Did Sargent make a mouth wrong?

[SB Wang]

What is beauty? Read:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/luna...rks/puskin.htm

"When we speak of the beauty of a work of art, we always mean the strength of its influence, the captivating nature of the work, its ability to hold our interest, to make us happy, to illuminate our consciousness.

All "beauty" has specifically this intent. In uttering the word "beauty" one strives to indicate the objective quality in nature or in a work of art which he believes to be the reason for his elated mood, his emotional uplift.

From a narrow point of view, beauty reduces itself to those elements in nature or in art which are pleasant to the senses, or into correct, i.e. easily-grasped, combination (design, melody, harmony, rhythm, etc.), or into pleasing presentations of physical perfection, vital strength, health, intellectual brilliance, moral fascination, etc.

On the other hand, we know well enough that art does not reduce itself merely to this type of beauty. Art can include elements which from this narrow viewpoint are unbeautiful or downright ugly. Art, as Aristotle pointed out in his day, deals also with ashes, with pain, with unusually accurate reproductions of repelling phases of life (Flaubert). And all this the artist can nevertheless surmount. Whether they depict the stripped carcass of a bull or a brutal scuffle of warriors, Rembrandt or Leonardo da Vinci attain heights of beauty and compel us to exclaim--"excellent !" A powerful sensation, which overcomes the reader, compels him to see the world in a new light, makes him think differently of the world and thus moulds his world-outlook, this essentially is beauty. The more subtle it is, the more novel it is, the further it departs from elementary prettiness--the more we delight in it, for its influence operates in the most difficult realms.

Now for shortcomings. A shortcoming is that which repels us, that which reveals the artist's weakness, betrays his inability to cope with his task, shows that due to his impotence, or in order to be clever, he falsifies reality, or tells us things which are extraneous to us and therefore bore us".


And study beauty from Sargent. There are some patterns of design elements in Sargent's group portraits.
Sargent did not tell what is his scheme. Maybe he thinks that a painting should not be accompanied by words that explain everything.