Madame X, 1884 - a photo on Flickriver

Madame X, 1884

            John Singer Sargent
American 1856-1925
Oil on canvas
Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY

Maybe his most famous painting, it is and certainly it was the most talked about of his portraits in Paris, when it was displayed at the Salon of 1884.

Despite the mysterious title the sitter was well known. She was Sargent's cousin Virginie Avegno, the wife of Pierre Gautreau and a leading "professional beauty" of Paris who was called the "Madame Récamier of the Third Republic." Sargent declared himself fascinated by the lavender color of her skin, for which she was famous. She is shown standing full-length against a blank wall in the tradition of Velazquez, Whistler and Manet. She leans on a tabletop and, though posed frontally, turns her head in profile to the viewer. 

There seems to be no reason, apart from the notoriety of the sitter herself, for this picture to have caused the scandal it did at the Salon of 1884. Most likely the sheer hauteur of her crisply drawn profile, her air of aristocratic disdain, roused the ire of the audience. At any rate the picture was a spectacular failure, the kind that helps rather than hinders an artist's career. 

Sargent kept it in his studio for fifteen years, then sold it to New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, where it can be seen today.
585
   

Taken on: May 26, 2013

Tags:

Sargent

John Singer Sargent

Paris

France « less

Sets appears in: • Portraits, Men & Women • Women in Flickr Art Photos more » • NY Metropolitan Museum of Art « less

Groups appears in: • Museum • world wide women more » • Oil Painting • Oil Paintings • Art makes you happy! • At the museum • Art / 藝術 • ART History • Museums of the World • Art Gallery and Museums - Post 1 Award 2 / Sweeper on! • Art World « less

Stats: 3,393 views / 2 comments

close tools panel

Badge creator

Use Flickriver Badge Creator to create a badge linking to your photos, your group or any other Flickriver view.

You can place your badge on your Flickr profile, Blog or Website.

Add to your iGoogle or Netvibes page

Flickriver widget for iGoogle or Netvibes can display almost any Flickriver view - most interesting today, by user, by group, by tag etc. Once added to your personalized homepage, just edit widget settings to select your desired view.

Clickr on one of the buttons below to install:

Embed on your Web site

To embed this view, Copy and Paste the following HTML code:

Black background (preview):

White background (preview):

Firefox and Chrome addons

Adds a 'Flickriver' button to your browser. While viewing any Flickr photos page, click on this button to open the same view on Flickriver.

Install in Firefox
Install in Chrome

Search plugin

Add 'Search on Flickriver' to your browser's search box. Works with Firefox and Internet Explorer. Install search plugin

"View on Flickriver" Greasemonkey script

A Greasemonkey script that adds Flickriver links to various Flickr photo pages - user photos, favorites, pools etc, allowing to quickly open the corresponding Flickriver view.

Also, allows quickly viewing any Flickr photo on black background in large size.

Install "View on Flickriver" script

Bookmarklet

While viewing any Flickr photos page, click on the bookmarklet to open the same view on Flickriver.

To install: drag and drop the following link to your Bookmarks toolbar.
IE users - add the link to your Favorites under the Links folder