In this book Edward Lucie-Smith considers the achievement of John
Singer Sargent in response to a new exhibition at the National
Portrait Gallery in London. This exhibition features Sargent's more
private works - images of friends, rather than portraits painted on
commission. In many ways Sargent is an ambiguous figure. The child
of wealthy expatriate American parents, he was brought up in
Europe, at first made his career in France, then settled in
Britain. Totally cosmopolitan, he kept his American nationality,
painted many American sitters, but never lived for any extended
period of time in the United States, either as a child or as an
adult. During his time in France he consorted with a number of
artists who, at a certain point in their careers, were thought of
as cutting edge. Monet is a prime example. However, his more
intimate artist friends, such as Helleu, whom he painted a number
of times, were not radicals, and always second-or-third rankers.
Sexually he is a mystery. Biographers have tended to classify him
according to their own sexual preferences, rather like the
biographers of Caravaggio. For some he was a closeted gay man, for
others he was definitely a lover of women. He never married and
there is no proof of any liaisons, either heterosexual or
homosexual. Paintings of subjects from his own social circle, made
for his own pleasure rather than on commission, suggest that while
he liked handsome young men, he was also fascinated by women of
dominant temperament. His own mother was apparently a woman of this
type. Easily social with friends, he nevertheless fiercely guarded
his essential privacy. There is a parallel here with his somewhat
older contemporary Lord Leighton, another hugely successful
bachelor artist. Both men were strikingly masculine in appearance.
In terms of his later reputation, Sargent was long regarded as a
paradigmatic example of an artist who was immensely skilful but in
no way truly experimental - someone who fitted perfectly into the
wealthy society of his time. The reconsideration of Sargent that is
now taking place has parallels with the reconsideration of Gustav
Klimt, which got its start a little earlier. Neither one of them
can really be described as 'avant-garde' in any meaningful sense of
that much-abused term, but we have now started to see them as being
extremely significant as makers of images that somehow sum up their
epoch without sacrifice of aesthetic quality. Their paintings still
resonate with the contemporary audience today.
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