For more than three centuries, the female subjects that were the focus of Jan Vermeer's paintings have stood quietly, performing insignificant tasks in the small interiors of his house in Delft, Holland. Surviving in anonymity and often portrayed alone, they were rendered in such an intriguing way that we wish to know who they were, what they were thinking, and how restrictive was this domestic world that they still occupy. In her works of the past three years, Terri Priest has taken them from their original settings, and transferred them into new situations that bring them into the world of modern art and culture. Carefully studying the painting techniques and color relationships of the Dutch master and several modern counterparts, Priest renders these women on larger scale (often much larger), occasionally reversing the pose, and has them viewing or relating to works of 20th century art - sometimes her own earlier paintings or prints.

So faithful and respectful are her stunning replications of Vermeer's women, that they retain their quiet contemplative mystery and intrigue. Similarly, the modern works are rendered with careful accuracy. Like the Duchamp sculpture combining a bycycle wheel and stool that appears in her Vermeer, Duchamp & Priest, we are reminded that disparate "ready-mades" can be brought together to form new and original works of art. The connections made between the appropriated 17th century images and those of the 20th have a remarkable compositional and thematic logic. In Vermeer & Lichtenstein (2000), Vermeer's lute player on the left is juxtaposed with a Lichtenstein woman listening to music on the right, the musical bars and notes flow between them. The painting Vermeer & Hopper portrays a Vermeer woman reading a letter to Edward Hopper's attentive wife within his Western Motel, the muted hues and painted surfaces of both originals carefully adjusted and orchestrated together

The compositional devices that hold together these seemingly disparate "quoted" images are of considerable interest in themselves. But the subject matter is what the viewer keeps coming back to.What are these works about? Clearly Priest is greatly intrigued by the women that were the predominant subjects for Vermeer, and her artist's statement notes, "As the works progressed, narratives began to drive the paintings." She has liberated these women out of their original settings. By enlarging them they are given more space and more importance, they are no longer diminutive, nor confined by both space and domesticity. At times the invitation she extends to them to explore greater space is dramatic, as in Vermeer & D'Arcangelo, where the women ponders the deep expanse of a Pop Art highway, or in Vermeer & Vija Celmins, where another looks out to the infinity of a night sky. Several works play on Vermeer's open window as the connection--and barrier--between the outside world and the domestic interior, traditionally the woman's domain. In Vermeer & Lichtenstein (1999), the window she opens reflects a Pop Art ideal of the modern counterpart to the Delft interior. The theme of woman's confinement or societal limitations is implied in other ways: Vermeer & Matisse places Vermeer's maid behind a Matisse gate, though it does not leave her without means of escape, the Pop Art bars of an earlier Priest painting fall across the face of another woman in Vermeer, Warhol & Priest. The anonymous treatment and objectification of women found in Vermeer's work receive emphasis when juxtaposed against stylized nudes by Matisse, Picasso, Modigliani and Lichtenstein, though the creative expression they represent offers possibilities for the Vermeer women to break out of their imposed roles.

Indeed, Priest sees the bold rule-breaking originality of the appropriated modern images as the answer to the strictures of the feminine world occupied by Vermeer's women. As indicated by the exhibition title, Priest offers choices to the Vermeer friends she has made. And choice is about freedom and personal expression. Relating the Vermeer women to her own art is to bring them in contact with what has given the artist great means of defining herself and her importance, liberating her from the mid-20th century role model of housewife to explore ever-widening horizons. She includes works by Cassatt and O'Keeffe in other paintings as examples of the liberation from traditional feminine roles that an artistic career offers. In looking carefully and thinking deeply about these engaging and beautifully composed paintings by Priest, it becomes clear that these latest paintings are reflections on her own evolution as an artist and liberated woman, and on those things that have been the inspiration---and the obstacles overcome---in her self-realization.

Roger Dunn
Professor of Art
Chair, Art Department
Bridgewater State College