From: Harold Zeckel
(<h zeckel @ rcn.com)
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2004
A few years ago I saw an exhibit of JSS' landscapes at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. Many of those works are my favorite paintings by him, although I had never seen them before or since- in reality or reproduced. At the exhibition I read that landscape painting was what he liked to do best, although he couldn't make his living that way. Especially the paintings of the imposing mountain peaks were awe-inspiring and in my estimation far outdid Alfred Bierstadt and Frederick Church - both of whom I admire greatly. JSS' renderings of those peaks elicited the awareness of the power and massiveness of the rocks above.
[Val d'Asta . . .] most closely approximates the landscapes I was referring to. However, this one was not of the Western U.S. The paintings I wrote of were exhibited in the Gardner Museum in Boston in 1999 as his "Late Landscapes". Unfortunately I don't have any reproductions of those nor could I find any on the web. I will try calling the Gardner to see whether they have any
Sargent in Italy, 2002-2003