John Butler Yeats 1909

Robert Henri painted this portrait of John Butler Yeats with oil on canvas. Just imagine Henri standing back, squinting at Yeats, then lunging forward to place those bold strokes of ochre and white onto the canvas, building up the form of his face, a dab of pink for the nose. It’s like Henri’s trying to capture not just what Yeats looked like, but who he *was*. I see the influence of painters like Manet and Velázquez, that bravura brushwork and the way the figure emerges from the dark background is so great! The paint looks like it’s been applied wet-on-wet, those edges blurring and dissolving into one another. Look at the hand resting on the chair, Henri's captured it with just a few strokes, but it totally *works*. Painting's a conversation, right? Henri learned from the masters, then added his own voice to the mix. That’s how artists keep things fresh, building on what came before while pushing things forward.