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| Neapolitan Children Bathing, by John Singer Sargent |
Presented to the Club by David T. Noyes on Monday evening, December 5, 2016
Can you remember when the only building housing the Clark
Art Institute was the stark, austere, imposing, lonely, marble fortress set
back from the street on a knoll in Williamstown? After moving to Pittsfield in
1981, Sue and I made many trips to take in Sterling Clark’s collection. There
was no food service at the Museum in those days, so we might grab lunch at the
(now defunct) Howard Johnson’s, or have a sandwich at Papa Charlie’s Deli on
Spring Street. No visit was complete without admiring this small painting—also
titled Innocence Abroad; or Boys on a Beach, Naples, painted in 1879 by John Singer Sargent.
This 11” x 16” canvas shows children enjoying a beautiful
sunny day at the beach. Two boys—one with a towel over his face, the other on
his stomach with his head propped up on his hand—lie near two other, much
younger boys standing. The boy at the center, wearing water wings, looks as
though he is trying to get up the courage to wade into the rolling surf. Out in
the water, a head bobbing above the rolling waves shows us a swimmer. The only
interruption of the blue sky is the sailboat on the horizon. The smallest
child, still showing the chubbiness of babyhood, looks outward engaging the
viewer, thereby inviting us into their realm. The use of a completely frontal
stance became a hallmark of Sargent’s painting as he felt this gave a more
powerful image and made a more direct connection with the viewer. The children
are all relaxed, and self absorbed—the very epitome of childhood innocence.
During those early years in Pittsfield, we frequently made
family trips to Cape Cod to stay and visit with my parents at their cottage
with a view of the water. Naturally, the beach was the favorite place to be—accessed
via a simple walk across the narrow road passing by the front porch. From the
moment I first saw this painting, I imagined that the two younger boys were our
sons, Todd and Tyler, as they were exact likenesses. When I dropped off the
postcards to Harold to be included with the regular reminder mailing, Audrey
immediately said: “Is this a picture of your family?” “Exactly!” I smiled.
In fact, The Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize winning art
critic, Sebastian Smee, was similarly struck by this painting. In a June, 2015
article he writes: “This small stingingly bright canvas always stops me at the
Clark, where it hangs amid great works by 19th-century painters,
most of them French. It evokes a world far from the Clark’s undulant campus. The
stark light and satisfying spiritual click of standing on your own shadow
reminds me of my own childhood in Australia, much of it spent on all-but vacant
beaches like this one.”
This painting, by John Singer Sargent, when he was just twenty-two
years old, was his third work to appear in America. The owner lent it to the
National Academy of Design in New York City for its 1879 exhibition where it
was applauded as “delightful, happy, and sparkling” and commended for its
subtlety of color. The tremendously positive reaction reflected the important
status given to children in post Civil War America; they were signs of purity
and innocence, as well as hope for the future.
Although Sargent is considered an American artist, he was
born in Florence, Italy in 1856. His father, Fitzwilliam Sargent, was born in
Gloucester, Mass. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a
degree in Medicine 1843. For ten years, from 1844 until 1854, he worked as a
surgeon in Philadelphia. Eminent in his profession, he published works on minor
surgery. John Sargent’s mother was Mary Newbold the daughter of John Singer, a
well to do Philadelphia merchant and successor to a prosperous business he
inherited from his father.
As a child, Mary had travelled to Italy. Such was the magic
of that country, that after four years of marriage, she persuaded her husband
to give up his practice and in 1854 they moved to Florence. Fitzwilliam Sargent
had, by virtue of his practice in Philadelphia, made a good living. But Mary
was sufficiently well off that he did not have to work to support the family.
Fitzwilliam expected his son would have a naval career, but
at age 12, John’s mother recognized his artistic talent and his schooling soon reflected
that. The conventional curriculum of Greek/Latin and Mathematics was supplanted
with music and foreign Languages, where, he excelled.
