Henry James 1908

Jacques-Émile Blanche painted this portrait of Henry James in oil, and it’s all about atmosphere. The colour palette is muted, like a rainy day, but the application is surprisingly energetic. Look at the way the leafy background is evoked with loose, almost haphazard strokes, a kind of painterly shorthand. This approach is mirrored in the rendering of James’s face, where individual marks coalesce to form a likeness, but never quite resolve into perfect clarity. The paint seems thin in places, allowing the texture of the canvas to peek through, adding to the overall sense of immediacy. Notice the hand tucked into his waistcoat; the artist hasn’t laboured over the details, preferring instead to suggest form and volume with broad sweeps of the brush. The subtle variations in tone and the interplay of light and shadow are what make this painting sing. You could almost be looking at a Whistler. It reminds us that art isn't about perfect replication, but about capturing a feeling.