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| John Singer Sargent At Torre Galli - Ladies in a Garden 1910 oil on canvas Royal Academy of Arts, London |
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| John Singer Sargent Near the Mount of Olives, Jerusalem ca. 1905-1906 oil on canvas Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge |
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| John Singer Sargent On His Holidays - Norway 1901 oil on canvas Lady Lever Art Gallery, Liverpool |
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| John Singer Sargent Sketch of Dame Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth 1888 oil on canvas National Trust, Smallhythe Place, Kent |
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| John Singer Sargent Sketch of Dame Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth 1906 oil on canvas (grisaille) National Portrait Gallery, London |
"John Singer Sargent began work on his portrait of Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth [directly below] early in 1889. Oscar Wilde observed of the spectacle of Terry turning up for a sitting at the artist's studio in Tite Street, Chelsea, already in costume: 'The street that on a wet and dreary morning has vouchsafed the vision of Lady Macbeth in full regalia magnificently seated in a four-wheeler can never again be as other streets: it must always be full of other possibilities.' Although the finished composition depicts Terry standing alone in her famous beetle-wing dress, Sargent's initial idea for the portrait was to show Lady Macbeth's entry in Act 1, scene 6, when she comes out of Macbeth's castle by torch-light to welcome Duncan. Terry recalls the artist's attraction to the scene: 'He liked the swirl of the dress, and the torches and the women bowing down on either side. He used to make me walk up and down in his studio until I nearly dropped in my heavy dress, saying suddenly as I got to the swirl: – "That's it, that's it!" and rushing off to his canvas to throw some paint on in his inimitable fashion!' Sargent was deeply impressed with Terry's performance in the play, which marked a significant point in her partnership with Henry Irving at the Lyceum Theatre. He attended the opening night on 29 December 1888 and apparently 'let out an audible gasp' as she strode onto the stage in the dim gaslight."
"Sargent subsequently discarded this idea, but gave Terry his coloured oil sketch for the design, which she treasured [above, now preserved by the National Trust at her former home in Kent]. In 1906 she wished to reproduce her version as an illustration in the programme for her jubilee matinee performance at Drury Lane on 12 June. The actress wrote to Sargent asking his permission to do so and, anxious that the preliminary sketch would not reproduce well, he offered to rework the design for this purpose: '. . . in the height of the season and of his work with fashionable sitters, he did an entirely new painting of the same subject, which would reproduce! . . . "You must think of me as one of the people bowing down to you in the picture," he wrote to me when he sent the new version for the programme. Nothing during my jubilee celebrations touched me more than this wonderful kindness of Mr. Sargent's.' The result is a larger, more tightly worked composition in grisaille [also above]. Whilst the sense of movement conveyed through the looser brushwork of the original is somewhat lessened here, a great deal of detail added to the figure of the actress and the lines of attendants helps to give the scene more definition. The artist also pays closer attention to the architectural forms, the cobblestones in the foreground and the stone archway behind. . . . This version also remained in Terry's possession until her death, and appeared as lot 13 in the sale of her collection at Christie's on 17 December 1928. It was purchased by the National Portrait Gallery for £63."
– from curator's notes at the National Portrait Gallery, London
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| John Singer Sargent Dame Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth 1889 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
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| John Singer Sargent Portrait of Sir Frank Swettenham 1904 oil on canvas National Portrait Gallery, London |
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| John Singer Sargent Portrait of an unknown lady in lost profile ca. 1900 oil on canvas National Trust, Belton House, Lincolnshire |
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| John Singer Sargent Portrait of Robert Mathias ca. 1913 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
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| John Singer Sargent Lady Fishing - Mrs. Ormond 1889 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
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| John Singer Sargent Portrait of Alfred, son of Asher Wertheimer ca. 1901 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
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| John Singer Sargent Portrait of Mrs. Charles Hunter 1898 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
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| John Singer Sargent Portrait of Major E.C. Harrison as a boy 1887 oil on canvas Southampton City Art Gallery |
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| John Singer Sargent Study of Mme. Gautreau ca. 1884 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |