Sargent and Fashion explores the dynamic relationship of painting and dress — from portraits and performance, gender expression and the New Woman, to the pull of tradition and the excitement of new ideas.

"The coat is the picture," John Singer Sargent exclaimed to his fellow artist Graham Robertson in the summer of 1894, tugging a heavy overcoat ever more tightly around his sitter's slender figure. Sought-after by sitters for his ability to present to the world flattering and engaging likenesses, Sargent was simultaneously pursuing his own artistic vision.

Rather than holding up a mirror to contemporary fashion, Sargent made fashion a part of his artistic repertoire. He often chose what his sitters wore, pinned their garments, or draped fabric around them, all with a view to creating confections to be recorded on canvas through his unrivalled artistic gifts.

With contributions from many of the leading thinkers on Sargent and his world, and lavish reproductions of major portraits and exquisite costumes of the period, this publication offers a vital new perspective on one of the most famous and fashionable artists of all time.

Prizes

Winner of International Creative Media Awards 2024

Erica E. Hirshler is Croll Senior Curator of American Paintings, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Caroline Corbeau-Parsons is an art historian and museum curator. She holds a PhD from King's College, London, and started her career as Editor of the catalogue raisonné of Philip de László. She was Curator of British Art, 1850-1915 at Tate Britain between 2012 and 2021, when she joined the Musée d’Orsay as Curator of Drawings and British and American Paintings. She notably curated Impressionists in London (Tate and Palais), Beardsley (Tate and Musée d’Orsay), Pastels : from Millet to Redon(Musée d’Orsay), and, more recently, Sargent : Dazzling Paris (Met and Musée d’Orsay). James Finch is a curator and art historian specialising in British art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He is currently Assistant Curator of nineteenth century British Art at Tate Britain where he most recently curated Sargent and Fashion. Other exhibitions and displays of historic and modern British art at Tate that James has worked on include (as co-curator) The Rossettis and Turner’s Modern World. Prior to joining Tate, James was Curatorial Assistant at the Royal Academy of Arts, and undertook his doctorate, as a partnership between the University of Kent and Tate. He has published widely on nineteenth and twentieth century art. Pamela A. Parmal is Chair and David and Roberta Logie Curator of Textile and Fashion Arts Emerita, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Elizabeth Prettejohn is a writer, independent curator and Professor of History of Art at the University of York.