John Singer Sargent and Admitting Uncertainty

[This article is a companion piece to a YouTube video I co-wrote with my friend and colleague on Museums and Sex. You can find the link at the end of this blog post.]

​In December 2022, my girlfriend and I took a day trip to Boston, during which we visited the Museum of Fine Arts. While browsing the collections on display, we came across this portrait, Nude Study of Thomas McKeller by John Singer Sargent. At this point, I was already aware that some saw Sargent as a queer man, so I was excited to see how the museum handled that. It was therefore very disappointing to see that there was very little discussion of that side of him, opting instead to simply gesture at the debate rather than engage directly. Sexuality was even given the last word in the accompanying label. 

John Singer Sargent, "Nude Study of Thomas E. McKeller," oil on canvas, about 1917-1920, Museum of Fine Arts.

​This has stuck with me, and I have come to see it as an instance where “admitting uncertainty” can still inscribe the status quo. For those unfamiliar with the concept, admitting uncertainty is a writing technique that allows museums to “engage the visitor in the debate that might exist about an object.” (Trench, 20). When a site admits uncertainty, when they declare that they do not know, they seek to invite visitors to form their own conclusions about the object on display. But this is not always as neutral as it might appear. Labels are often very short, and techniques like admitting uncertainty can be used as a shortcut to suggest that there are larger debates surrounding a work or artist. The issue arises when the audience is not given the tools to engage in this debate. When used to discuss queer possibility, admitting uncertainty often becomes a way to gesture at progressive interpretation without actually engaging with it. It becomes a form of covert censorship.

The label for Nude Study of Thomas E. McKeller at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Photo taken 30 December 2022.

​Let’s now examine how this label tries to admit uncertainty around Sargent’s queer identity. Firstly, it is a rather dense label, seeking to convey a lot of information in its short two paragraphs. By focusing on the relationship between the two men, the label writer highlights the ways that their identities clashed. Most prominent here, and the one given the most space, is the racial dynamics that separated them. Sargent, a successful while artist, versus McKeller, a Black hotel employee who was often “transformed” in the final works. Meanwhile, the label’s discussion of sexuality is limited simply to mentioning that “critical questions” are raised when examining the two. But the label does not leave room for a queer reading. Sure, one might choose to understand the description that they worked together “usually nude” as euphemistic, but it is impossible to ignore how the label presents their relationship as a working one. Sargent as the artist and McKeller as the model. As collaborators. Not as friends or anything more. Just work buddies. Who just so happen to raise questions about their sexuality. 

So, just what are these “critical questions” about Sargent’s sexuality? What exactly is going unsaid here? Or, to put it more directly, why do people believe that Sargent was queer?
​

​Trevor Fairbrother has been one of the leading Sargent scholars to suggest that the artist was queer. After Sargent’s death, many of letters were destroyed by his sisters, leaving a dearth of insight into his personal life. In 1981, Fairbrother argued that, when faced with this lack of evidence, Sargent’s private sketches should inform how we see view his sexuality. One album of sketches, held by the Fogg Museum at Harvard University, is key to providing the necessary glimpses into Sargent’s private life. This collection, which had never been exhibited during Sargent’s life, is a distinctly homoerotic series of male nudes in various poses. While Fairbrother acknowledges that some of the sketches in the album are “academic” (Fairbrother 1981, 72) in their poses, I can see many of them fitting right in with gay men’s beefcake magazines of the 1950s. This album and the nude sketches within would become the basis of Fairbrother’s exhibition in 2000 that sought to draw attention to the homoeroticism that underlays much of Sargent’s nudes, including McKeller’s. 

​This queerness could be felt even by those less familiar with Sargent’s work, as shown in an interview Fairbrother did with the openly gay Andy Warhol. In 1986, Fairbrother took Warhol on a tour of the Sargent exhibit at the Whitney Museum. Throughout the tour, Warhol made many sly, witty comments that alluded to more, alluded to a kind of queer recognition. For example, when Warhol finds out that Sargent and Oscar Wilde were friends, he asks whether they were “those kinds of friends,” to which Fairbrother responds “who knows.” The exchange ends with Warhol stating simply, “oh.” (Fairbrother 1987, 65). In another conversation about Sargent’s nude sketches, Warhol’s bodyguard describes states that he “thinks [Sargent] liked the guys” right before Warhol compares Sargent’s depiction of Hell for the Boston Public Library to a “gang-bang.” (Fairbrother 1987, 68). 

This is the mural that Andy Warhol compared to a gang-bang. John Singer Sargent, "John Singer Sargent's Mural, "Hell" at the Boston Public Library, Gelatin Silver Print, 1916, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.

​In my opinion, the most telling comment that Warhol makes is in reference to the destruction of Sargent’s letters. When Fairbrother mentions that his sisters destroyed his letters, Warhol asks “oh, you mean they were hot?” (Fairbrother 1987, 69). This reflects a queer kind of knowledge, a familiarity with queer lives and queer history. When Warhol is confronted by the destruction of evidence, he understands and recognizes that as evidence itself, rather than a lack of it. Destruction of personal correspondences is common within queer history, so Warhol reads it as a confirmation of Sargent’s “secret”.  This is a prime example of what museum designer Margaret Middleton describes as queer possibility, wherein we “value queer experience as expertise and gaydar as epistemology.” (Middleton, 433).
 
When compared to Warhol’s perspective of Sargent, the McKeller nude’s label clearly lacks this kind of queer imagination. The label seemingly wants to address the questions that surround Sargent’s sexuality, but it is hesitant to actually leave the possibility open. The relationship is portrayed as transactional, that between an artist and his muse. Whereas Fairbrother provided Warhol with the space to explore the idea of Sargent’s homosexuality from the margins, the MFA label resists it by limiting the discussion to slight references occurring elsewhere. In this way, the traditional, heterosexual view of Sargent can be reinscribed and reinforced.
 
These kinds of issues are important to keep in mind when writing about possibly queer people in museums. Unacknowledged biases can slip in very easily and undermine the intended message, especially when speaking about communities that have had their existences erased over time. Admitting uncertainty is a great technique when used intentionally, but the writer’s point of view must be taken into account first so as to not further isolate queer readings. Otherwise, we end up in situations where someone’s sexuality is only questioned, rather than acknowledged.

This blog post was written to accompany a YouTube video essay on sex and sexuality in museums. My good friend and colleague Christeah and I have been co-writing this video for the past year and are very excited to share it with the world. 

Works Cited

​Failing, Patricia. “The Hidden Sargent.” ARTnews, May 1, 2001.
Fairbrother, Trevor. “A Private Album: John Singer Sargent’s Drawings of Nude Male Models.” Arts Magazine 56 (December 1981): 70-79.
Fairbrother, Trevor. “Warhol Meets Sargent at Whitney.” Arts Magazine 61 (February 1987): 64-71.
Middleton, Margaret. “Queer Possibility.” Journal of Museum Education 45, no. 4 (2020): 426-436.