General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums“The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit” by John Singer Sargent
...when was the pinafore ever painted with that power and made so poetic?
--Henry James
The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit. 1882. The Museum of Fine Arts. Boston.
[IMG][/IMG]
Those girls...
We care about them instinctively and immediately...but, why? They are clearly children of the Gilded Age seen amidst the quiet rooms and hushed voices of the very rich. They are dressed properly in their play pinafores to protect their fine clothes. They appear to be safe and well cared for, indeed fortunate...and yet....there is a locus of uncertainty about them in this painting that evokes in us some vague concern for their well being...
Sargent has placed the youngest daughter, Julia, age 4 in the foreground on a lovely but surely expensive carpet (island?) with her baby doll. Behind her, Mary Louisa stands with all the determination and certainty that an 8 year old girl possesses. Behind her in a shadowed hallway stands the oldest, Florence, 14 (leaning against a tall vase) and Jane, 12. Could the artist be painting the threshold of complexity and approaching loss of innocence that is inexorably going to be a part of adulthood, despite the cushion that their wealth provides to them?
The Boit family was part of a community of wealthy American expatriates living in elegantly furnished Paris apartments in the late 1870s and early 1880s. Edward Boit was a minor artist who married the daughter of a wealthy industrialist. The Boits, Sargent and the writer Henry James were friends who shared a preference for life in Europe rather than the United States. Details are not known, but either Edward Boit commissioned this picture as a group portrait of his daughters or Sargent had conceived the project himself and suggested it to Boit.
While the painting was greeted at the Paris Salon as an oddity, James wrote perceptively about ...the sense it gives us of assimilated secrets and instinct and knowledge playing together... It was a departure from conventional ideas about portraiture and became more of a genre scene, an interior that included four children. Interestingly, a few years earlier Edgar Degas was introducing the same asymmetry into his compositions -- family members disconnected from one another, emotional distance, a sense of unease in their calm lives...
Edgar Degas, The Bellelli Family, 1858-67, Musee dOrsay, Paris
[IMG][/IMG]
A visitor to the MFA today would see Sargents Daughters exhibited between the now immortalized vases
[IMG][/IMG]
As you can immediately see the Japanese vases (donated to the museum by the Boit daughters along with the painting) have a more complicated design than what Sargent included in his work. He probably did not want the design to distract the viewers attention from his canvas. The vases Sargent did render work beautifully for this painting,-- a lovely shine is captured by Sargents brush as is the graceful arch of Florences back against the smooth curve of the porcelain.
The pinafores give Sargent the opportunity to show off his virtuosity in painting nuances in white and it one of the occasions of sheer joy for viewers to study. Closely seen, these aprons softly glow...
[IMG][/IMG]
[IMG][/IMG]
Sargent often painted women of that era in varying tones of white, such as this portrait of Lady Agnew and many others.
[IMG][/IMG]
Today it is popularly believed that The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit was strongly informed by Diego Velazquezs Baroque masterpiece Las Meninas.
Las Meninas. 1656. Museo Nacional Del Prado. Madrid
[IMG][/IMG]
Sargent had traveled to the Prado in the fall of 1879 and copied Las Meninas (the Maidens), which shows us the young Infanta (princess) Margarita, her maid, tutors and playthings, as well as her parents, King Philip IV and queen Mariana of Austria, and the painter himself. This work has its own tantalizing mysteries. Velazquez is shown painting the scene and yet he is on the other side of the canvas and part of the scene. The king and queen appear as a reflection in a mirror in the recesses of the hall (just as Sargent has painted a mirror over a mantle and fireplace in the background of his picture). Is everyone looking at the royal couple and are they supposed to be passing through Velazquez workspace? As we view this picture, is the girl on the Infantas right starting to curtsy? Who is the courtier seen leaving in the background and why is he there?
In 2010 the MFA sent The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit to Madrid, to be exhibited for the first time in the Prado in close proximity to Las Meninas. This remarkable event is seen here
[IMG][/IMG]
Seen together at that exhibit, it must have forced viewers to look entirely anew at both familiar paintings in each others context. We tend to group paintings in terms of their eras and how well they express the art of their time. Now we are asked to wonder yet again about timelessness in art, the carrying forward of themes and meanings. These happenstances ask us to be open to new possibilities and give us ever more wonder at such riches as art affords us....
longship
(40,416 posts)I know nothing about visual arts except that which moves me personally. What there is to be learned about the topic must come from a passion for such things. It is some people's ability to relate that passion that allows the passion to spread.
