The John Singer Sargent exhibition is at the Tate Britain in London, and we went last Friday. Sargent was born in 1856 in Florence to American parents and he became famous for the society portraits that he painted.
He not only painted his sitters, he also dressed and styled them to create the mood he wanted to convey. Sitters noted how their outfits were draped and pinned and tucked in to create an appearance, a mood.
By 1907 he had stopped painting more or less, although he resurrected himself to become a war artist in the First World War. And he died in 1925.
I like photographing people in galleries because they are focused on what they are looking at. And an exhibition of fashionable portraits has the added advantage of being able to compare the dress of the visitors to the dresses in the paintings.
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