Strapless

After reading this, I want to go back to the Met and stand in front of Sargent's portrait of Amélie again. I have the distinct impression that if the gallery ever got quiet enough, you'd be able to hear scandalized whispers wafting all the way from 19th-century France. In 1884, John Singer Sargent submitted to the Paris Salon his portrait of Amélie Gautreau, a woman widely considered to be the most beautiful woman in Paris, a woman whose beauty made her the kind of celebrity that people filled the streets to see, and unwittingly, crushed his hopes of a career in Paris and her social standing.


Deborah Davis tells the story as a journalist, not as an academic, so it's more accessible than most books in the art history section. Occasionally, she takes a crack at being academic, and it's a bit jarring; I was happiest when she stuck to the E! News version of the story. As is always the case with sexual politics, Sargent eventually got a clean slate, starting fresh with wealthy clientele in Newport, while Amélie became a recluse. I was happy to discover that she did at least become a melodramatic recluse - banishing all mirrors from the house and walking on the beach only at night and swathed in white. Nothing tacky like hiding away in a hotel suite in your chemise, surrounded by empty liquor bottles and old newspapers!

It's hard to imagine Parisians being shocked by a wayward shoulder strap, with affairs, mistresses, and scandals readily accepted, but somehow everything unraveled from there. I thought of Willa Cather, O, Pioneers, I think: "There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before." What happened was really just small decisions and unforeseen huge consequences, and it sort of makes even the most unadventurous life seem risky. Answer an email, take a part-time job, leave early, stay late and change your life. Reclusiveness starts to seem much more practical!