Steve Wynn, the Las Vegas hotel millionaire, recently sold this painting to an unknown buyer. It is currently hanging in the Met next to 5 other Vermeers and will be up until 1 June 2009. I don’t know where it will go after that.
I love it when painters (these both American painters) put themselves in the scene. It’s then a self portrait. Others come to mind. Yan Eyck’s The Arnolfini Marriage. Velázquez’s Las Meninas is much more overt.
The Madame X strap controversy…
Some say Sargent could have been gay because of the way he represented men. No way. The way these women look and their expressions, I can’t imagine him NOT getting massive amounts of action. I believe the stories of his adventures in Paris.
