Portrait of John Singer Sargent

John Singer Sargent Painting Reproductions 3 of 12

1856-1925

American Impressionist Painter

John Singer Sargent (January 12, 1856 - April 14, 1925) was the most successful portrait painter of his era, as well as a gifted landscape painter and watercolorist. He was an American expatriate who lived most of his life in Europe. Sargent was born in Florence, Italy to American parents. He studied in Italy and Germany, and then in Paris under Emile Auguste Carolus-Duran.

Biography and work
Sargent's portraits subtly capture the individuality and personality of the sitters; his most ardent admirers think he is matched in this only by Diego Velazquez, who was one of Sargent's great influences. The Spanish master's spell is apparent in Sargent's The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit, 1882, a haunting interior which echoes Velazquez' Las Meninas. Sargent's Portrait of Madame X, done in 1884, is now considered one of his best works, and was the artist's personal favorite. However, at the time it was unveiled in Paris at the 1884 Salon, it aroused such a negative reaction that it prompted Sargent to move to London. Many years before the Mme. X. scandal of 1884, he painted exotic beauties such as Rosina Ferrara of Capri, and the Spanish expatriate model, Carmela Bertagna.
Although Sargent lived in the United States for less than one year, some of his best work is in the U.S., including his decorations for the Boston Public Library. He also completed portraits of two U.S. presidents: Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson.

Sargent is usually not thought of as an Impressionist painter, but he sometimes used impressionistic techniques to great effect, and his Claude Monet Painting at the Edge of a Wood is rendered in his own version of the impressionist style.

Sargent painted a series of three portraits of Robert Louis Stevenson. The second, Portrait of Robert Louis Stevenson and his Wife (1885), was one of his best known.

During the greater part of Sargent's career, he created roughly 900 oil paintings and more than 2,000 watercolours, as well as countless sketches and charcoal drawings. About 1910 Sargent forsook portrait painting and focused on landscapes in his later years; he also sculpted later in life. As a concession to the insatiable demand of wealthy patrons for portraits, however, he continued to dash off rapid charcoal portrait sketches for them, which he called "Mugs". Forty-six of these, spanning the years 1890-1916, were exhibited at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters in 1916.

In a time when the art world focused, in turn, on Impressionism, Fauvism, and Cubism, Sargent practiced his own form of Realism, which brilliantly referenced Velazquez, Van Dyck, and Gainsborough. His seemingly effortless facility for paraphrasing the masters in a contemporary fashion led to a stream of commissioned portraits of remarkable virtuosity. Thus, he was dismissed as an anachronism at the time of his death, but appreciation of his art has since grown steadily, especially following a retrospective exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1986.

John Singer Sargent is interred in Brookwood Cemetery near Woking, Surrey.

Relationships
Sargent developed a close friendship with fellow painter Paul Cesar Helleu. They met in Paris in 1878 when Singer was 22 and Helleu was 18. Sargent painted both Helleu and his wife Alice on several occasions.

Sargent was extremely private regarding his personal life, although the painter Jacques-Emile Blanche, who was one of his early sitters, said after his death that Sargent's sex life "was notorious in Paris, and in Venice, positively scandalous. He was a frenzied bugger." The truth of this may never be established. However most scholars now presume he was homosexual; not only because of his personal associations (such as with Prince Edmond de Polignac and Count Robert de Montesquiou), but because of the way his sensibility shaped his art. This includes not only the sensuality of his male nudes (most particularly his portrait of Thomas E. McKeller), but also the exotic 'otherness' implicit in his general work. It is been suggested that it was this quality which appealed to the sympathies of his many Jewish clients which he painted in the 1890s.

270 Sargent Paintings

Venetian Wineshop, c.1898 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Venetian Wineshop c.1898

Oil Painting
$642
SKU: SAR-1750
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: unknown
Private Collection

The Wyndham Sisters, 1899 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

The Wyndham Sisters 1899

Oil Painting
$1029
Canvas Print
$55.35
SKU: SAR-1751
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 292.1 x 213.7 cm
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA

An Interior in Venice, 1899 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

An Interior in Venice 1899

Oil Painting
$756
Canvas Print
$61.03
SKU: SAR-1752
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 66 x 83.5 cm
Royal Academy of Arts, London, United Kingdom

Sir George Sitwell, Lady Ida Sitwell and Family, 1900 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Sir George Sitwell, Lady Ida Sitwell and Family 1900

