https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-1999-04-25-9904250328-story.html
>Despite this second close call, it's obvious Sargent was temperamentally unsuited to the role of modernist pioneer. After having folded his tent after the comparatively mild scandal of the 1884 Salon, it is hard to imagine him surviving the years of ridicule and rejection suffered by artists like Cezanne or Gauguin.
>Superbly equipped by talent and training, strategically situated in both time and place to synthesize European modernism and American realism, Sargent let his great moment slip through what amounted to a failure of nerve. But though it's easy to suggest in retrospect that he might have made better use of his gifts, it's also possible he simply would have starved, as did Sisley and Van Gogh.
Did Sargent not have the mental fortitude to make it as one of the great artists in the annals of art history?
You could hardly say he suffered for his art, as he lived quite comfortably his whole adult life, and any attempts he made at the avant garde he quickly abandoned in the face of someone misunderstanding them.
A lot of his later work can even be boiled down to that moniker that's toxic to any fine artists reputation: Illustration.
>Despite this second close call, it's obvious Sargent was temperamentally unsuited to the role of modernist pioneer. After having folded his tent after the comparatively mild scandal of the 1884 Salon, it is hard to imagine him surviving the years of ridicule and rejection suffered by artists like Cezanne or Gauguin.
>Superbly equipped by talent and training, strategically situated in both time and place to synthesize European modernism and American realism, Sargent let his great moment slip through what amounted to a failure of nerve. But though it's easy to suggest in retrospect that he might have made better use of his gifts, it's also possible he simply would have starved, as did Sisley and Van Gogh.
Did Sargent not have the mental fortitude to make it as one of the great artists in the annals of art history?
You could hardly say he suffered for his art, as he lived quite comfortably his whole adult life, and any attempts he made at the avant garde he quickly abandoned in the face of someone misunderstanding them.
A lot of his later work can even be boiled down to that moniker that's toxic to any fine artists reputation: Illustration.
