If you are interested in the works of Rembrandt and Vermeer and other Dutch painters, it is worth looking at these three Blogs and the one for the National gallery. I guess there are as many interpretations on technique of artists as there are viewers of their work, probably more, when rembering that there have been many art historians in the past that simply made interpretations based on hearsay.
Looking at these Blogs you can at least feel some connection to the world in which the artists lived, many in situations that would be counted today as unfortunate or down right bad luck. Vermeer is of interest in his seemingly disinterest in earning money but over interest in producing children, especially when he seemed to produce very little and not sell enough to pay for the up keep of his increasing family. Whether this then led to the sad state of health of his children I would not know, many died in infancy. He produced a few allegorical paintings from when he was 25 being very much in the Carravagio style and then moved to produced a collection of paintings that almost exclusively used his home and family as their base and had a soft focus photographic quality. The other strange thing was the absence of any drawings, he produced works with huge precision and yet without seemingly doing any preliminarily sketches. Rembrandt on the other hand seemed to have created a huge folio of work which gives a good sense of progression and a guide to the artists approach.
It is certain to my eye that in many ways the two artists produced outstandingly modern visions, Vermeer the clear light and photographic technique, whilst Rembrandt put texture and expressionism, most notable in his last few works.
My own unfinished copy of a Vermeerhttp://www.rembrandtpainting.net/rembrandt_van_rijn_legend_and_man.htm
http://flyingfox.jonathanjanson.com/
http://www.essentialvermeer.com/vermeer_the_man.html
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/
http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artMakerDetails?maker=473
