John Singer Sargent, Carnation, Lily, Lily and Rose, ca 1885

London, Tate Britain, N01615

Image here via: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:John_Singer_Sargent_-_Carnation,_Lily,_Lily,_Rose_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg

Is any single painter more evocative of Belle Époque and Fin de siècle high society than John Singer Sargent?

This American ex-pat visited all the best places, knew all the right people, and displayed just enough Impressionist radicalism and sexuality to make him irresistible to the Gilded Set – without being too controversial. Everyone who was anyone wanted their portrait painted by him.

Well that would have been a generous summary by the later twentieth century, by which time all that had been at the pinnacle of the arts at the turn of the century had been relegated to the very bottom. His work was dismissed as superficial and insubstantial.

In all fairness, he hasn’t had to wait as long as some for a reassessment of his career. Since the 1980s and the exhibition of his “hidden” paintings of male nudes, there has been a growing understanding that Sargent may have been a reluctant conformist. The controversy surrounding the Portrait of Madame X did his career real (if temporary) harm, and his later work demonstrates that he was a true follower of the en plein air principle. Throw in his engagement with both ethnicity and gender non-conformity and we have today a much more rounded and nuanced view of this artist. We’d like to share some of that with you.

RJW F2601 Online (via Zoom)

A 5-hour short course, delivered via 2 x 2½-hour sessions on consecutive Saturdays (Saturday 3 & Saturday 10 January).

£40 (individual registration); £72 (for two people sharing one screen).