In October 1874 at the age of 18 he entered the studio of
Carolus Duran, then the foremost portrait painter in Paris. Sargent himself
always recognized his debt to the teaching of Duran. At the height of his fame
he commented that “Carolus Duran couldn’t actually do it himself---but he could
teach it”. When asked, for example, how he avoided false accents in
portraiture, Sargent said: “you must classify the values. If you begin with the
middle-tones and work up and down from there towards the darks and lights—so
that you deal last with your lightest lights and darkest darks—you avoid false
accents. That’s what Carolus taught me.”
In 1876 he sailed to America and experienced his first visit
with the United States. There is no hint of the impression he received. He was
an American by parentage, born and educated in the Old World, steeped in the
culture of Europe, and now, at the age of twenty, he was introduced to his
native country for the first time. The contrast must have been sharper than it
would be today. The great American collectors had not really begun the
piecemeal transfer of European collections of art. It was only by visiting
Europe that one could obtain any idea of the history of painting.
In 1878 his picture “En Route pour la Peche” received
honorable mention at the Salon.
In 1882, two of Sargent’s pictures in the Salon, were
singled out by the critics for unqualified praise. One critic wrote of the
portrait: Mrs. Austin---“one does not know which to admire most, the simplicity
of the means which the artist has employed or the brilliance of the result
which he has achieved” Another critic wrote that El Jaleo was the most striking
picture of the year. And so at the still quite young age of 26, Sargent, an
American by virtue of his heritage, was being hailed in Paris as the author of
the two most outstanding pictures in the Salon. He was soon receiving as many
commissions as he could execute, charging for a full length portrait----8,000
francs, for a half length—five thousand, and for his subject pictures and for landscapes,
anything from two to four thousand francs.
No French artist was more admired by Sargent than the French
Neoclassical artist, Jean—Auguste--Dominique Ingres who became most famous for
his portraits from the early to mid nineteenth century. Yet the two artists
were quite dissimilar. Ingres painted with serenity in his delineation of form,
and with repose and beauty in his lines, but often shunned the agitation and
movement of light. By contrast—Sargent was forcible in his execution, concerned
with the play and reflection of light, and on the look-out for the intricate
aspect of things; highlighting an art that is alert, vibrant, and vital with
color and the spirit of life. But underneath all that, there remains the
draftsmanship, the genius for composition and the fluent strength and elegance
of the line of the French master—it was these virtues that Sargent never tired
of extolling.
And those skills are dramatically apparent even in this
early painting. It would appear to be a simple, casual representation of a day
at the beach. But the painting was developed from several pencil sketches and
four preliminary oil studies on panel, all of which seem to have been painted en plein air. Sargent puts three of the
boys off center, and crops the legs of the figure in the foreground. The
shining grey-white sand, surf, and translucent water wings contribute reflective
surfaces so that soft golden hues can define the children’s bodies, with
puddles of grayish purple forming their shadows. The overall effect is one of
warm sunshine that charms the viewer.
While in Paris, he frequently saw Degas, Renoir, Sisley and
Pissarro, but was most friendly with Claude Monet whom he believed had a
greater influence on art than any other modern painter. When Sargent discussed
genius on painting, he said there were four painters who possessed genius in a
superlative degree: Rembrandt, Titian, Tintoretto and Raphael. When asked his
opinion of Velasquez joining the group. He added that no painter exceeded
Velasquez in technical skill, but that he was less gifted in his power to
interpret “spiritual qualities”.
Sargent moved to London in 1885—more out of distaste for
Paris than preference for London. He leased the studio that had previously
belonged to James Abbott McNeill Whistler, another American, but European
portrait painter.
“Those who watched Sargent painting in his studio noticed
his habit of stepping backwards after almost every stroke of the brush on the
canvas. And the track of his paces so worn on the carpet that it simulated the
path sheep make through heather. When confronting difficulty, he had a sort of
battle cry of “Demons, Demons” with which he would dash to and fro at the
canvas”
During the winter of 1887-1888 he sailed to Boston where he
exhibited twenty of his pictures. His work was hailed for its sincerity, and
its brilliant variation from the stereotypical conventions of the day. Henceforth,
his reputation in America was assured.
