Chalet 1912

Curator: We're looking at John Singer Sargent's "Chalet," a watercolor painting completed in 1912. Editor: My initial impression is of a structure fighting against the sky. There's something precarious yet sturdy about the angles. Curator: Sargent was deeply embedded in the upper class, capturing their lifestyles with such brilliance. But let's consider what that reveals about the social stratification of labor present at that time and even today. Who constructed these chalets? What were their lived experiences compared to the painting's commissioner? Editor: That's valid, but let's not diminish the skill with which Sargent translates these materials. The watercolor gives us the tactile sensation of roughly hewn timber, and the textures certainly highlight the manual effort of the builders. Curator: Absolutely. However, the idyllic impression often eclipses the class and labor dynamics inherent in the image, and, in fact, these very class structures granted him access and afforded him this life and perspective. Editor: I appreciate the attention to that. We see so much wood, its processing, how it forms the structure of shelter, labor manifest. Curator: In considering this painting, it’s essential to think critically about whose story gets told and at what cost. Editor: The piece makes me consider both those visible forms of production, like construction, but also less visible ones, like Sargent's artistic labor—how is artistic "genius" also a kind of making and how can that relate back to how the material is used to tell a visual story? Curator: That's so important. What kind of stories about gender, class, race, and environment can one elicit here? It really opens up so many exciting possibilities and reflections. Editor: Yes, and looking closely reminds us of the concrete act of creating something, piece by piece, layer by layer. It’s a dance between process, place, and our contemporary world.