Street in Venice

A young woman hurries down a shadowed Venetian backstreet, eyes lowered, while a man in the dark turns to watch her. Sargent skipped the palaces and canals and painted a quick, uneasy moment instead.

The story behind the painting

John Singer Sargent painted Street in Venice around 1882, during a stay in the city where he made a number of Venetian scenes. The setting is a quiet backstreet off the Calle Larga dei Proverbi, near the Grand Canal. The woman is probably the Venetian model Gigia Viani. Like his other Venetian pictures, it largely ignores the famous architecture and turns instead to edgy back-street life. The painting is oil on wood and small, about 45 by 54 cm according to Wikidata. It was first exhibited in 1882 at the Galerie Georges Petit in Paris.

What to look for

The woman walks along the flagstones, kicking her skirt forward with her right foot, her shawl and hem flowing as she moves quickly past. To the right, two dark figures of men huddle in conversation, and one follows her with his gaze while she keeps her eyes down. In the middle background a couple sit outside a café, absorbed in each other. The street is a series of descending rectangles that meet at her head, with a strip of blue sky above. The picture is almost monochrome, with touches of red in her comb, her dress and the café behind.

Meaning and intent

The Wikipedia article reads the painting as being about the invasive male gaze and its effect on a passing woman, shown in her down-turned eyes and fast pace. Sargent placed the moment in Venice, away from London, Paris or New York, cities he knew better and thought more refined. The broad, dark areas recall Diego Velázquez, while the tight cropping and the frozen movement suggest the influence of photography, especially Carlo Naya's pictures of Venice. Margaret Conrads has linked its mood to Giovanni Boldini's Crossing the Street. Sargent cared more about tone than colour here.

Legacy

The Impressionist influence shows in the broad strokes of the dress and the unusual cropping. In 1888 Elizabeth Chanler of Boston bought the painting and gave it to the architect Stanford White in return for professional services. In 1962 it was acquired by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., where it is on permanent display. Wikidata lists the museum by its Spanish name, Galería Nacional de Arte. Its almost photographic, freeze-frame capture of a single moment remains what sets it apart.