A 21-Painting Salute to Vermeer : Not in three centuries have so many works by the 17th-Century artist been shown. The joint U.S.-Dutch exhibition includes two-thirds of his known works.

One of the most eagerly awaited events on this fall’s international exhibition horizon features a mere 21 paintings by 17th-Century Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer. Small as it is, the show looms large both in terms of its representation of the artist’s oeuvre and its historic significance.

Vermeer is only known to have made 35 paintings, several of which belong to institutions that do not allow such rare treasures to travel, so gathering 21 examples under one roof is a landmark event. Indeed, it’s the biggest exhibition of its kind in 300 years.

The last relatively large assembly of Vermeers took place in 1696 in the artist’s hometown of Delft. That show featured a private collection that was later dispersed.

“Johannes Vermeer” has been organized by the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Mauritshuis in the Hague, and it will be presented only at those two museums. The show will debut in Washington on Nov. 12 and run through Feb. 11. It will move to the Hague March 1-June 2.

Predictably, the largest holdings of Vermeers come from the organizers. The National Gallery is lending four works: “Woman Holding a Balance,” “A Lady Writing,” “The Girl With the Red Hat” and “Young Girl With a Flute.”

The Mauritshuis is contributing “Diana and Her Companions,” “Girl With a Pearl Earring” and “View of Delft,” which is making its first trip outside Europe. Other participants include the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, Queen Elizabeth II of England and the Louvre in Paris.

Nine of the paintings have been restored for the occasion. Among them are “View of Delft” and the National Gallery of Ireland’s “Lady Writing a Letter With Her Maid,” which was stolen several years ago but recently recovered.

Little is known about Vermeer, who was born in Delft in 1632, the son of an innkeeper who was also an art dealer. Although the artist was well-regarded during his lifetime, he was destitute at his death in 1675 and did not achieve widespread notice until the late 19th Century when French critic Thore-Burger wrote about his work.

Today, Vermeer is admired for intimate scenes that make magical use of light and shadow, but he also painted relatively expansive cityscapes and historic themes. By bringing together a 20-year span of his work, curators Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., of the National Gallery, and the Mauritshuis’ Frederik J. Duparc hope to demonstrate a continuous, classical approach that distinguishes his work from more ordinary visual records of everyday life.

*

DEPARTURE: Pratapaditya Pal, an eminent curator and scholar of Indian and Southeast Asian art who has been a pillar of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for a quarter-century, officially ended his employment at the museum earlier this month, but he isn’t retiring.

“After 25 years, I’m going on to fresh pastures,” he says. “It’s time for a change.”

It doesn’t sound like a vacation. Pal, 59, will continue teaching art history at UC Irvine as a visiting professor, while taking on three new positions.

One of these jobs is at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, where he plans to spend about three years writing a complete scholarly catalogue of the museum’s collection of Indian and Southeast Asian art. It’s a logical project for Pal, who knows the collection intimately. Simon, who died in 1993, frequently sought the LACMA curator’s advice during the 1970s when he became interested in Indian and Southeast Asian art and emerged as a powerful force in the marketplace. The second post is at the Art Institute of Chicago, where Pal will serve for three years as a visiting curator of Indian and Southeast Asian art.

“I’ll be building up their collection and filling in the gaps,” Pal says. He also plans to organize a major exhibition of Himalayan art for the institute. For this out-of-state venture he says he’ll be based in Los Angeles, but travel to Chicago as often as necessary--except in the dead of winter.

Pal’s third new enterprise is much closer to home. From Jan. 1 to June 30, he’ll be a visiting scholar at the J. Paul Getty Trust’s Center for the Study of Art History and the Humanities in Santa Monica. Pal will join an international group of colleagues as they conduct research on the history of collecting.

Before embarking on any of those activities, however, Pal took off to New Orleans for the mid-July opening of “The Peaceful Liberators: Jain Art From India,” a major traveling exhibition that he organized for LACMA. The show appeared in Los Angeles last winter and moved to the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth before the New Orleans engagement, which continues to Sept. 17. The final run will be at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Nov. 22-Feb. 18.

Best known for his exhibitions and writings on Indian and Southeast Asian art and for building LACMA’s collections of that material, Pal also played a seminal role in the museum’s landmark acquisitions of Islamic and ancient art from the Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck collection. He came to LACMA in 1970 as head of the newly created department of Indian and Islamic art, served as acting director of the museum in 1979-80 and became senior curator of Indian and Southeast Asian art in 1981, after the formation of a separate department of Islamic art.

*

REMEMBERING THE BOMB: Works by 14 artists are on view in “50 Years Hiroshima,” at the New Gallery in Santa Monica’s 18th Street Arts Complex, through Aug. 26. The exhibition, organized by Clayton Campbell and Barbara T. Smith, is the centerpiece of a multidisciplinary commemoration of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 50 years ago. Among artists who have created works for the show are Lita Albuquerque, Patrick Nagatani, Sheila Pinkel and Masako Takahashi.

A slate of special events is scheduled for Aug. 5, including an artists’ discussion at 3:30-5 p.m., a performance by Denise Uyehara and Maria Elena Paitan at 6:30 p.m. and a public reception at 5-8 p.m. Information: (310) 453-0217.

*

UNCENSORED: In a move designed to disavow past censorship, a vaguely erotic drawing that was removed from an L.A. Art Assn. exhibition in 1988 because of its title, “Flowers, Bird Goddess, Manifold Clitori,” has been put on view at the association’s La Cienega Boulevard gallery. The artist, Charles Sherman, says the drawing was taken out of the original show after the association’s director, the late Helen Wurdemann, shortened the title to “Flowers” and refused to reinstate the full name.

Sherman, who has kept the issue alive ever since then, recently won his case when the association’s board agreed that he had been the victim of censorship and invited him to exhibit the 16-by-11-inch graphite drawing in a group show that continues through Aug. 4. “Censorship is totally against our policy,” association president Joan Carl wrote in a letter notifying Sherman of the board’s decision.*