From this point forward in his career, he no longer chose
subjects from the humbler walks of life. Destiny prescribed for him the role of
a portrait painter of the social world. He had brought the tradition with him
from Paris; he had grown up in an age when, having your portrait painted, was an
expected part of the fashionable life. In London he carried on the tradition. He
was unaffected by the changes taking place in Paris in the character of
subjects which the rising Impressionist artists were painting. The work of
Sargent now came from a study of the eminent, the rich and the successful. He
painted the world of which Henry James wrote. His migration to England put an
end to his interested outlook in the peasant life and folk
subjects----fisherwomen by the sea, dancers in Spanish cabarets, Parisians in
the Luxembourg Gardens, Venetian water-carriers, or, even, Boys on a Beach!
Conditions in England decided the direction of Sargent’s
genius. He was turned away from his experiment in Impressionism, and his
leanings towards common subjects. As the chronicler of the fashionable world,
like Van Dyck in his day, or like the 18th century English portrait
painters Sir Joshua Reynolds and Thomas Gainsborough in theirs, he established
within a few years an undisputed supremacy.
Few artists have been more consistently applauded in their
lifetime than Sargent, few have seen their work maintain throughout many years
greater popularity with the public. There had never been a moment since 1875
when his pictures had not found a ready market, there had never been a year
when he didn’t have more commissions than he could execute. Critics, after the
first hesitations, and with few exceptions, consistently eulogized his
paintings; dealers had been resolute in their acquisition; fellow artists had
acclaimed him; and the public, had made him their favorite. The prices realized
by his pictures at auction rose steadily during his lifetime. And in July 1925,
237 of Sargent’s oil paintings and drawings sold at Christie’s for 170,000
pounds—there was no parallel for such a sale at that time.
Robert Sterling Clark purchased this painting from the son
of the original owner in 1923 when he was forty-six.
The person whose fortune made all of Sterling Clark’s
collecting and high living possible was Edward Cabot Clark. The four grandsons:
Sterling and Stephen and their brothers, Edward and Ambrose could not have been
who they were without the incredible wealth from Edward’s phenomenal business
success. When he died in 1882 his net worth was 50 million dollars. The origin
of the family fortune is due to Edward Clark’s alliance with the sewing machine
developer—Isaac Merritt Singer.
Singer would become infinitely better known than Clark—in large part because
his name was on every one of the machines that entered first American and then
international households. These engineering
inspirations were a result of Singer’s inventiveness, but turning those
qualities into such a vast fortune was the genius of Edward Clark.
Edward Clark was born in 1811 in Athens, New York. His
father had a successful pottery business and Edward grew up in comfortable
circumstances. At the age of twelve he began four years of education at the
Academy in Lenox Massachusetts. He then went on to graduate from Williams
College at the age of nineteen in 1831. (He would later become a trustee and be
awarded an honorary Doctorate.) Edward apprenticed for three years at the law
firm of Ambrose Jordan in Hudson, New York, and was then admitted to practice
law--setting up a practice in Poughkeepsie. He
married his boss’s daughter and then moved with his father-in-law, in 1836, to
New York City. Soon thereafter “Jordan and Clark” gained the reputation as New
York City’s most prestigious law firm. (It probably helped that Ambrose Jordan
was the state’s attorney general!)
Isaac Merritt Singer was also born in 1811, in Pittstown,
New York. He grew up in poverty and left home at the age of twelve. He
apprenticed in a machine shop, and began to make a good living because of his
mechanical ingenuity. Singer stood six feet four inches tall and had a massive
build, cutting quite an imposing figure. He married Catherine Haley and had two
children with her.
