A Maid Asleep

Finished in 1653, scene around 1656-57, showing a young woman dozing at a table beside a wine glass. A half-open door leads to a distant, light-filled room. The work is among Vermeer's earliest genre paintings, marking his transition from religious subjects to domestic interiors.

X-rays reveal Vermeer originally included a man in the doorway and a dog, both later painted out. This editing heightened the painting's ambiguity. Is she drowsy from wine? Dreaming of an absent lover? The rumpled tablecloth and toppled glass hint at recent activity. The work is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.