Oil Painting
$1002
Canvas Print
$63.79
SKU: SAR-1753
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 170.2 x 193 cm
Private Collection

Ena and Betty, Daughters of Asher and Wertheimer, 1901 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Ena and Betty, Daughters of Asher and Wertheimer 1901

Oil Painting
$1002
SKU: SAR-1754
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 227 x 170.6 cm
Tate Gallery, London, United Kingdom

On His Holidays, 1901 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

On His Holidays 1901

Oil Painting
$813
Canvas Print
$50.22
SKU: SAR-1755
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 137 x 244 cm
Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight, United Kingdom

Lord Ribblesdale, 1902 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Lord Ribblesdale 1902

Oil Painting
$831
Canvas Print
$51.41
SKU: SAR-1756
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 258.4 x 143.5 cm
National Gallery, London, United Kingdom

Winifred, Duchess of Portland, 1902 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Winifred, Duchess of Portland 1902

Oil Painting
$890
SKU: SAR-1757
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: unknown
Private Collection

Mrs. Fiske Warren and Her Daughter Rachel, 1903 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Mrs. Fiske Warren and Her Daughter Rachel 1903

Oil Painting
$1181
Canvas Print
$50.65
SKU: SAR-1758
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 152.4 x 102.5 cm
Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Massachusetts, USA

An Artist in his Studio, 1904 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

An Artist in his Studio 1904

Oil Painting
$746
Canvas Print
$58.53
SKU: SAR-1759
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 56.2 x 72 cm
Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Massachusetts, USA

The Fountain, Villa Torlonia, Frascati, Italy, 1907 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

The Fountain, Villa Torlonia, Frascati, Italy 1907

Oil Painting
$797
Canvas Print
$59.64
SKU: SAR-1760
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 71.4 x 56.5 cm
Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois, USA

The Brook, c.1907 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

The Brook c.1907

Oil Painting
$662
Canvas Print
$50.22
SKU: SAR-1761
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 53.3 x 69.8 cm
Private Collection

The Chess Game, c.1907 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

The Chess Game c.1907

Oil Painting
$683
Canvas Print
$50.45
SKU: SAR-1762
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 70 x 55.3 cm
Harvard Club of New York City, New York, USA

Mosquito Nets, 1908 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Mosquito Nets 1908

Oil Painting
$806
Canvas Print
$60.61
SKU: SAR-1763
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 57.2 x 71.8 cm
Detroit Institute of Arts, Michigan, USA

Almina, Daughter of Asher Wertheimer, 1908 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Almina, Daughter of Asher Wertheimer 1908

Oil Painting
$926
SKU: SAR-1764
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 134 x 101 cm
Tate Gallery, London, United Kingdom

Cashmere, c.1908 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Cashmere c.1908

Oil Painting
$867
SKU: SAR-1765
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: unknown
Private Collection

Group with Parasols (A Siesta), c.1908/11 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Group with Parasols (A Siesta) c.1908/11

Oil Painting
$746
SKU: SAR-1766
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: unknown
Private Collection

Olive Trees, Corfu, 1909 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Olive Trees, Corfu 1909

Oil Painting
$567
SKU: SAR-1767
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 51.4 x 61.6 cm
Private Collection

In the Garden, Corfu, 1909 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

In the Garden, Corfu 1909

Oil Painting
$806
Canvas Print
$50.22
SKU: SAR-1768
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 91.4 x 71.7 cm
Private Collection

A Garden in Corfu, 1909 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

A Garden in Corfu 1909

Oil Painting
$785
SKU: SAR-1769
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: unknown
Private Collection

Villa Torre Galli: The Loggia, 1910 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Villa Torre Galli: The Loggia 1910

Oil Painting
$759
SKU: SAR-1770
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: unknown
Private Collection

A Waterfall, c.1910 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

A Waterfall c.1910

Oil Painting
$713
Canvas Print
$50.22
SKU: SAR-1771
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 113 x 72.4 cm
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania, USA

The Rialto, 1911 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

The Rialto 1911

Oil Painting
$756
Canvas Print
$50.22
SKU: SAR-1772
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 56 x 92 cm
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania, USA

Nonchaloir (Repose), 1911 by Sargent | Painting Reproduction

Nonchaloir (Repose) 1911

Oil Painting
$777
Canvas Print
$63.65
SKU: SAR-1773
John Singer Sargent
Original Size: 63.8 x 76.2 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington, USA

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