He fancied himself quite the actor, and especially enjoyed performing
Shakespeare. In 1839 while working with his brother in Illinois digging a
waterway, he got his first patent: a machine for drilling rock. With the two
thousand dollars he received, he formed his own travelling theater company. He
was now known as Isaac Merritt and his actress mistress, Mary Ann Sponseler,
was known as Mrs. Merritt. He ultimately had eleven children with her. (He also
had an additional child from a third woman, Mary Eastwood Walters, during this
time) The troupe ran out of money and
Singer moved to New York with an idea for a machine that would carve wood-block
type. Here he sought the help of the Jordan and Clark law firm.
Ambrose Jordan found Singer “too personally distasteful to
represent”. But he must have seen some value in retaining him as a client
because he referred him to his son-in-law. Edward Clark helped Singer obtain
the patent in 1849 and Singer assigned Edward three-eights of it in lieu of
paying legal fees.
Sewing machines had existed since at least 1790 when Thomas
Saint had received a patent for one in England. A French tailor, Barthelemy
Thimonnier improved the machine in 1829. In 1846 Elias Howe received a patent
for his sewing machine. Singer’s improvement was to have the machine make
stronger stitches in a perfectly straight line. He received a patent in 1851
and went into a financial partnership to start the Jenny Lind Sewing Machine Company.
(Named after Swedish soprano then touring the United States.)
However, Elias Howe felt that Singer’s machine was
sufficiently close to his own that he began legal proceedings for patent
infringement. Singer once again turned to Edward Clark. Still penniless, Singer
ultimately agreed to give Clark half ownership and the right to take control of
the new company: I.M. Singer & Company in exchange for legal services.
What is interesting about the patent litigation is that
Singer had, indeed, violated the law and infringed on one of Elias Howe’s
patents. When Howe pressed for a settlement of twenty-five thousand dollars, he
did so because of Singer’s use of the eye-pointed needle in his new machine. Although
Howe had not invented that device, he did own the patent. Everything else about
Singer’s machine was an advance over Howe’s, but the use of the needle without
authorization was illegal. The settlement reached in 1854 awarded Howe a
royalty from all Singer Machines. Edward’s genius was in keeping the settlement
from being more onerous and in mitigating the effects of Singer’s criminality.
For the next decade, Clark oversaw every aspect of the
business while Singer basked in the role of resident genius. Edward was
concerned with appearances and got Singer to decorate the black machines with
gold ornament. He had the idea of selling machines to minister’s wives for half
price so that they would introduce them to their sewing circles. During the
recession in 1856, Edward pioneered the idea of an installment plan whereby for
five dollars down and three dollars a month, customers could reach ownership of
the machines. He also developed and expanded the European market to a degree
previously unprecedented in American Manufacturing.
Clark also became embroiled in the management of Singer’s
personal life. He and Mary Ann Sponselor, whom most took to be his wife, lived
opulently in a grand house on lower Fifth Avenue. But Singer now had an additional mistress, Mary
McGonigal with whom he had five more children! Singer lived with her as Mr. and
Mrs. Matthews in a separate house in New York. The sewing machine buying public
disdained Isaac Singer for his scandalous ways, and it was in the interest of
the company to clean up his reputation. It fell to Edward to negotiate Singer’s
divorce from his legal wife, Catherine Haley. Clark assumed that Singer would then
marry Sponselor, but he was too loyal to “Mrs. Matthews”. One day when Singer
was out with Mrs. Matthews, they accidentally came upon Mary Sponselor who
unleashed a public tirade for all to hear.
Singer responded by storming into the house on Fifth Avenue
and choking Sponselor, and one of their daughters who tried to intervene, into
an unconscious state. Before legal action took place Singer fled to England,
accompanied by Mary McGonigal’s nineteen year old sister Kate.
Again, Clark was concerned that women would not buy a
machine linked to adultery, wife beating, and illegitimate children. He
persuaded Singer to give up any active management of the firm and incorporated
Singer Manufacturing Company. Together they would still be equal owners with
20% of the stock sold to key employees. Singer agreed as long as Edward could
not be president while Singer was still alive. Edward, however, managed to retain
considerable influence as Chairman of the Board.
