Shown from the waist up, a young woman sits on the other side of the edge of a table, leaning toward us on one elbow in this vertical painting. She looks at us with dark brown eyes under faint, arched brows. She has pale skin with flushed cheeks, a long, rounded nose, and her ruby-red lips are parted. Her brown hair is tucked into a wide, conical hat with gray, pale yellow, and ash-brown vertical stripes. Light falls across her face from our right, so the hat casts a shadow over her eyes and on the far cheek, to our left. Light glints off of two teardrop-shaped pearl earrings. Her muted blue bodice has a few touches of topaz and sky blue create a brocade-like floral pattern. The bodice is trimmed with a wide band of white fur down the front and around the cuffs, which come down just beyond her elbows. A white kerchief tucked into the bodice covers her shoulders. She leans onto her left forearm, to our right, and that arm is close and parallel to the bottom edge of the composition. In that hand she holds a golden flute like a pencil, and her other hand rests against the edge of the table. She leans to our right so we can see the gold lion's head finial at the top of her wooden chair. The area behind her is painted with patches of harvest yellow, fawn brown, muted brick red, and parchment white to create a loosely patterned drapery that fills the background.
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Once cautiously attributed to Johannes Vermeer, Girl with a Flute was more likely painted by a studio associate of Vermeer. Although the general character and appearance of the work relate closely to works by Vermeer, especially Girl with the Red Hat, the quality falls short of Vermeer’s standards. Girl with a Flute demonstrates an awareness of Vermeer’s idiosyncratic painting processes—such as the use of certain unusual pigments and the distinctive application of highlights—but a lack of skill or experience in reproducing them.
The two paintings are so close in concept that it seems likely that the artist of Girl with a Flute was inspired by Girl with the Red Hat. The paintings are not portraits, but informal studies exploring the effects of light and facial expression. Both women gaze at the viewer from beneath striking hats that cast strong shadows over much of their faces. Each wears a rich blue garment and occupies a shallow space defined by a patterned tapestry and a chair with lion-head finials. While the model in Girl with the Red Hat seems to regard the viewer with a quick turn of her head and an inquisitive gaze, her counterpart in Girl with a Flute leans forward in a more static frontal posture.
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