One must never apologize for such a thing. Instead, one should celebrate it.
I miss your weekly Friday posts. And never, ever apologize for them again.
My best to you for consistently raising things here above the fray.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)I try to do these posts every other week. I've still got material to work with, believe me.
This one was a joy to do...I really enjoyed the research, both online and in the library. It takes me to a sphere I like to be in...
longship
(40,416 posts)Because you are.
I wish I could do the same for my passion, classical music and opera, an atheist who likes religious music, especially Bach. That's quite a bit more difficult on a Net forum.
As always.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)orchestras. I've learned a lot from him. We listen to "Sunday Morning Baroque" on our local NPR station every week. It's like a couple of hours of loveliness. Pure joy...
leveymg
(36,418 posts)I get the same dizzying feeling from Escher.
Thanks for that experience. A pleasant, mild psychedelic experience on a Friday evening.
P.S. - Your post is part of why it's still worthwhile to hang around this imaginary space.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)many artists DO copy the old masters though...it's kind of an homage but it is also a way of seeing with new eyes...
leveymg
(36,418 posts)Fantastic post. A real treat. Thanks again.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)there is nothing like seeing a great painting right there in front of it...
btw, the Prado is an overwhelming experience...it's a huge museum and so much fabulous Spanish art it could kill you...Velazquez and Goya will finish you off...LOL...
Lifelong Protester
(8,421 posts)And the vases! Ah, the vases! I recall seeing them in Boston along with the 'detritus' that was found inside before (or maybe after) they were donated!
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)Avalux
(35,015 posts)CTyankee
(63,912 posts)Avalux
(35,015 posts)I was trained in oils and remember being fascinated with that painting, amazed at the pinafores. I tried so hard to copy how he did it and got close but not close enough.
I didn't give a lot of though to the composition and the feelings evoked (as you have done), I do remember being oddly drawn to how he positioned the girls and the looks on their faces.
It's really neat to see the Sargent and Degas together like that, really shows the similarities (although I prefer the Sargent). I've never seen that pic before.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)Sargent had great talent. It's too bad he went out of style for a while. Do you agree about the way he manages to paint white tonalities? If you look at other of his works where white is so dominant, you see great virtuosity. The guy was talented...
Avalux
(35,015 posts)That's why my instructor wanted me to copy the pinafores - white is hard! Sargeant was genius at using a liberal amount of paint and carefully placed brushstrokes, as few as possible, wet on wet.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)brer cat
(24,615 posts)It is interesting to me that the only thing other than the girls that caught my eye are the two small vases on the mantle that sort of echo the large ones. The larger ones blend in (or the eye is drawn to the girls) while the small ones really stand out as the only bold color in a very muted part of the painting. Nothing significant, I just thought it was interesting.
Thanks for the post CTyankee. I enjoy them very much.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)background. And thanks for pointing out that "echo."
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)those vases on the mantel are the very same vases in the painting. It's not a mantle, it's the floor of the museum, and the vases are very large. The painting is life-sized, which you can see easily in a lower picture of them moving it.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)and that for a portrait they think it is unheard of...who knew?
brer cat
(24,615 posts)I was looking at the background of the first picture. There are two blue vases on a mantle (or maybe a large piece of furniture). The museum floor isn't in the painting. Or I may be having a very senior moment. I do that sometimes.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Where is it? In the dark hallway?
I'll have to look again.
Whoops, I just looked again and saw it this time. Sorry about that.
brer cat
(24,615 posts)Glad I dodged that one. At my age, I am always grateful to learn I am not seeing things that don't exist.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)I can make out the vases on the mantle,the mantle itself and the fireplace underneath them. It's is very hard unless you have a pic of the painting that has a very fine resolution in the pictorialization in the background...
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)CTyankee
(63,912 posts)that there are SIX vases in the painting...I have employed the use of a magnifier to find the other two and Im still looking...damn...hate that...I am going to try googling on that painting again only specifically at certain details. I'll let you know what I find. I could visit the MFA again but most of the time you can't use magnifiers in museums. In some museums you have to check it at the door...I have found myself being tapped on the back by a museum guard...
KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)One of his hallmarks and innovations was having multiple people having multiple conversations at once.
Before him, movies showed an actor saying something
finishing their sentence
and the next actor saying something.
These group portraits offer many personal portrayals at once. Multiple thoughts going on that aren't necessarily joined to one external reality.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)mcar
(42,376 posts)I was in Boston's fine arts museum a few years ago and regrettably missed this amazing painting.
