All Eakins', Homer's and Sagent's paintings pleased me in different ways. First of all, I loved Eakins' 'Miss Amelia Van Buren' and 'Wrestlers'; the characters of those paintings don't look as if they were posing to the public, they are just normal people going on with their sad (?), upsetting (?), violent life. The lights that are portrayed are just perfect for the scenes and, in a few words, the two mentioned paintings look just so magically real. 'The Swimming Pole' caught my eye too because there's something different in there: generally, in painting we get to see a lot of female nudity but we don't really get to see too much of a man's body, but in this painting, there are not only some naked women swimming, there are men with no bathing suits!
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| Wrestlers |
Holmer's 'The Fox Hunt' at first enchanted me with that cute fox watched from behind just sit in the snow... then I noticed! It actually took me a time to see those threatening black birds coming for the fox; they completely changed the atmosphere of the painting. (I actually just finished a painting of a fox). 'Kissing the Moon' is genius; that unseen boat it's just perfect and I felt like Homer sort of wanted to play with the public with that. On the other hand, I found 'Snap the Whip' just too lovely: I feel it transmit a lot of tenderness.
Finally, my favourite: Sargent. I don't usually like portraits, but Sargent's are surely some great pieces! It seems that we actually know these girls; it's like they are looking at us, just waiting to say something... something that goes with their particular personality that enriches more the painting. I can only take my imaginary hat off.
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| Lady Agnew of Locklaw |
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| Madame X |
These are three great painters. I definitely think you are right about "Kissing the Moon," Homer was playing with the public's perceptions.
ReplyDeleteSargent's portrait-subjects SPEAK, no question. I think Sargent was very influenced by a great earlier American portraitist, John Singleton Copley (1738-1815).