Like the first life forms on Earth, the career of John Singer Sargent rose up from the sea. Between 1874 and 1879, when Sargent first emerged from his teens and began his career as an artist, he painted scenes of the sea and shore he witnessed during trips to Brittany, Normandy, Capri, and other Mediterranean spots. The exhibition Sargent and the Sea currently at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston brings together Sargent’s seascapes together for the first time to allow us to understand how the greatest portraitist of his time literally got his feet wet as a painter. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Take Me to the Water."
[Image: John Singer Sargent, American, born Italy, 1856-1925, En Route pour la pêche (Setting Out to Fish), 1878. Oil on canvas. Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Museum Purchase, Gallery Fund, 17.2.]
[Many thanks to Yale University Press for providing me with a review copy of the catalogue to Sargent and the Sea. Many thanks to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston for providing me with the image above from the exhibition Sargent and the Sea, which runs through May 23, 2010.]
