In the paintings by seventeenth-century Dutch artist Vermeer, we find several recurrent items: a satin jacket, a certain Turkish carpet, and wooden chairs with lion' s head finials  These reappearing objects might seem to evince a dearth of props  Yet we know that many of the props Vermeer used were expensive
Thus, while we might speculate about exactly why Vermeer worked with a small number of familiar objects, it was clearly not for lack of props that the recurrent items were used
The satin jacket and wooden chairs that recur in the paintings were owned by Vermeer's sister.