- Hardcover: 79 pages
- Publisher: Universe Publishing (Incorporated, Div. of Rizzoli (31 May 1999)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0789302616
- ISBN-13: 978-0789302618
- Product Dimensions: 20.8 x 1.5 x 25.7 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 861,436 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
Published on occasion of the major Sargent retrospective traveling to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in 1999, John Singer Sargent: The Male Nudes brings to light a fascinating portion of Sargent's work long hidden from the public eye.
Beginning in his adolescence, and throughout his distinguished career, John Singer Sargent, the celebrated painter of patricians, produced a superbly rendered, uninhibited book of work that was rarely seen and never exhibited: the male nudes. Models were a significant aspect of the great painter's profession, whether they were commission-producing society "sitters" or professional models used as reference for his three Boston mural projects or works created for his private enjoyment--one young Italian model stayed in the artist's employ for nearly twenty-six years. Sargent's enduring subject was capturing the "human form divine" in portraits of the fashionable and famous and the absolute male.
Over the last century, these little-known works have been dispersed to museum archives and private collections throughout the United States and Great Britain. John Esten has unearthed the most extraordinary of these images, ranging from vibrant watercolors and oil paintings to charcoal studies, published here for the first time in a single volume.
Beginning in his adolescence, and throughout his distinguished career, John Singer Sargent, the celebrated painter of patricians, produced a superbly rendered, uninhibited book of work that was rarely seen and never exhibited: the male nudes. Models were a significant aspect of the great painter's profession, whether they were commission-producing society "sitters" or professional models used as reference for his three Boston mural projects or works created for his private enjoyment--one young Italian model stayed in the artist's employ for nearly twenty-six years. Sargent's enduring subject was capturing the "human form divine" in portraits of the fashionable and famous and the absolute male.
Over the last century, these little-known works have been dispersed to museum archives and private collections throughout the United States and Great Britain. John Esten has unearthed the most extraordinary of these images, ranging from vibrant watercolors and oil paintings to charcoal studies, published here for the first time in a single volume.
About the Author
John Esten created and designed many books including Man Ray/Bazaar Years, Manhattan Style, and Hampton Style. A former art director at Harper's Bazaar and L'Officiel USA magazines, he has been a special consultant to the Grey Gallery of New York University, as well as guest curator at the Guild Hall Museum in East Hampton, New York, and the International Center of Photography, New York.
Donna Hassler is an art historian specializing in American drawing and sculpture of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. She was assistant curator at the Department of American Paintings and Sculpture of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and served as the acting director and curator of the Hyde Collection, Glens Falls, New York. Ms. Hassler is currently executive director of the Rennsselaer County Historical Society, Troy, New York. She is coauthor of the forthcoming book American Sculpture in the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Artists Born by 1885.
Donna Hassler is an art historian specializing in American drawing and sculpture of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. She was assistant curator at the Department of American Paintings and Sculpture of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and served as the acting director and curator of the Hyde Collection, Glens Falls, New York. Ms. Hassler is currently executive director of the Rennsselaer County Historical Society, Troy, New York. She is coauthor of the forthcoming book American Sculpture in the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Artists Born by 1885.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
John Singer Sargent, that glorious artist of the Edwardian age, whose society portraits beam down at us over the decades, was also a most brilliant depictor of the male nude.
Here is a collection of some of his best works in the genre. Most are charcoal life sketches or more finished works, but there are some very beautiful, intimate watercolour drawings of 'Tommies' resting by the riverside, done by Sargent when in France during the First World War on an official capacity.
The portrait in oils of Thomas E. McKeller, an American bell-hop who posed for Sargent several times while he was working on his Boston Museum of Fine Art murals, is worth the price of the book alone. The strong but seraphic figure with wings indicated mysteriously at his shoulders is a haunting one indeed.
Perhaps we are lucky at all to have these images. When Sargent died in the 1920s his family witheld all the male nude artwork from the sale of the contents of his studios, as the general public, prone to hysterical homophobia just thirty years on from Oscar Wilde's brutal punishment, might well have deemed such things pornographic. They are nothing of the sort: they are, in fact, some of the finest studies of male nudes in the history of art.
A book to be studied and treasured.
Here is a collection of some of his best works in the genre. Most are charcoal life sketches or more finished works, but there are some very beautiful, intimate watercolour drawings of 'Tommies' resting by the riverside, done by Sargent when in France during the First World War on an official capacity.
The portrait in oils of Thomas E. McKeller, an American bell-hop who posed for Sargent several times while he was working on his Boston Museum of Fine Art murals, is worth the price of the book alone. The strong but seraphic figure with wings indicated mysteriously at his shoulders is a haunting one indeed.
Perhaps we are lucky at all to have these images. When Sargent died in the 1920s his family witheld all the male nude artwork from the sale of the contents of his studios, as the general public, prone to hysterical homophobia just thirty years on from Oscar Wilde's brutal punishment, might well have deemed such things pornographic. They are nothing of the sort: they are, in fact, some of the finest studies of male nudes in the history of art.
A book to be studied and treasured.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Following the foreword are two very brief essays which discuss Sargent's background and his work. A sensitive and intelligent appraisal of the artist and his approach to the studies under consideration here, one that especially in the light of the context does not skirt around the inclinations of the artist's heart, and addresses the possibility of a relationship with his loyal and devoted lithe young Italian valet and occasional model who resided in the Sargent household for twenty six years.
The work presented here is superb; sensitive yet dynamic drawings and paintings; the text makes an interesting observation to the observer's response to them, but however one views them one cannot deny their beauty. One of the first illustrated is an oil painting of a young boy lying on the beach, and the pose immediately brings to mind similar subject matter painted by Joaquin Sorolla, produced some twenty or so years after Sargent's effort.
The plates run from page twelve to page seventy eight, and include sketches, charcoal drawings, watercolours and oils, of which eighteen are in full colour, occasionally accompanied by a few relevant notes. The book concludes with a chronology and selected bibliography.
This is a delightful book, slim and not over large; the work contained within is unrestrained, evocative, seemingly effortless; unquestionably the work of a great master.
The work presented here is superb; sensitive yet dynamic drawings and paintings; the text makes an interesting observation to the observer's response to them, but however one views them one cannot deny their beauty. One of the first illustrated is an oil painting of a young boy lying on the beach, and the pose immediately brings to mind similar subject matter painted by Joaquin Sorolla, produced some twenty or so years after Sargent's effort.
The plates run from page twelve to page seventy eight, and include sketches, charcoal drawings, watercolours and oils, of which eighteen are in full colour, occasionally accompanied by a few relevant notes. The book concludes with a chronology and selected bibliography.
This is a delightful book, slim and not over large; the work contained within is unrestrained, evocative, seemingly effortless; unquestionably the work of a great master.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
John Singer Sargent is admired as one of this country's premiere portrait artists and museums clamor for any new Sargent that comes on the auction block. His stately Edwardian ladies and gentlemen are elegance personified. Yet as we slowly discover the private lives and portfolios of some of our nation's brightest lights in painting, we uncover other aspects of their gifts. Sargent's Male Nudes are here displayed in all their brilliance of line and tenderness of demeanor that only emphasizes Sargent's fondness for the male figure. Though the author (John Esten) does not dwell on the evidence of these homoerotic drawings and paintings, he gently offers the works themselves in the same context with the works of Thomas Eakins and the literature of Henry James and allows us to piece together the private, closeted lives they all shared. This is a brief but elegant and tender collection of works that deserve a much wider audience. Grady Harp, May 10
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