Almost every significant oil portrait by Euro-American master John Singer Sargent is currently on display in one spectacular Boston exhibition. All the greats are here: Madame X, Dr. Pozzi at Home, Lady Agnew of Lochnaw, La Carmencita, Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth, and several dozen others. Most of them come from museums and private collections across the US, UK, and France. The opportunity to see so many Sargent masterpieces at one time just doesn’t come around very often. That’s why Fashioned by Sargent (on view through January 15th at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston) would be worth visiting even without its interesting theme.

Art Plus Fashion
Fashioned by Sargent‘s basic premise will be familiar to most art lovers – that people in Sargent portraits tend to be sensationally fashionable. The exhibition expands on that simple fact to think about the fashion statements presented and who was actually responsible for making them. Spoiler alert, it was almost always Sargent himself.

The artist served as both director and costume designer of his painted productions by vetoing clients’ clothing choices, modifying details to suit his tastes, and even completely inventing fictional dresses to portray on canvas. While clothing is generally a tool of self expression, it works here to project Sargent’s image of his sitters, not their own. The exhibition asks us repeatedly to think about this fact but, refreshingly, refrains from telling us how to feel about it. The show’s six thematic sections also explore the connotations and impact of portraiture fashion, especially as it relates to sitters’ personalities and social positions. We discover trends in how Sargent depicted clothing and fabric, such as his preference for black and white and his habit of simplifying visual details.
The Dresses


Not all the fashion in the show is portrayed in paint. The exhibition also includes more than a dozen real items of clothing from Sargent’s era, including several of the very same dresses shown in the portraits beside them. These include Spanish dancer La Carmencita’s yellow dance costume and English actress Ellen Terry’s elaborate Lady Macbeth dress and cape. The latter outfit is even more magnificent in real life than in her iconic portrait. The inclusion of these dresses is what really elevates Fashioned by Sargent to landmark exhibition status.
The exhibition is well curated and designed. It takes place in inviting galleries whose elegantly-colored walls harmonize with the art rather than distracting from it. The installation gives lots of room to move around and flows well even with a crowd.
The Verdict

Fashioned by Sargent exceeded my already-high expectations. Not only did I relish the opportunity to see so many Sargent masterworks in one place – in itself a thrilling experience – but I appreciated getting a new perspective on an ubiquitous aspect of Sargent’s art that we usually take for granted.
I was excited to see some of my favorite Sargent paintings in person for the first time, but I also discovered new favorites among the lesser-known inclusions. I particularly loved the 1922 portrait of Sargent’s friend and frequent sitter Sybil Sassoon in a dramatic black, red, and gold Worth gown that Sargent himself commissioned expressly for this portrait. The dress appears beside the painting and is equally amazing in paint and in fabric.


In short, I highly recommend Fashioned by Sargent to people who love any or all of the following: Sargent, portraiture in general, historical fashion, and Gilded Age history and culture. The exhibition is thought-provoking, and I definitely suggest taking the time to read all the texts and to really look closely at each painting and object. However, the major ideas are also easy enough to understand that the process didn’t feel overly taxing. It took me about 90 minutes to make my way through the exhibition.
Details

Fashioned by Sargent is on view at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston through January 15, 2024. Then, it will travel to co-sponsoring institution Tate Britain. Combined MFA and exhibition admission is $34 for non-member adults. Entry to the exhibition, but not the rest of the museum, is timed in half-hour increments, though it seems you can stay as long as you like once inside. The show seems well-attended, but I had no trouble getting in right away on a Saturday morning. While you’re there, be sure to visit the second floor of the MFA’s American galleries to see another great Sargent masterpiece, The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit.
Inventing Isabella
One great Sargent painting absent from Fashioned by Sargent is his portrait of Isabella Stewart Gardner, which is just down the street at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. (I don’t believe the Gardner is allowed to loan out its collections.) However, that museum has created its own small exhibition, Inventing Isabella, that explores both Sargent’s portrait of the museum founder and her own control of her public image more broadly. The Gardner and MFA currently offer reciprocal discounts if you book your tickets online.
The book
Fashioned by Sargent also has a 247-page, hardcover catalog, which is every bit as wonderful as the exhibition itself. The book includes seventeen essays by various experts on topics related to the exhibition and 122 color images depicting both works in the show and other related artworks. I got a copy for Christmas and enjoyed it more than I can describe. The essays are all the perfect length – long enough to be meaty but short enough to stay fresh and interesting – and I learned so much from each one. Reading the book was a great coda to having seen the exhibition in person, since it gave me deeper insights on what I saw, but it would also be a good substitute for those who didn’t get to visit the show.
Understand the messages that art exhibitions share with their viewers.

After reading this review, you may be wondering how I got all these ideas out of this exhibition and how you can pick up on more of them yourself. The good news is that it’s actually not that hard. The key is simply to realize that all art exhibitions have points of view, no matter how neutral they may initially seem. You just have to know where to look.
Once you learn to identify these messages for yourself, you’ll uncover some fascinating ideas that might stick with you long after the exhibition closes.
You can discover how art exhibitions present and develop their messages in Be the Critic: Evaluate Museum Exhibitions. This handbook will teach you to recognize and evaluate the choices – like artwork selection and exhibition design – that add up to an exhibition with a point of view.
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