Art & Artifacts: Winding Road and Cypress Trees, San Vigilio by John Singer Sargent

Winding Road and Cypress Trees, San Vigilio (1913) by John Singer Sargent

Location: Upper Level outside Gallery 204

In 1970, the college received the painting as a gift from the national women's fraternity, Kappa Kappa Gamma, to mark the 100th anniversary of its founding at Monmouth. Kappa Kappa Gamma had purchased it from the Kennedy Galleries in New York, N.Y.

A 28" by 37" oil on canvas, San Vigilio was painted in 1913 while Sargent, along with his sister and three friends, was visiting San Vigilio, a small fishing village at the south end of Lake Garda in Italy. He called the area a "paradise - cypresses, olives, a villa, a tiny little port, deep clear water and no tourists."

In 2002-2003 the painting was selected to be a part of an international exhibit entitled Sargent and Italy. The painting was on exhibit at the Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art (Palazzo del Diamante) in Ferrara, Italy, from Sept. 22, 2002 to Jan. 6, 2003, and then returned to the United States for exhibits at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Feb. 2-May 11, 2003) and the Denver Art Museum (June 28-Sept. 21, 2003).

Monmouth College is the sixth owner of the painting. It was first catalogued in 1925 as part of Sargent's estate and was then owned by three collectors in London, including the Right Honorable Viscount Rothermere, before it was purchased by a private collector in New York and then by the Kennedy Galleries. More photographs and a news release of the painting's travels are available from the Office of College Communications.