February 2019 - Occasional Glimpses of the Sublime

One of my favourite artists is John Singer Sargent, the great Edwardian-era portrait painter. Born in Florence to American parents, he lived an itinerant early life in Europe, his parents moving regularly between sea and mountain resorts in France, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland (alright for some). Sargent’s early signs of artistic talent led the family to Paris where he gained admission to the École des Beaux-Arts and studied with the noted French portraitist, Carolus-Duran.

In 1879, at the age of 23, Sargent painted a portrait of Carolus-Duran and exhibited it at the Paris Salon. It met with such public approval that his future direction was sealed. He quickly accumulated commissions for portraits and his fame spread. He painted commissioned portraits right up until his death in 1925, but in between commissions he would paint friends and colleagues for fun. It was one such non-commissioned painting, Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose, that grabbed my attention at the Tate Britain and turned me into an instant fan. However, the subject of today’s blog is the painting that became Sargent’s headline-grabber, Portrait of Madame X.

Just as we saw when I blogged about Edouard Manet, Sargent’s successful career was not without scandal. In 1884 he submitted Portrait of Madame X to the Paris Salon. “Madame X” was “professional beauty” and socialite, Virginie Gautreau, the American wife of a French banker. Sargent actually pursued her to paint her, rather than the other way round. It’s a deeply alluring piece, with the sitter standing in profile, and the deep black of her dress emphasising the “aristocratic pallor” of her skin. With cinched waist, the elegant bone structure, and with one shoulder strap seemingly about to fall off the shoulder, the image could only suggest one thing — the erotic — and it was this, inevitably (for the time), that precipitated the scandal at the Salon. It was only a temporary setback (and Sargent responded by repainting the shoulder strap in a “safer” position), and I don’t suppose a little bit of scandal is too harmful to the career of a gifted artist, after all.

In June of 1999, Nicole Kidman was the cover girl of Vogue, and in her cover story, she posed for photographs in a number of John Singer Sargent re-imaginings (including Madame X) by the photographer, Steven Meisel. The photogenic Kidman suits these pictures perfectly so I thought it well worth showcasing them here, alongside their originals…starting with the beguiling Madame X.

Given all the standard genres of painting open to an artist in 17th century Amsterdam – landscape, portraiture, still life, history, religious – you could be forgiven for assuming that the subject of today’s blog, Rembrandt’s The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp, was something of a one-off. It has a seemingly very specific and niche subject: that of an anatomy lesson involving the dissection of a cadaver! In fact, though, at the time of Rembrandt’s work in 1632, there was already a strong tradition of Dutch “guild portraiture” (group portraits commissioned by a professional association such as the Guild of Surgeons) and many of these involved dissection scenes, so Rembrandt’s subject was far from unique for the time.

This was the Dutch Golden Age. Compared to most other countries of 17th century Europe, the Netherlands was positively progressive in its model of government. Since the formation of the Dutch republic in 1581, the Netherlands had experienced the emergence of a national and cultural identity, and both religious freedom and open trade were highly valued. With a burgeoning economy and the rise of the middle classes, it was a place where Dutch scientists — and Dutch artists — were able to experiment without fear of papal censure. Guild portraiture was therefore an expression of Dutch progressivism.

The practice of dissection, prior to the Dutch republic, had been morally questionable: in fact, the Church had officially condemned it, and even post-republic it was still a grey area. However, it was recognised that dissection was part and parcel of scientific advancement, and so Amsterdam’s now-Protestant city council sanctioned the practice on the condition that only the corpses of criminals were used. Anatomic dissections soon became highly popular public events, lasting for several days (and for that reason carried out in the winter, to retard the decay of the cadavers) and generating a substantial income from paying observers.

Artists were thus commissioned to capture the scene and guild members would have paid a pretty sum to be featured in it. What differentiates this painting from all the others was the fact that this was Rembrandt, the most gifted and prolific artist of his age, and typically he undertook to reject the traditional composition of Dutch guild portraiture and instead he adopted a more visceral style. Rembrandt puts the corpse at the centre of the scene and portrays it in full length, in Christ-like repose. It turns a group vanitas portrait into a quite dramatic and arresting image.

The corpse, incidentally, was one Adriaan Adriaanszoon, who was convicted for armed robbery and sentenced to death by hanging (which occurred on the very morning of the dissection). Perhaps not the most illustrious reason to be captured on canvas for posterity, but hey ho!

Occasional Glimpses of the Sublime

Monthly Archives: February 2019

John Singer Sargent’s Madame X (1884)

Rembrandt’s The Anatomy Lesson Of Dr Nicolaes Tulp (1632)

Commentaries on excellence in art, music, film, and literature