Lady Agnew of Lochnaw

Lady Agnew of Lochnaw

John Singer Sargent (American)

1892-1893

First Impressions:

To me, this girl looks like she is from a prominent family. The cloths that she is wearing are very fashionable and expensive. Her facial expressions are happy and jovial. She seems to be a happy person and a delicate girl. She looks  focused and maybe in her twenties, she is definitely young. Her skin is smooth meaning that she takes care of herself. The painting is done in great detail and very carefully done, symbolizing that the family paid a lot of money for the painting.

What I Have Learned:

Lady Agnew is a vert prominent lady and "The painting was done in a "high key" and carefully finished. "It is a careful portrait, free of any fine frenzy, sedately handled, and rather lacking in the force and fire  of his daring technique" ((Charteris, P136),http://jssgallery.org/Paintings/Lady_Agnew.htm) It was considered a masterpiece by everyone. The times said "A masterpiece... not only a triumph of technique but the finest example of portraiture in the literal sense of the word, that has been seen here in a long while. (The Times, 1893). "Carter Ratcliff described it this way in his book on Sargent: 

Lady Agnew's personality engages in endless elusive play against her social type. Sargent has made her face almost schematic, yet within the regularity there is slight departures, nuances whose faintness blends nicely with the sitters languid pose. Lady Agnew's face seems all possibility, and consciously so. The moment of the right side of her lips look slightly drawn back, as if in doubt or weariness, the left side seems almost to smile. And, as if to insist on her control of this ambivalence, her eyes are oddly calm."
(Ratcliff)

This Portrait gives the viewer a clear look at Lady Agnew.

Sources: http://jssgallery.org/Paintings/Lady_Agnew.htm