Madame X (Madame Pierre Gautreau) By John Singer Sargent, 1883–84 (detail)

Madame X (Madame Pierre Gautreau) by John Singer Sargent, 1883–84 (detail)

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

John Singer Sargent created this portrait with the intention of turning it into the highlight of his professional career but was instead met with unprecedented criticism when he first exhibited it in public. The reason behind this was the fact that the sitter was visibly wearing make-up (notice the red lips and the difference of colour between the sitter’s ear and her skin), a device widely used by contemporary actresses and prostitutes. Make-up was seen as an artifice reserved for women of ill repute and for a high society woman to be represented in an official portrait wearing it was considered scandalous at best. The sitter for this painting refused to buy it due to the negative comments that it had received and it thus ended up staying in Sargent’s studio for years.