No comments about Uncanny Spectacle: The Public Career of the Young John Singer Sargent.

No comments about John Singer Sargent: A Biography.

No comments about Sargent at Broadway: The Impressionist years.

No comments about John Singer Sargent (Distinguished American artists).

No comments about Six Women's Portraits Cards (Small-Format Card Books).

4 comments about Sargent Abroad: Figures and Landscapes.

1. These are some of Sargent's most beautiful compositions and color galore. He was an amazing portrait artists and still, these landscapes are out of this world. His command of the painting media was genius........sheer genius. You'll love the beauty of these pictures. The more Sargent I see.......the more I have to rub my eyes to be sure anyone could be that good.



2. For a grand tour of Sargent landscapes, this is one of my favorite books. I'm a Sargent fan, with many books on Sargent, and if I had to take just two or three to a desert isle, this would be one of them.
   (Another is "Sargent and Italy", at least for Italy.) Many books have been written about Sargent over the last almost century and a few of them have been produced sort of "hurriedly" to put it kindly. Perhaps holiday shopping quickies. In contrast this book is first class, one of the very best. The manufacturing is first rate. Good reproductions. Sturdy binding.
   This is a great book, both for simply its sheer, naive viewing pleasure as well as for its scholarly text, putting the images in informative context. Both a beautiful coffee-table picture book and a good textbook on Sargent.
   
   An aside... in 2003, while painting in the gardens of the Duke's palace in Trieste, I made the acquaintance of two Italian ladies who also were painting. I spoke no Italian; they spoke no English. Somehow over the easels, the pantomined conversation got around to Sargent. Perhaps because we were all three painting together in an Italian garden? Turns out, all three of us, each had recently purchased a copy of "Sargent And Italy". Of course we had; it just made a lot of sense. I wish I spoke Italian; I should have asked if they also had "Sargent Abroad."
   
   About 10 1/2 by 12 1/2 inches. From Abbeville Press, producers of excellent book on art. 254 pages. Organization is, roughly, seven chapters with titles like "Venice", "In the Alps.":, etc. These chapters are long essays by well-known and distinguished Sargent scholars, such as Richard Ormond, Sargent's grand-nephew. Includes an edifying appendix "Chronology of Travels". Also a subject index, but not a separate index to the very many good color images. Many B&W photos, not of Sargent's work, but of related scenes, e.g. Sargent and friends in the Alps. (For example, some photos show one about Sargent's circa 1900 Alpine haunts in company with reproductions of work produced there.)
   An excellent book about a rather singular aspect of an outstanding artist. Highly recommended!



3. Unlike the other reviewers I don't care much for this book on Sargent. Perhaps it's because I only bought the book for the illustrations and could care less for the text and essays. That said, it's a large thick book with a fair number of illustrations, but most are smaller in size and I'm very disappointed with the paintings represented. With regard to size, quality, and selection of illustrations I'm far happier with the book by Kate F. Jennings ( ISBN 1572153415 ).



4. Excellent selection of Sargent's paintings, focusing on the looser, more private paintings instead of his formal oil portraits. Beautiful watercolors I've never seen in another book!

1 comments about American Drawings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art Volume 3: John Singer Sargent.

1. First... some disclosure. I am a "card-carrying" admirer of John Singer Sargent and of all of his work. I have more than fifty books on Sargent. And I am an obsessive amateur watercolorist; half of our home is filled with paintings, paintings in progress and painting supplies. But, a little rational mitigation... I am not monomaniacal. I also deeply appreciate the work of other greats such as John Whorf and Winslow Homer. And today's Trevor Chamberlain, John Yardley, David Curtis, etc. So, if you like this kind of work, then you'll love this book.
   
   Love it even without any fancy academic theory, art history or the like. Like me, you can just look at a reproduction of an alpine brook in watercolor by Sargent and simply say, "Wow!" And pass your eyes over every millimeter. "Look how he suggests those rocks and ferns!" But then I also greatly enjoy reading the textual background. Where it was done. In what context. Sargent's visits and vacations. The work's provenance. This last can be facinating as in the case of Sargent's recently surfaced, fabulous and obviously originally "mis-acquired" by a maid, "Spanish Dancer". Why, if my own work was any good and further if I did employ a maid then I'd be very careful to... :)
   Well, obviously I can speak only as a naive Sargent enthusiast, but I can't recommend this book more. I read it over and over. I'd have paid twice the price.
   
