cover image John Singer Sargent: 
Figures and Landscapes, 
1900–1907 (The Complete Paintings, Vol. VII)

John Singer Sargent: Figures and Landscapes, 1900–1907 (The Complete Paintings, Vol. VII)

Richard Ormond and Elaine Kilmurray. Yale Univ., $75 (400p) ISBN 978-0-300-17735-0

This lusciously illustrated, carefully researched volume covers a period when Sargent, despite his “demanding, internationally based portrait practice” and commitment to a mural cycle for the Boston Public Library, began to “paint as he chose rather than as commissions dictated” and to focus more on landscape and figure studies in travels across Europe and the Middle East. Organized thematically and by location, the book provides “a wider view of Sargent’s work,” with detailed descriptions and analyses of the paintings and the context in which they were created, as well as lively excerpts from original sources. For example, Vanessa Bell’s 1903 description of studying with Sargent: “The one thing he is down upon is when he thinks anyone is trying for effect regardless of truth.” Ormond and Kilmurray illuminate how Sargent looked “back and forward... highlighting the fluidity of the dividing line between the traditional and modern,” searched “for a more authentic, less mediated experience,” and understood modernity: that “there is an inherent value in the means of depiction, rather than in the object depicted,” as well as his “ambivalence toward the modern world” and “changing understanding of the natural world and the contingent nature of modern experience.” Libraries, art lovers, and Sargent fans will appreciate this beautiful volume. 392 color and 73 b&w illus. (Nov.)