Women in the 19C United States of America: John Singer Sargent's (1856-1925) Elegant American Ladies with Japonisme Fans

Monday, May 23, 2022

John Singer Sargent's (1856-1925) Elegant American Ladies with Japonisme Fans

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Etta Durham

The painter of these images of well-to-do women holding fans influenced by the Japonisme style, John Singer Sargent, was one of the American artists who went to study in Paris. Sargent did not paint many trendy compositions, but his fans fit into part of the Asian influence of the late 19th century.

Sargent went to study in Paris, because it was the place to be for any serious art student who could afford to travel there. After the American Civil War, Paris was a bustling cosmopolitan city & the capital of the western art world. Art students went to Paris to enroll in one of the many art schools there, seeking to polish their academic education. More established artists used Paris as a proving ground, leveraging exhibiting in its important international exhibitions to establish their artistic reputations.

A few made Paris their home, becoming part of a significant American expatriate community in the French capital. As the novelist Henry James reported of the "irresistible city" in an 1887 article, "it sounds like a paradox, but it is a very simple truth, that when today we look for American art we find it mainly in Paris. When we find it out of Paris, we at least find a good deal of Paris in it."

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Ian Hamilton (Jean Muir)

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Joseph Chamberlain

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Thomas Wodehouse Legh

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Hamilton McKown Twombly (Florence Adele Vanderbilt)

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Cecil Wade

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Countess Clary Aldringen Threse Kinsky

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Mahlon Day Sands (Mary Hartpeace)

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Ada Rehan

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Frederick Barnard

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs Henry White

John Singer Sargent (1856 - 1925). Mrs William Playfair.

About this blog

In colonial America, men were considered superior to woman in all ways. In a strict patriarchal hierarchy, men controlled not only wealth & political power but also how their children were raised, religious questions, & all matters of right & wrong.

In the early part of the 19Cy, however, many Americans experienced a revolution in gender. The doctrine of “separate spheres” maintained that woman’s sphere was the world of privacy, family, & morality while man’s sphere was the public world -– economic striving, political maneuvering, & social competition. But women were interested in equality.

In 1848, New York passed the Married Woman’s Property Act. Now a woman wasn’t automatically liable for her husband’s debts; she could enter contracts on her own; she could collect rents or receive an inheritance in her own right; she could file a lawsuit on her own behalf. She became for economic purposes, an individual. By 1900, every state has passed legislation modeled after this, granting married women some control over their property and earnings.

In 1870 after the Civi War, the 15th Amendment was ratified, saying, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” African-Americans could vote, but women could not.

But it was not until 1920, that the 19th Amendment was ratified granting women the right to vote. “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”