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Originally Posted by Sharon Knettell
Jeez, am I pompous or WHAT!
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No. From your posts, I'd say you're passionate, sincere, and hold high standards.
Sharon, do you have the "back story" on this portrait that tells us the sitter was unhappy with it? (many of Sargent's do). If not, why did you say that?
Consider that by the time JSS "quit" doing "mug shots" he had pursued a career as a portraitist for over 25 years, so prolific a story circulates about a diplomat who considered it a safe conversational gambit to ask people he met for the first time, "So, how do you like your Sargent portrait?"
I'm not sure it's true in all cases, but as I look around, there's a definite "burnout" factor in people who work a demanding profession for a quarter century. If they can't re-invent it or quit, they can get annoyingly cranky!