‘The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit’ by John Singer Sargent was recorded in a 1903 photograph when it was only 21 years old and unlikely to have been cleaned and/or lined. Here, the painter Gareth Hawker discusses seemingly irrefutable photographic evidence of restoration injuries that that Velazquez-inspired portrait group incurred in 1983 at the Boston Museum of Art. It is ironic that Sargent’s devoted copy/study of Velazquez’s Las Meninas (shown below) should itself now testify to the horrendous restoration induced losses that that great work subsequently suffered.
John Singer Sargent’s “The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit” « Artwatch.