Details

Title

Portrait of Ralph Curtis on the Beach at Scheveningen

Artist/Maker

John Singer Sargent (American, 1856–1925)

Date

1880

Medium

Oil on panel

Dimensions

10 1/2 x 13 3/16 inches

Credit

Gift of the Walter Clay Hill and Family Foundation

Accession #

73.3

On View

On View - Stent Family Wing, Level 3, Gallery 304

A leading expatriate figure painter of the late 1800s, John Singer Sargent was still a student when he produced this vibrant work. He traveled to Holland to study portraits by Dutch master Frans Hals. Grains of sand embedded in its surface suggest that Sargent executed the painting on the spot at a Dutch beach resort. The small, vivid sketch of Sargent’s cousin Ralph Curtis in repose—so different in spirit from the full-length formal portraits for which he is best known—represents one of the artist’s favorite themes: casual portraits of friends and family painted en plein air.

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