![Jan Vermeer, The Art of Painting, circa 1670. Painter and model depicting Clio, muse of history (section).](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/vermeer-titel-300x225.jpg)
Some light reflections on history
Over is over. The past is finished, set, unchangeable. History, on the other hand, is open, vivid, changeable, and thus disputable. Is there any such thing as certain knowledge? Yes – just not for ever.
![The past only becomes history if we bring it out of the darkness and into the light.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/past-history-300x211.jpg)
What is important to each period? And how important?
Nothing in the future will change the past. But knowledge of the past is progressive.
A contemporary record from the Baroque period
![Jan Vermeer (1632–1675), The Art of Painting, circa 1670, 120 x 100 cm.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/vermeer-malkunst-254x300.jpg)
Vermeer painted very slowly, averaging only around two pictures per year.
Of truth – or argument and counter-argument
No sooner found than lost
![Der Historiker kann nie sagen: Ich hab‘s! (No ‘eureka!’ moments for historians)](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/tauchender-historiker-300x170.jpg)
A whole variety of perspectives
![In their 2006 set of teaching materials Barbara Bonhage, Peter Gautschi, Jan Hodel, and Gregor Spuhler shine a light on Switzerland during the Nazi era from more than 20 different vantage points.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/multiperspektivitat-en-300x169.jpg)
Giants and dwarves, and the 21st century
![Our Lady of Chartres Cathedral, stained glass from the first half of the 13th century.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/chartres-189x300.jpg)
![A dwarf sitting on the shoulders of a giant. Southern Germany, circa 1410.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/zwerg-auf-den-schultern-eines-riesen-177x300.jpg)