Thank you CT. A lovely entry to the weekend.
No Vested Interest
(5,167 posts)remind me that my mother made pinafores for me as a youngster.
She was a good and adventurous seamstress as a young mother, making coats, dresses, dolls, etc., that women today couldn't/wouldn't conceive of attempting.
The paintings are gorgeous!
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)ms liberty
(8,600 posts)I had never thought about the similarities in composition between these three paintings before. I've always loved the use of light and shadow in this Sargeant painting; he really was masterful with white in particular. Thanks! I always learn something new from your posts; today is no exception!
Warpy
(111,359 posts)Mom might have given birth to them years ago, but their care was given over to nannies and she barely knows them, only seeing them for an hour or so a day before she must dress for dinner. Her eyes give her away, focused far away, completely unconcerned with the child on whose shoulder one hand rests. Is she dreaming about fleeing? How would she live? The girls are as stiff as their starched pinafores, careful to speak when spoken to, sitting still. Papa is the only one who seems at all engaged, in partial shadow, far off to the side, his back to us but facing his children. Mom clearly checked out years ago.
The Sargent painting shows dynamics clearly, the two elder girls in each other's confidence in the shadows, possibly discussing a handsome dancing master, anticipating being "out" in a few short years. The youngest is lonely, only an inanimate doll for company, making the best of it. The eight year old is off to the side, defiantly too old for dolls (but perhaps hiding one behind her back) and clearly wondering what to do with herself. The pinafores are poetry. Their size, compared with the vastly enlarged vases, indicates their status as toys to be taken out and admired daily, then shooed back to the nursery.
Velasquez, on the other hand, captured a family that seems rollicking in comparison. The poses are varied and the pinafores absent, one child even seems to be demanding someone's attention. The only one lost in boredom seems to be the dog.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)I think the youngest is pretty much the happiest looking. I note that Sargent has brightly lit her and then as the girls get older they are further back with the oldest two in the shadows. But given the time this was painted it is hard to give our modern day psychological interpretation with certainty of the artist's intent.
ananda
(28,877 posts).. have very similar uses of perspective and vanishing points.
Thank you for this very interesting combination of paintings.
Degas' painting of the Bellelli family might be the best of the
lot. It really draws me in, and the vanishing point is actually
is in another painting cut in half on the wall to the right.
When an artist goes meta and includes a painting within a
painting that also serves a false perspective, that grabs me.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)wonderful, close reading of great art!
Hekate
(90,829 posts)Thank you as always.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)tishaLA
(14,176 posts)(it won't receive the gift, however, until the unimaginable day Ms Streisand passes on)
<...> Mrs. Cazalet and Her Children Edward and Victor is society portrait commissioned by the family to compliment an existing portrait of Mrs. Cazalets husband. The painting was displayed at the Cazalet home in Fairlawne in Kent and was purchased by Ms. Streisand in 2002. The painting is over 8-feet-tall, and will be officially donated to the museum after her death.
Ms. Streisand served on LACMAs board from 2007 to 2014, and is an avid collector of American art, which she began collecting after a visit to the White House following the 1992 Presidential Inauguration of Bill Clinton.
It was a time of special optimism and I wanted to grace my walls with those painters America had given to the world, she told the L.A. Times. <...> New York Observer
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)I know how we all feel about the rich here but such open generosity as Streisand exhibits is laudable. She wants LACMA, a great museum, to have this painting as her bequest, so many people with benefit from it. I wish she would give it earlier but I understand the reasons she doesn't.
Fine. It's great, Barbra...
ananda
(28,877 posts)It's more than annoying to me how the rich hold on to art.
This perverts the whole concept of art as a way in to
the Zeitgeist or Weltanshauung of a society.
This happened with a poetical essay by Shelley which was
bought from the Bodleian and co-opted by a private interest
who won't allow it to be published.
Argghhh!
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)museums for the public good. Our great art museums in this country were financed largely by wealthy donors, some back in the Gilded Age, who did think of the people.
I've done a lot of research and deep thinking about this. J.P. Morgan founded the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC with his stash of marvelous art he bought in Europe. I have to give credit where credit is due.
Ron Lauder, heir to Lauder Cosmetics, created the Neue Galerie in NYC and outbid the corrupt (and latent Nazi) Belvedere Museum in Austria to buy "Adele Bloch Bauer" once her heir got it back. He then promptly started the Neue Galerie in NYC and donated the painting to it. I have seen it there and it was a wonderful experience.
