Two of Vermeer’s most famous paintings, and the only two with men as the subject, involve some allegorical elements— a focus on someone who studies heaven or the heavens, and someone who studies earth. Hence the former is a painting of an astronomer with his tools of the trade, and the latter is of the geographer with his tools of the trade. It is obvious Vermeer had admiration for science and scientist, and the person who sat for both these portraits, was none other than the most famous scientist of that era– Leewenhoeck, the inventor of the microscope!.
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