When Edward died in1882, he left an estate worth fifty
million dollars! Although he had three sons, only the youngest, Alfred, was
married, with four children—Edward Severin (nicknamed Rino), Robert Sterling
(whom the family called Robin), Frederick Ambrose, and Stephen Carlton. I’ll
skip over Alfred’s life, which may be worthy of Club Paper on its own.
Sterling Clark studied engineering at Yale, and then joined
the U.S. army Ninth Infantry Regiment. He fought in the Spanish American War
that captured the Philippines, and in China to help stifle the Boxer Rebellion
in 1901.
With that international background and no concerns about
having to make a living, he moved to Paris in 1910, at the age of thirty-three.
There, he bought a three-story house a short walk from the Arc de Triomphe. He
frequented the most famous art galleries in Paris, London, and New York City. Sterling
collected art the way he drank fine wine (Burgundy being his favorite) and ate
good food (he wrote his own cookbook)—with an appreciation for his own sense of
quality. He trusted his own artistic judgment—no one else could tell him what
was good or bad, what would rise or sink in value, or what might add balance to
his collection.
In 1919, now forty-two, he married Francine Clary, an
extremely pretty former actress in the Comedie Francaise. She already had an
illegitimate child when they met. Sterling regaled in doing the unexpected. This
was the sort of thing Isaac Singer might do—not a member of the Clark dynasty. His
three brothers, along with their wives, were appalled.
Then, in the early 1920’s tensions began mounting over the
children’s inheritance. The various Singer trusts were organized in such a way
that the benefits only accrued to the next generation via direct family
lineage. Sterling’s brothers Ambrose and Edward had no children while Stephen
had four. Thus when Sterling died his “share” would be given to Stephen’s
children. At a meeting of the brothers with their trust financial manager in
1923, Sterling and Stephen came to a physical altercation. This was the
beginning of a rift that would never heal. This feud became public when the New
York Times reported in 1927 that Sterling was suing the family trust, valued at
some eighty million dollars! Sterling lost. He never spoke to any of his
brothers again. His diary entries over the next twenty-five years persistently confirmed
the ongoing contempt he had, especially for Stephen and his wife, Susan.
Meanwhile, Sterling had been planning for the ultimate
disposition of his collection. His initial idea focused on Cooperstown, N.Y.—the
site of the Clarks‘ summer family compound. But after World War II, he opted
for building a museum to rival the Frick in New York City. In 1945 he bought
three buildings on the corner of Park and Seventy-Second Street for that purpose.
However, five year later, he changed his mind, following a visit to
Williamstown. He bought one hundred acres of woods and field to build the
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. He felt the setting reminded him of
the paintings of Winslow Homer. He and Francine were convinced that a
“crossroads museum” would entice summer tourists who might never get to a big
city. They also chose the college town because it was far from an urban center
that might be a target for atomic bombs. The construction of the museum included
reinforced concrete designed to withstand an atomic explosion one-tenth of a
mile away. The three million dollar building was faced with marble—a tribute to
ancient Greek monuments. Sterling died from a stroke at age seventy-nine, just
one year after opening the museum. He left an estate that was worth eighty-four
million dollars (the equivalent of half a billion dollars today) which would
allow his collection to be seen free of charge.
Of course, we know that the Clark Art Institute is no longer
a single building, and, also, that it’s no longer free! It has become much more
than a small rural museum, as witnessed by last year’s Van Gogh exhibition, and
this year’s “Nudes from the Prada” presentation. Yet, I never fail to seek out
Sargent’s simple, refreshing image of children at the beach whenever I visit
the museum. Do any of you have an artwork that has so persistently spoken to
you?
Material for this essay is taken from:
John Sargent by
Evan Charteris, Charles Scribner’s and Sons, New York 1927
The Clarks of Cooperstown,
by Nicholas Fox Weber, Alfred A. Knopf, 2008
American Painting and
Sculpture at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, by Margaret
Conrads, Hudson Hills Press, Inc., 1990
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“John Singer Sargent’s Neapolitan Children Bathing”,
Sebastian Smee, The Boston Globe, June 2, 2015
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