I hate to say this but the rich banking families of Florence had an enormous influence on the early Italian Renaissance. It is true that the Guilds in Florence did the same but the Medici were extremely important to art with their sponsorship of some of the greatest artists we know of today.
I'm more socialist at heart and this pains me to say. It's sad when Detroit has to go to the rich suburbs to get enough money to keep the city's art treasure from being sold off to satisfy the city's debt load. that nearly broke my heart. Hopefully, the Detroit gallery will be placed in a trust and not considered as an asset of the city to be sold off to satisfy a debt the city holds...
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)I was an art major and took art history, and still never saw any of Sargent's work until you posted this. I love the Boit girls painting and I think it is one of the best I've seen from his period. I can't imagine why it was not even included in my massive art history book.
I wish I was close enough to visit the museum. I'll have to enjoy it vicariously through your posts.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)Whatever, he is now back on the scene! Enjoy!
blogslut
(38,018 posts)His subjects are always so alive.
femmocrat
(28,394 posts)Thank you for your enlightening art history lessons.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)femmocrat
(28,394 posts)But I never really looked at it this closely before. The placement of the figures is disconcerting once you start to analyze it. I learn so much from your art history posts. Thank you so much.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)panader0
(25,816 posts)CTyankee
(63,912 posts)note what he does with that improbable white skirt...
suffragette
(12,232 posts)and that the oldest girl is leaning against the vase.
The bird in the painting is more fragile and ephemeral than it is on the actual vase.
The time of youth passing by?
Adulthood and leave taking soon to come?
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)But he does make it appear in a fainter outline. I think it may just be that he was de-emphasizing the vase decoration to keep your attention on his work...
panader0
(25,816 posts)CherokeeDem
(3,709 posts)Your observations and discussions of these beautiful works of art are very enjoyable. I loved your noting Sargent's "virtuosity in painting nuances in white." I was drawn to the luminous quality of the aprons s soon s I viewed the painting.
Thank you, thoroughly enjoyed this essay.
pangaia
(24,324 posts)Wonderful presentation.
I especially appreciate the discussion of the influences of one period on a later period and of earlier artists on later artists. Of course this is true in all art but the way you present it is so clear..another door being opened.
And you now have me interested in white...
Then there is the counterpoint in 'Las Meninas.' A reminder, in a way, of your last gift to us.
And, I HOPE this summer to take in a Red Sox game,, a visit to Fenway being on my bucket list. And of course if I make it.... a stop at the MFA is now on the books.
Thank you again,
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)Oh, and btw, you can also see Slave Ship by Turner there...the MFA is a great museum. Sargent designed its ceiling
pangaia
(24,324 posts)Humm,, Did I miss one in between?
I;ll definitely go the the MFA if I make it to Boston....
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)which I hope can be resolved soon. And the Biden funeral has undone me for this day...I keep thinking of Beau's kids...this is a tough one for all of us to get through...
edhopper
(33,625 posts)every painter I know admires Sargent. Usually we look at originals by Masters and say, "Oh, I see how he does that." and pick up a technique point or two.
But with Sargent it is usually "I can't ever do that, maybe I should stop painting." His technique is so strong, the perfect brush strokes in the perfect place, it is truly amazing.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)a resurgence of his popularity. I think the art lovers in Boston have always felt endearingly toward him...
edhopper
(33,625 posts)he is a the top of the list. And judging by the attendance to the museum shows. the public loves him as well.
It is only the part of the "Art Establishment" that thinks painting started with Picasso and hate traditional, representational work that don't appreciate him.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)people who think art was just started oh, maybe in the beginning of the 20th century. I think they are just lazy and can't/won't do any deeper thinking than modernism. You can't even talk to them about it. We've got plenty of them right here in the People's Republic of New Haven and some of them are around the Yale School of Art....
edhopper
(33,625 posts)long after the likes of Jeff Koons have sunk into obscurity.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)edhopper
(33,625 posts)It's more manufacturing than art.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)to BE what he isn't, just stole the application...yuck.
edhopper
(33,625 posts)not any really original ideas and made art about celebrity.