   Approximately 11 & 1/2 by 9 inches and 426 pages. Published by the Metropolitan in 2000. An excellent physical production in the usual quality manner of Yale University Press, lately the source of excellent series on artists. (Here, Sargent but also the likes of William Merritt Chase. Yale was a physical partner in this particular Sargent enterprise.) This book is organized roughly chronologically, from Sargent's youth onwards. However, there's much more; an Essay on Materials and Techniques, a Sargent Chronology, an Exhibition History, a Record of Travel and Other Studies, and an appendix, Works of Questionable Attribution.
   
   Finally, for some, the category "drawing" can be confusing, as is evident here it also includes watercolors. Go figure. But, I don't mind the nomenclature as long as the academics provide me with pretty decent reproductions and an interesting history.

5 comments about I Am Madame X : A Novel.

1. Madame X was a beautifully written and well researched novel. As someone who has just started reading historical fiction, and as a reader who wants the accuracity to not bog down the enjoyment of the story-I found Madame X to be both informative and very exciting.
   
   Especially well written were the chapters set during and post civil war New Orleans, followed by the characters "fish out of water" feelings as an expatriate in Paris.
   
   A quick, enjoyable novel, highly recommended to beginning fans of historical fiction.
   4.5 stars.



2. I Am Madame X is a novel about Virginie Gateau's life as she tells it. She explains her beauty, her beliefs, her family, and the history durignthe time where she lives.
   Gioia Diliberto's purpose for this novel is to teach an audience that enjoys a sad romance about history and how some people in those times lived through it. If the author is arguing , she must be defending the idea that Americans of the time were not the proud, snotty, arrogant, culture corrupters that the French thought them to be and that women are not worthless after they give themselves way out of married. The support to her believe that Americans are not all bad, come from some of the characters themselves. Virginie Amelie Gautreau and John Singer Sargent were born in( or their parents were from) the U.S.A. but came to France and totally supported the French, living their lives to please the French with their beauty and artwork. Neither John or Virginie ever tried to force American culture on the French people they knew, or steal from the fame of other French people. Virginie's life shows that she totally supported the culture of the French, she rarely ever spoke English and believed herself to be French at heart. Event though Virginie gave her virginity away at such a young age and despite her mother's predictions of a miserable life because of her promiscuity, Virginie got married, was respected by many people, and had may lovers. Just by showing a character who beat the stereotypical beliefs, Gioia's wins her arguments by example.
   I think that Gioia Dilberto did a fabulous job of meeting the objectives of teaching her audience about France during and after it's civil war, portraying the characters thoughts and actions throughout the novel, and writing a based on real people novel that is not entirely exposé.
   My conclusions about the novel are that it is a great book not only for those who are interested in romance and history, but also those who want to know more about a women's feelings toward beauty and other women who are more beautiful then she. This book gives a taste of the life of wealthy people who lived in France and America. It is a taste of history through exciting and emotional fiction. It shows the power of peer pressure on adults, and that idea is not openly portrayed enough.
   I really enjoyed the novel, it would be even better if the real Virginie was able to deal with her emotions better, but that is how she lived. I definitely enjoyed the book and would recommend it anyone I know who likes to read about other people's lives. Even with Virginie's depressing bitterness and pain, I give this book four and a half drops.



3. I Am Madame X is the fictional story delving into the woman in the painting and how the work of art came to be. Diliberto freely admits that the book is based on fact, but is a work of fiction. This keeps the pace lively as the author does not have to painstakingly adhere to historical details and therefore does not get bogged down in minutae.
   
   Diliberto provides many fanciful details that pique the reader's interest (such as Virginie's mother-in-law's flawless accounting of all of her daughter-in-law's expenditures) and paint additional pictures of the infamous Madame X. A substantial downside to the book is that there are not that many pictures of Sargent's other works. Instead of the actual pictures of the parties involved, I much would have preferred additional Sargent images.
   
