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A Javanese Dancing Girl

1889
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
One of the centerpieces of the Exposition Universelle, held in Paris in 1889, was the Kampong javanais, a re-creation of a Javanese village. The highlight of the village was a performance of traditional Javanese dance accompanied by gamelan music. The young dancers, who had been brought over with a group of Javanese craftsmen and musicians to represent the native traditions of Dutch Indochina, were treated as celebrities and spectacle. Sargent visited the exposition and was fascinated by the dancers, their costumes, and the expressive symbolism of their dance. He created a series of studies of the individual dancers, perhaps with the idea to create a larger composition. In this unfinished painting, Sargent experiments with the position of a dancer’s left arm and hand and suggests the movement of her feet.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: A Javanese Dancing Girl
  • Artist: John Singer Sargent (American, Florence 1856–1925 London)
  • Date: 1889
  • Culture: American
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 70 × 32 in. (177.8 × 81.3 cm)
    Framed: appx. 72 × 34 in. (182.9 × 86.4 cm)
  • Credit Line: Private Collection
  • Curatorial Department: The American Wing