Pieter van Ruijven had belonged to the Van Ruijvens, who had built up a large collection of paintings by Vermeer, three by Emanuel de Witte, four by Simon de Vlieger and one by Jan Porcellis. He is depicted as a predatory lecher in Tracy Chevalier's historical novel "Girl with a Pearl Earring" (1999), although there is absolutely no evidence of this. The 2003 film of the book also follows this characterization. Pieter van Ruijven Pieter Claesz. van Ruijven (Delft, 1624 – Delft, August 7, 1674) is best known as Johannes Vermeer's patron for the better part of the artist's career. Van Ruijven was
Girl with a Pearl Earring (film) not. The film incorporates seven of Vermeer's paintings into its story. Thomas Leitch, in his book "Film Adaptation and Its Discontents: From Gone with the Wind to The Passion of the Christ", writes that while Chevalier's Griet describes ten Vermeer paintings (without naming them), Webber's film avoids "show[ing] an external world that looks like a series of Vermeer paintings," as this would have been a trivialisation of the artist's achievements. Leitch adds the director "compromises by showing far fewer actual Vermeer paintings than Chevalier's Griet describes but lingering longer over the visual particulars of the studio in which he creates