   I saw the Sargent collection when it was housed in Seattle and absolutely loved it. Hearing about the artist's life and learning about society at the time provided context for Sargent's works. I find it so interesting that an artist can go from extremely popular during his time, to becoming so obscure as to be nearly forgotten, and then make such a resounding charge decades later.
   
   This book definitely served as a great entree into Sargent's life and works and makes me want to learn more!



4. As an art historian, I approached this book with a degree of trepidation. In the vein of The Da Vinci Code, so many works of historical fiction run so contrary to what is known about art that they are laughably unrealistic. I realize that these books are fiction, but the best historical fiction is written with an eye to the known facts, in an attempt to make the story more plausible. I'm not looking for, "We don't know what happened, so I can make anything up." I'm looking for, "Given what we do know, this story could very well have been possible, even though we'll never know for certain." (Tracy Chevalier excells at this.)
   
   Diliberto so ignores the facts of art history that this book is virtually impossible to choke down. Virginie Gautreau, for one thing, typically went by her middle name, Amelie. She even signed letters this way. It wouldn't have taken Diliberto, an already established biographer, an inordinate amount of research to figure this out. This mistake at the beginning of the book was a harbinger of the boring, unresearched story to come.
   
   I could forgive a lack of research, however, had the book been well written, but it was, quite simply, awful. The flatly drawn characters utter melodramatic phrases, one after the other, creating a work that reads more like a soap opera script than a novel. While Gautreau's life certainly did read like a tabloid at times, Diliberto's dialogue is completely unrealistic, oscillating between unintentionally comical and downright grating on the nerves.
   
   I have to suggest that anyone intrigued by this painting read Deborah Davis's Strapless instead. Though not a work of fiction, it is written in a style that is more conversational than academic, and it's an easy and rewarding read. Davis also put quite a lot of effort into her research, and it shows. Too bad Diliberto didn't bother.



5. This novel is simply a great story, written in crystal-clear prose. The bottom line is, you'll stay up all night reading it. One of the book's pleasures is the extraordinary research that Diliberto clearly did - about the life of the real Virginie Amelie Gautreau, (who was referred to by her nickname Mimi;) about daily plantation life in Louisianna before the War, the community of souther expatriates who took shelter in Paris afterwards, the techniques that of 19th. century painting. Every detail has authority.

3 comments about Sargent: Painting Out-of-Doors.

1. As a high school art student, money is tight and investing in expensive art books can be a pain. =-= However, this book truly is an excellent purchase.

   From the dust jacket to the glossy high-quality pages, John Esten covers the span of Sargent's life, providing a sound background for someone who is unfamiliar with Sargent.

   Regarding the images included in this book, there are a few less popular on-the-edge-of-rare pictures including a few paintings and drawings done by Sargent when he was a child/teen (which are coupled with his later watercolor and oil paintings). Note: A majority of the paintings in here are watercolor. (If you are looking for an affordable book which focuses on Sargent's oil paintings, I recommend "The Age of Elegance : The Paintings of John Singer Sargent.")

   Commentaries by Sargent's closests friends and family accompany Esten's text. Other bonuses include photographs of Sargent painting, a watercolor done by his mother (an amateur artist), and drawings/paintings done by his friends.

   (Important: this is NOT a picture book. Text and images are, for the most art, evenly distributed.)

   If you enjoy Sargent's works or paintings filled with beautiful light, then this collection, is definitely worth every penny. ^-^




2. Sargent had deep love and respect for outdoors. His parents have instilled in him and his sisters their love of travel, the natural environment, and open-mindedness which naturally led him to a career in art, especially painting. This book tells about Sargent and his quest to constantly broaden his outlook on life by traveling and exploring different cultures and lifestyles other than the bourgeois world, which had molded him in his formative years. He had done at least 500 paintings depicting the outdoor life or landscapes/seascapes. Examples are "Alligators," "Corfu," "Fumee d'Ambergris," and the Venetian paintings of the 1880s. I would recommend this book to those with an open mind about this amazingly brilliant artist, whose pictures depicted late 19th century life around the world and whose talent has taken him to the farthest reaches of the world.



