I realize that I'm probably boring you with my sudden infatuation with all things MerriweatherPostian, but when life is as vexing as is ours at the moment, one does find consolation in the contemplation of beautiful things.

Mr. Sargent, again. His portraits astonish me, and the chance to see this one at the Boston MFA before we left was wonderful (as was, unusually for a museum restaurant, lunch - a Sunday jazz brunch with a nice glass of Champagne does wonders for the art-viewing exerience, not to mention Mr. Muscato's patience).

But back to the girls. There they are, four Victorian misses, captured by the painter somewhere between Alice in Wonderland and Wednesday Addams. They totally lack the cloying affectations of children of the era, and the three who are looking at us have stares that are unnervingly direct and appraising: Who are you, and why are you in our drawing room?

The dish queen in me was thrilled to see that the MFA displays the painting flanked by the Boit's rather distinguished blue-and-white vases. Mr. Sargent did them justice, but it's nice to see them in person, as it were.

The indispensable John Singer Sargent Virtual Gallery has an especially insightful dissection of the picture here. Apparently, the girls went on to fulfill, in various ways, the destinies he had painted for them. No surprise; that's what you get when you let a genius, of all things, into your drawing room.

John Singer Sargent painted some of the most scandalous portraits of the nineteenth century. My favorite among them is that of Dr. Samuel-Jean de Pozzi, Paris's leading physician for women during the Belle Époque, roué, and possessor of two of the most sensual hands ever painted:

He was the only doctor Sarah Bernhardt allowed near her person (in one of several ways, apparently), and he doubtless looked fetching in his preferred working outfit of white overalls and black cap - although it's hard to imagine he looked any better than he did here, in red robe and enormous ... self-regard.

The portraitists of the Belle Époque! How one does adore them. Of them all, Helleu is perhaps the greatest connoisseur of women, whether they are Great (if pensive) Ladies like Consuelo, Duchess of Marlborough:


Or rather minxier types (do I detect a whiff of Bonham Carter here?):

I like the way his subjects keep their own secrets; their expressions are always rather distant, as if listening to something in the next room...

Although they are, at least occasionally, amused:

He was a great friend of John Singer Sargent, who while unquestionably the greater painter, still picked up something of his colleague's allusive style, as in this portrait of Paul César himself:

Ah. So French, so fin de siècle, so lovely. Now I want to ring for my landau and go for a drive in the Bois de Boulogne, preferably in either top hat or corset. Or both...