“The coat is the picture,” John Singer Sargent, Gilded Age art king, once told a portrait sitter who was reluctant to wear cashmere in the summer. This declaration resonates inwhich calls the Hammer Museum its home. Samuel-Jean Pozzi, a renowned French gynecologist and art collector, poses swathed in a crimson robe. And the subject of Sargent’swas pregnant with her third child when she posed for the artist, though the evening gown in deep cherry with daring V-neckline was anything but matronly.
Each of these portraits, along with the artist’s—the latter of which had Parisian society seeing red—will be included in the upcoming Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, exhibit, titled “Fashioned by Sargent,” on view October 8. His eye for detail would lend itself well when considering style selects to draw the greatest impact this fall season, long leather trenches and accessories dripping of ruby.