Album of Figure Studies

Artists

Description

Album with black-cloth-covered cardboard covers, brown-leather-covered spine and corners; and remains of ties. Silked- (treated with clay to resemble silk), marbled-, and gilt-paper endpapers. Fifty pages of cream cardboard adhered to stubs (linen over paper) in a post binding. A number of sheets have been removed. Contents: Primarily studies of male nudes, some of whom may be Sargent’s valet, Nicola d’Inverno. Several drawings of draped male nudes and two figures in Biblical costume for Amsterdam Bible project commissioned in 1895 (fols. 14, 16, 17A, 17B, see Fairbrother 1981, note 1; Promey 1999, p. 319, note 19). Heads of Crescenzo Fusciardi (fol. 13) and Nicola d'Inverno(?) (fol. 29). This album contains thirty charcoal drawings of models and one collotype. Most of the drawings cannot be dated, but the group was probably executed during the period from 1890 to 1915, when Sargent was involved in the Boston Public Library mural project.

Dimensions

73.4 x 56.9 cm (28 7/8 x 22 3/8 in.) each page: 72.1 x 54 cm (28 3/8 x 21 1/4 in.)

Provenance

To the artist's sisters, Violet (Mrs. Francis) Ormond and Emily Sargent, at his death, 1925; gift of Mrs. Ormond to the Fogg Art Museum, 1937.