This will be the first exhibition to explore the author’s deep and lasting interest in the visual arts and their profound impact on his literature. Offering a fresh perspective on the novelist, the show reveals the importance of James’s friendships with American artists such as John Singer Sargent and James McNeill Whistler. While the author decided that the visual arts were not to be the arena in which he would work, the painterly quality of his writing has enthralled readers for over a century. Co-curated by acclaimed novelist Colm Tóibín and Declan Kiely, head of the Morgan’s Department of Literary and Historical Manuscripts, the exhibition includes a rich selection of paintings, drawings, sculptures, photographs, manuscripts, and letters. Find out more about the ‘Henry James and American Painting’ exhibition from the Morgan Library’s website.
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An Interior In Venice (The Curtis Family) (1898), John Singer Sargent. Courtesy of the Morgan Library & Museum
Count Alberto Bevilacqua (1899), Hendrik Christian Andersen. © National Trust / Charles Thomas
Italian Hours by Henry James published in 1909. Photo: Graham S. Haber, Courtesy of the Morgan Library & Museum
Portrait of Henry James (1910), William James. Image courtesy of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Robert Louis Stevenson and His Wife (1885), John Singer Sargent. Photo: Dwight Primiano, Courtesy of the Morgan Library & Museum
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The problem with portraits