3. "... The whole problem with our contemporary art market, as I see it, is that our standards for professionalism have been too low. We have been missing the mark because we have been aiming at the wrong mark. Masters in plein air painting like Sargent, Sorolla, Courbet, Homer...are the historical standards for this type of work. A contemporary artist is not a Master Artist despite publicity labeling. A Master artist, can only be determined by the historical sorting out that takes place at the end of an era or epoch. If we set our standards by comparison of our work to contemporaries, whose work has not been proven in the historical context then our standards are open to question. This allows us to easily be mislead by marketing interests." Quote from Professional Plein Air Painters Discussion ...
   ... [this] is why I believe this book is so valuable, because everytime you go back to the historically proven source of information you can't help but improve your knowledge.

5 comments about John Singer Sargent.

1. I saw this exhibit at the Tate Gallery, London. The exhibit was terrific, though something seemed lacking in the over all presentation. Sargent is one overlooked watercolorist. He is one of the greatest, on an equal or superior platform to Homer. His Valasquez like eye made him a superior artist, though he seemed to get trapped in his facile technique in society portraits. Sargent is an amazing artist. One whose personal power has always been challenged by those that believe technique is secondary. Tell that to someone who appreciates his lively beautiful brushwork and intelligent landscapes. They won't buy it! The reproductions are not second rate as stated previously. They are rather good!The essays are good reading too.



2. I have no idea what the others are complaining about. I compared this Sargent book side by side at a book store with other published Sargent books, and this one had the best reproduction by far. It is even better than "John Singer Sargent : The Early Portraits (The Complete Paintings , Vol 1)", which is by the same author and editor as this one. Make no mistake, this is the best book so far I've seen on Sargent. I'm not concerned about the writing since I'm a fan of Sargent because I'm a painter, and he's one of the best there ever was. Sure I'd read the text, but it's not nearly as important as the reproductions of his paintings. It's all about the paintings, and he is an artist. That's all that matters.



3. First off, you will never be satisfied with any reproduction compared to the original painting. Sargent's paintings in the MFA in Boston looks like the paint was laid yesterday. But I have seen several reproductions of this work, the originals in the MFA and MOMA in NY, and of all the major books I have seen, this has the most disappointing reproductions. The colors seem muted and flat.
   On the other hand, the information on each painting is great, and for specific info on his works in a one volume set, this can't be beat.



4. This book accompanied an international exhibit traveling from the Tate Gallery, London, to the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and finally to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Edited by Richard Ormond (the artist's great nephew and Director of the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich) and Elaine Kilmurray (author of catalogue raisonne of Sargent's work), the book encompasses the breadth of Sargent's work as an artist.
   I used this book as a reference while reading the biography "John Singer Sargent: His Portrait" by Stanley Olson. This is a comprehensive collection of Sargent's art from his early works including The Oyster Gatherers of Cancale to later works such as the painting Gassed (a monumental canvas done for the British War Memorial Committee of the Ministry of Information).
   As represented by this book, Sargent was much more than only a portraitist. "He was not a portrait painter who practiced as a muralist and landscapist on the side, he was all three in equal measure, and he gave to each in succession his undivided attention." The book includes: many of his Venetian hours (Venise par temps gris and An Interior in Venice), Paris and the Salon (the painting of Carolus-Duran at whose atelier he studied), and the Madame Gautreau debacle (the painting Madame X). It continues with Sargent reinventing himself in England with the painting Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose, which was a success when exhibited at the Royal Academy, London. It follows with portraiture--many Victorian characters such as Robert Louis Stevenson, Isabella Stewart Gardner, Henry James, and "a gallery of Edwardian personalities." Later chapters include the Murals at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and the Boston Public Library (definitive works as an artist), and Sargent the Watercolourist, especially Venetian watercolors (perpetual architecture, perpetual fluidity).
   Sargent's art is a unique blend of realism and impressionism. "His pictures do not dissolve into skeins of color like those of Monet or Renoir because his instinct for defining forms and constructing spaces is too ingrained." For anyone who wants to see as Sargent sees, this is the book to have. Next best thing to viewing the exhibit.



5. I bought this book on sale at a book store for less that ten dollars. The illustrations are far larger and better than in the sixty dollar books on Sargent I've bought.