1908
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
The Patio is a 1908 by John Singer Sargent, a Impressionism work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You see a sunlit courtyard with white walls, a few potted plants, and a woman in a long dress sitting in the shade. Sargent painted this quickly, probably in one sitting. He used watercolor like a sketch—loose, bright, full of light. It feels like a snapshot, not a posed portrait. The woman’s face is barely there, but the heat and stillness of the day come through. If you like this, look up Winslow Homer. His watercolors are just as fresh and spontaneous.
Sargent was born in Italy, studied in France, and worked chiefly in England, but he never renounced his American citizenship. As a young man, Sargent achieved fame and wealth as a portraitist, but he gradually tired of painting wealthy, superficial aristocrats. In his later years he focused increasingly on watercolor. Along with Winslow Homer, Sargent was the major artist to develop a spontaneous approach toward watercolor. Rather than carefully layering his pigments, he dashed off his paintings in a single sitting, allowing the colors to freely blend together.
Read the full account in the museum source.
John Singer Sargent (; January 12, 1856 – April 15, 1925) was an American expatriate artist, considered the "leading portrait painter of his generation" for his evocations of Belle Époque and Edwardian-era luxury.
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