New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1903-12-12

Gus volume must bring new sense OF the
painters extraordinary originality and power.
The threescore fun page photographers il con
tains Of the highest quality, so that even
r. in the absence Of color they give a wonderfully
vivid impression Of just what he has accom-
pIshed. and, when il is remembered that these
plates are far from representing all the work
that he has executed, and that he is still in his
prime. something like establishment is, We re
peat, bound 10 be felt
Who else in modern art could have produced
50 many portraits Of such rare excellence?
Not Sargent's master, Carolus Duran, who has
spent long life trying TO DO much the same
thing In fact. the only man in the nineteenth
century who ever exhibited anything like Sar-
gents skin and fecundity in portraiture was
painter unlike him IL temperament and style
as could possibly be ina gined. We refer 10
Ingres. whose portraits, whether among his
paintings or among the thousands of dra wings
he left behind him. are unique in modern art
for authority and distinction. But Ingres was
s. thorough q classicist that around even his
most modern portraits there hangs the glamour
q remote past He is already, so 10 say. an
Old Master. Mr.. Sargent is a modern Of the
rnoderns. All his traits are Of to-day. his alert
outlook upon The world, his quick sympathy for
Its most characteristic types. his nervous ten
sion. In a word. his thorough sophisUicaton. Il
IS Tot IN the state portrait, we may call 1t.
that he eXceIs. III groups. a Ia Sir Joshua, like
The Lady Alexandra, Mary and TEeo Ache
SON or The Misses Hunter" II IS in a por-
trait that is actuality itself. ia such a mercless
Transcript from reality as the famous "Ashe.
"erIheiu=r." which q novelist of the ultra
H'o-erH school might envy, that he is most al his
case Yer be- has the pliability which is be
expected ia a man Of his generation. and it is
handles almost any motive when be Is urham-
9erel 9y convention q design and has simply 10
'aEt what he sees in nis sitter
-hs confirmed cosmopolitan. whose art is Of
no couHJry exclusively and Of no school; aho
--4Acs yol ~ certain masters Of the past only
enDhaslze the tact that he is when all is
--1' enlrh-licaly master Of the present. is
--ea by BID upe. half dozen nationaiities
are REPRESENTED iH mas portrait gallery M
'n7-l has painted members OF most Of The
77sl"As, and tie women u his time he COM
Siaies with no Jess sympathy than ne
I'D his studies of men. Among the re-
t'-uciions here az portraits which have never
SHOWN on flis side OF The Atlantic and
"''A rave rot hitherto been published. there is
1-7 PECULIARLY suggestive al once Of the artists
N''oeiIl'y ana % his aptitude in expressing the
'Hi 'i The particular miliea ID which he
ISpi'+Ls to and his sitter This is the full
N-lA "i iHe Duchess u Portland. standing in
e'-'-as coSflue Les.d - carved IlanteIpiece Of
--'0i .le' Ihere is nothing about The dress 10
'a' me earlier atmosphere Of English society.
49, perhaps Tie broad lace collar thar stands
0ui more or less grifny. like an old ruff The
composition is utterly without the formalitv
Characteristic Of eighteenth century portraiture.
'N-slhlng ln the pose of the Duchess more
'f@'' sofne-@-ns ~ arrested movement. subtIy
suggests The modern drawing room Yer Reyn-
O.1A himself whose qualities Of style and de-
SKI are not even family suggested by this