the pure,
final stage of art;    the moment when it becomes more real than reality