Isabella Stewart Gardner (1840-1924) once told a friend: “The greatest need in our country was art. We were a very young country and had very few opportunities to see beautiful things… So I decided to make this my life’s work, if I could.” He was born into a wealthy New York family and received the kind of cosmopolitan education experienced by the happy few of his class (such as his friends the novelist Henry James, the historian Henry Adams, and the painter John Singer Sargent). In fact, his story resembles the plot of one of James’s novels, in which new world idealism is often endangered by the old world. Fortunately, Gardner had resources that fictional heroes do not: a deep familiarity with European and Far Eastern culture, as well as strong opinions and the money to back them up.

Natalie Dykstra’s new biography sets out to tell the extraordinary story of a generous philanthropist who sought to bring art to her adopted city of Boston. The museum that bears his name was the fruit of a long and often lonely struggle to realize his vision at a time when much of the United States was culturally “Sahara-like.” Isabella’s greatest asset was her husband, John Lowell Gardner Jr., who was supportive and financially secure. Their marriage in 1860 introduced her – or “Miss Jack” as she was known – into the upper echelons of Boston society. But Isabella’s strong personality and desire to do more than make phone calls and join sewing circles alienated Boston’s social elite. He was viewed as “fast-paced” and often complained that “there wasn’t a charitable eye or ear in Boston.”

collect culture

The greatest tragedy in the couple’s life was the death of their young son, Jackie; travel became the antidote to this (see Comrade Traveler inside Art NewspaperApril 2023).

Isabella’s travels and broad interests became a source of strength as she began to navigate the dangerous world of art. One of his early mentors, Harvard professor Charles Eliot Norton, encouraged him to collect “culture,” but it wasn’t easy. Even well-educated people like the Gardners were at the mercy of dealers and consultants, and their relationship with Bernard Berenson was as complicated as it was successful. Isabella had sponsored Berenson’s early artworks in Italy, and Berenson returned to her life as a mentor years later, directing important paintings accordingly.

Berenson purchased some of the collection’s magnificent pieces: Titian’s Rape of Europe (1560-62), arguably the best in America by Titian, as well as works by Botticelli, Rembrandt and others. Perhaps because she realized she needed his expertise and connections more than a thousand dollars, Isabella remained with Berenson even when her husband realized she was overcharging him. Yet not all of his victories were Berenson’s; Vermeer’s acquisition Concert (around 1664) By 1892 he was following his own instincts.

Long before her museum took shape, Isabella was adding artists as well as works of art to her collection. He set out to create his own image and found kindred spirits in Sargent and Swedish painter Anders Zorn. Sargent’s full-length portrait of Isabella from 1888 showed her standing boldly in front of a red and gold tapestry. revealing Her black dress completed with pearl strings around her waist. Isabella must have wanted the painter to recreate something similar to her scandal. Ms.The obscurity of the sitter’s facial features was intentional, and Sargent cruelly remarked to a friend that Isabella had a face like a lemon with a slit mouth. The portrait sparked such negative comments in Boston that Jack Gardner did not allow the portrait to be seen in public during his lifetime.

In 1891, a significant inheritance from her father enabled Isabella to consider a permanent home for her art and library of rare editions. He chose the swampy lot of Fenway Court in Boston’s Back Bay. He wanted to have his own Venetian palace there, filling galleries labeled “Gothic,” “Spanish,” “Chinese,” and “Dutch,” among others, with his “spoils.” Architectural salvage pieces, fabrics and stained glass convey the impression of period rooms favored in the homes of the wealthy at the turn of the 20th century. The focal point was the glazed atrium, a breathtaking reminder of Venice with gothic arches amid abundant plants and flowers. At its opening in 1903, Miss Jack sat regal in a chair as she received the obeisance of the Boston Society. It had taken a long time, but now this “millionaire Bohémienne” was accepted by his peers and was even called “one of the seven wonders of Boston.”

Dykstra’s biography may lack the critical edge of Anne Higonnet. A Museum of Its Own (2009), but it is an empathetic and sensitive portrait of the Fenway Court Sphinx.

• Natalie DykstraIn Search of Beauty: The Life of Isabella Stewart Gardner, Mariner Books, 512pp, $37.50/£25 (hb), published 26 March/11 April

• Bruce Boucher‘s last book, John Soane’s Cabinet of Curiosities (Yale), published June 2024