DOI issue:
Nr. 78 (Septembre 1899)
DOI article:D'Anvers, N.: The work of Cecilia Beaux
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19232#0250
Cecilia Beaux
and of treatment, instinct with the same forcible
vitality.
In 1896 Miss Beaux sent six portraits, including
that of Dr. Grier, to the Salon of the Champs de
Mars, and was accorded the rare distinction of
having them all hung together on one panel.
Alluding to this honour, a French critic bemoaned
the distressing fact that the young American lady
had beaten all her rivals. Referring to the portrait
of Dr. Grier he adds : “ Composition, flesh, texture,
sound drawing—everything is there without affec-
tation and without seeking after effect.”
Equally characteristic with the Dr.
OrtT'and Ernesta is the picture known
as Sita a?id Sarita, representing the
artist’s cousin, Mrs. Walter Turk, with
a black cat on her shoulder, into
which some critics have managed, with
really remarkable ingenuity, to read all
manner of mystic meanings, whereas
the probability is that Miss Beaux was
merely struck with the harmonious
picture formed by the two friends in
an attitude of familiar everyday occur-
rence. What is really far more sig-
nificant than the presence of the cat
is the treatment of the hands, which
are painted with no attempt to tone
down or idealise their somewhat clumsy
character. As is well known by all
students of human character, the
hands are as expressive as the features,
though artists, with very few excep-
tions, concentrate their strength on
the treatment of the face, and paint
the hands of all their models in the
same style. Every one knows the
tapering fingers of a Vandyck portrait,
and the delicate symmetry of those
painted by Sir Joshua or Romney.
In fact that most astute of critics,
Giovanni Morelli, better known per-
haps by his nom de guerre of Ivan
Lermolieff, claims that what he calls
Fame, le tournure de Fespj-it, or the
very inner ego of the master, is shown
more in the treatment of the hands
than in that of any other part of the
body. He points out that the Italian
painters—notably Fra Filippo Lippi,
Giovanni Bellini, Bramantino, and
Botticelli—not only treated the hands
of every saint in exactly the same way,
“a new England /woman ” by cecilia beaux but transmitted their chosen types to
219
America to reconcile herself to expatriation, and
in 1891 she started for home, stopping for a short
time in England to paint several portaits there.
Back again in America, she settled down to
steady work, quickly winning general recognition
as an able portrait-painter, endowed with a rare
insight into character and power of rendering it in
the broad and masterly manner she had acquired
during her stay in Paris. The first portraits ex-
hibited after her return to America were those of
the Rev. Dr. Grier and of her little niece Ernesta,
both, in spite of their great difference of subject
and of treatment, instinct with the same forcible
vitality.
In 1896 Miss Beaux sent six portraits, including
that of Dr. Grier, to the Salon of the Champs de
Mars, and was accorded the rare distinction of
having them all hung together on one panel.
Alluding to this honour, a French critic bemoaned
the distressing fact that the young American lady
had beaten all her rivals. Referring to the portrait
of Dr. Grier he adds : “ Composition, flesh, texture,
sound drawing—everything is there without affec-
tation and without seeking after effect.”
Equally characteristic with the Dr.
OrtT'and Ernesta is the picture known
as Sita a?id Sarita, representing the
artist’s cousin, Mrs. Walter Turk, with
a black cat on her shoulder, into
which some critics have managed, with
really remarkable ingenuity, to read all
manner of mystic meanings, whereas
the probability is that Miss Beaux was
merely struck with the harmonious
picture formed by the two friends in
an attitude of familiar everyday occur-
rence. What is really far more sig-
nificant than the presence of the cat
is the treatment of the hands, which
are painted with no attempt to tone
down or idealise their somewhat clumsy
character. As is well known by all
students of human character, the
hands are as expressive as the features,
though artists, with very few excep-
tions, concentrate their strength on
the treatment of the face, and paint
the hands of all their models in the
same style. Every one knows the
tapering fingers of a Vandyck portrait,
and the delicate symmetry of those
painted by Sir Joshua or Romney.
In fact that most astute of critics,
Giovanni Morelli, better known per-
haps by his nom de guerre of Ivan
Lermolieff, claims that what he calls
Fame, le tournure de Fespj-it, or the
very inner ego of the master, is shown
more in the treatment of the hands
than in that of any other part of the
body. He points out that the Italian
painters—notably Fra Filippo Lippi,
Giovanni Bellini, Bramantino, and
Botticelli—not only treated the hands
of every saint in exactly the same way,
“a new England /woman ” by cecilia beaux but transmitted their chosen types to
219
America to reconcile herself to expatriation, and
in 1891 she started for home, stopping for a short
time in England to paint several portaits there.
Back again in America, she settled down to
steady work, quickly winning general recognition
as an able portrait-painter, endowed with a rare
insight into character and power of rendering it in
the broad and masterly manner she had acquired
during her stay in Paris. The first portraits ex-
hibited after her return to America were those of
the Rev. Dr. Grier and of her little niece Ernesta,
both, in spite of their great difference of subject