Also gave us there untalented Basguat and the marginal, cutesy Hardin.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)but he was a revolutionary artist of his time despite the later celebrity. I've been doing research on him for an upcoming essay on some of his art (and I'm going to see his soup cans which have returned to MoMA recently). Warhol did have a real philosophy early on about modern art. I guess later he did turn himself into a celebrity and that has happened to artists since time immemorial...I try to separate the two issues. It gets to the thorny question of what is art. I have a ton of material from a philosophy professor late of Columbia University, Arthur C. Danto, who has written extensively about Warhol. You'll see my essay in a month or so. Hope it doesn't make you mad. But let me know. It's OK to get mad about art!
edhopper
(33,625 posts)I don't find him vacuous like Koons or Hirst.
I just think the other major artists of that time did so much more significant work.
His use of pop images was by no means original (Johns and Raushenberg were doing it years earlier)
Mainly it's his rep with the public as the major artist of the period I have a problem with.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)I think of Warhol as a revolutionary philosopher about art and I think that is what attracted professor Danto. Anyway, it's a fun discussion and we'll have it in a month or so...onward!
that sounds good. The philosophy part is probably more interesting that his work.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)some folks think he was a sham all along, also...what is your take? I color field all its chalked up to be?
edhopper
(33,625 posts)the emotional content of the colors balanced off each other really is great.
I visited the chapel in Houston with his later work, powerful stuff.
I like modern art, it's just that most of the drivel that passes for it today is uninspired and unoriginal.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)kind of hoax. I think they missed the point of those paintings...their meditative purpose and the overall mission of the chapel in the first place. That is the context in which I see them...what do you think?
edhopper
(33,625 posts)now knowing the depression he was feeling, the work takes on an additional tone.
But the chapel paintings make it a very contemplative and somber inside.
It's not an art gallery, these are environmental pieces.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)my piece on rothko in case you are interested...http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025916650
I'll take a look.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)As for the Boit daughters, Florence (leaning against the pillar in the painting) was always a rather odd duck, never evincing the slightest interest in marrying or attending the usual social events. She was an avid player of the relatively new sport of golfwhich she introduced to the Boston area, inspiring the local rich folks to build a course at a country club in Newport. She and a cousin, Jane Boit Patten, nicknamed Pat to distinguish her from the innumerable Janes and Jeanies in the family, became fast friends and in later years, lived in what was called a Boston marriage, two spinster ladies living together.
The second daughter, Jane (standing next to Florence, facing forward), both before Isa died and afterward, was ill a great deal, both physically and emotionally, and spent several periods of time in and out of retreats and institutions where she underwent various cures to allay her apparently rather violent fits of anger and depression. Not much is known about Mary Louisa (standing to the far left, hands behind her back) except that she and Julia (on the floor with her babydoll) were always together, and Julia became fairly well known for her paintings and illustrations in water colors. Florence died at age fifty-one, on December 8, 1919, in Paris.
With the outbreak of WWII in 1939, the three remaining sisters moved back to the United States. Julia and Mary Louisa (also known as Isa like her mother) lived in Newport, where Mary Louisa died on June 27, 1945, at age seventy-one. Jane (or Jeanie as she was known) died at the age of eighty-five on November 8, 1955, in Greenwich, Connecticut. Julia passed away in February 1969, at the age of ninety-one.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)thanks for that info...
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)in an era where that would have been most unusual.
I wonder if their money enabled them to stay single. Their father died in 1919 and clearly enjoyed being married (was married twice) so they had a role model well into their adult lives. Maybe the tragic end of both of his wives put them off that kind of commitment?
Although a "Boston marriage" may well have been a cover for a lesbian partnership...
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)The author of the book on this painting, its background and history, didn't necessarily believe the girls were all unhappy during their lives. Even the one with physical and emotional problems lived her life with someone to help her.
But you have a good point about the tragic end to Edward's wives. Even upper class women could die in childbirth. And they had enough money to live well single. They might have been early feminists for all we know...
treestar
(82,383 posts)So many men were killed spinsters were rather plentiful.
Though of 4 girls you'd think at least one would manage it.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)who you are and not some weird abnormality.
I think if living in Boston she would really have an advantage...
erronis
(15,355 posts)Museum in Boston (also like the MFA.)
There are some wonderful paintings there and the museum itself is a work of art and a treasure.
The Gardner Museum's collection of Sargent is incredible: http://www.gardnermuseum.org/collection/browse?filter=artist:3184
It includes this awe-inspiring one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Jaleo
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)my daughter who lives in the Boston suburbs. We saw the Goya exhibit and took my granddaughter who loved the duchess in her black lace. Thank god I have one grandchild who likes to go to art museums...she even listened to her old grandma give her a brief tutorial on Goya on the ride in...
treestar
(82,383 posts)You can see that in the close ups of the pinafores.