Though she is not on view at the Met right now, La Carmencita, another enchanting flamenca from John Singer Sargent in 1890, sits in a postcard on my desk, daring me each morning to greet the day with fiery resolve. In my view she is infinitely more elegant and compelling than most on the red carpet last night
The Met says Sargent may have encountered her at the 1899 Expo in Paris, which was so important to art and to engineering. He apparently was utterly captivated and called her a "bewildering superb creature". She came to NY the following year and 'took New York by storm’".
She was a 'restless and demanding sitter' which makes sense: flamenco dancers are happiest when they are dancing a solea or buleria. He made many studies of her dancing, but then opted to portray her in a stationary pose.
It seems that critics were divided-how dare he represent "a common music hall performer in such a monumental way."
Though her face is rendered quite white, she is not as blanched as Madame X, who was to come a few years later, but her arrogant, frontal look is more daring than Madame X’s who although was upper class and dressed more revealingly is turned away from the artist as if to hedge his, and her, bets.
Gardner Chases After Sargent
This painting by John Singer Sargent, El Jaleo, 1882, launches a week of dance images-specifically flamenco-just because I study it and have been missing the esprit de corps of the classroom.
Isabella Stewart Gardner had been introduced to Sargent by Henry James (talk about networking). She loved his work and he even painted for a time in the museum. They were fierce correspondents and when he was in Boston they took in culture together.
Sargent was passionate about Spain, and about music-he was a talented musician himself-and about flamenco in particular. He revered Velasquez. Sargent gave Gardner a series of flamenco albums which she rated. (I need to find out if she also danced!)
As soon as she saw this painting, she wanted it. In remodeling her museum in 1914, she built a Moorish niche and when her in-law by marriage, T Jefferson Coolidge, who owned the painting, saw the space he gave her the painting on the spot.
Sargent captured the vibrant, complex interchange between the dancer and singers--el jaleo. It is very tricky to learn this art of clapping and call and response. Two years later he would paint Madame X.