John Singer Sargent: Benefactor

"Paul Helleu Sketching with his Wife" by J.S. Sargent

"Among John Singer Sargent's French colleagues were Lobre and the portrait painter Paul Helleu, his lifelong friend. When the two first met Sargent was twenty-two and Helleu eighteen. He astonished Helleu with his knowledge of French literature and his command of the French language. His conversation was indistinguishable from that of a cultured Frenchman. Helleu at the time was a struggling student and often unable to pay for a meal. Sargent seems to have suspected this to be the case. 

One day he climbed up to Helleu's small studio at a moment when Helleu was in the depths of despair about his work and prospects. The pastel which he had just finished had set the final seal to his discouragement and it was resting on the floor when Sargent, the successful young painter, opened the door. 'That is a nice thing,' Sargent said in a thoughtful way, pointing to the pastel, 'Charming, charming. The best thing you've ever done, mon petit Helleu.' Helleu protested, 'Oh, no, I was just thinking what a horror. I'd just torn it off the easel when you came in.' 'Because you've been looking at it too long, you've lost your eye. No one ever paints what they want to paint, but to me who can only see what you've done, not when you're aiming at, this is a charming thing I must have for my collection.'

Helleu was enchanted - he would be proud if Sargent would accept it. 'I shall accept it gladly, Helleu,' Sargent replied, 'but not as a gift. I sell my own pictures, and know what they cost me by the time they're out of hand. I should never enjoy this pastel if I hadn't paid you a fair and honest price for it.' Thereupon he drew out a note for one thousand francs. 

Helleu felt as if the heavens had opened. It was the turning point in his career. Sargent had set him on his feet. Helleu says he constantly helped his less fortunate competitors. He was equally generous with money, though it expressed itself in action shyly and by stealth, with encouragement and advice, or in improving the work of others with his own pencil or brush. His success stirred no envy. Fortune seemed to have chosen him for her own - his days were cloudless and his friends numerous and faithful."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "John Sargent" by Evan Charteris.)