samedi 24 février 2007
" Damn Queer ! "
"To R. L. Stevenson, his friend John S. Sargent 1885"
"Sargent was down again
and painted a portrait of me walking about in my own dining-room,
in my own velveteen jacket, and twisting as I go my own moustache:
at one corner a glimpse of my wife, in an Indian dress, and seated
in a chair that was once my grandfather's but since some months
goes by the name of Henry James's, for it was the novelist loved
to sit adds a touch of poesy and comicality. It is, I think, excellent,
but is too eccentric to be exhibited. I am at one extreme corner :
my wife in this wild dress, and looking like a ghost is at the
extreme other end: between us an open door exhibits my palatial
entrance hall and part of my respected staircase. All this is
touched inlovely, with that witty touch of Sargent's but of course
it looks damn queer as a whole."
Vu à l'exposition Peintres de la lumière : Sargent-Sorolla, Musée du Petit Palais, Paris.