By Jonathan E. Himlin

“To create without passion is to create nothing at all.” Bruce W. Sykes

Art Is Creativity
In its purest form, art is creativity. And if you agree with Mr. Sykes’ contention, you must also conclude, then, that art requires passion in order to create anything worthwhile.

As a group, artists are long on passion. Throughout history they have struggled famously for its cause, often sacrificing security, health and happiness to satisfy their own hunger for artistic truth above all else. Sometimes great rewards follow as a result. But too often the adoration of audiences is more difficult to attain.

Passion Doesn’t Always Pay the Rent
In short, passion doesn’t always pay the rent. So, artists are frequently faced with the task of toning down their work to make it more marketable to the mainstream, or resorting to more commercial ways to make money. But is commercial or commissioned work the enemy of artistic creativity? Or is it a matter of adding your own creative signature to whatever work you do, commissioned or not?

Some photographers, for example, loathe the thought of being hired to shoot weddings or corporate events, complaining about the stifling, structured environment that limits the flow of their creative juices. They would much rather train their lenses to capture the unrestrained possibilities that exist in the wild, communicate the plight of the poverty stricken, or appreciate the architecture in urban scenes. Others do both, often using studio work, the work they have to do, to fund their photography trips—the work they love.

I’ve spoken to painters who call themselves purists, swearing they’ll never do commissioned pieces. They consider it a contrived, artificially manufactured translation of a vision that’s not their own. “If I’m not painting what I want to paint—what I feel inspired about—I’m not being true to myself as an artist,” one artist told me.

Even the Masters Had to Eat
But even the Masters had to eat. Artists have been commissioned—by the wealthy or by governments or religious institutions—to produce some of the most important works in existence. Michelangelo’s painting of the Sistine Chapel was commissioned by Pope Julius II in 1508 and is among the most famous works of art in the world. The fame of Michelangelo’s greatest work is second perhaps only to Leonardo di Vinci’s Mona Lisa (1503-06), a portrait of wealthy Florentine merchant Francesco del Giocondo’s wife Lisa, and in all likelihood, also a commissioned piece.

Portraiture and other commissioned pieces were common practice among many famous artists since the Renaissance period, including greats such as Botticelli, Titian, Anthony van Dyck, Rembrandt, Jacque-Louis David, Claude Monet and John Singer Sargent to name a few.

Portrait of Carolus-Duran, John Singer Sargent (1879). Oil on canvas. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute at Williamstown, MA.

Sargent, ever since his 1879 portrait of Carolus-Duran drew high praise at the Paris Salon, concentrated the bulk of his career on commissioned portraits. His talents were subsequently sought after internationally by the wealthy and prominent, including two U.S. presidents: Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson.

As a result, Sargent became the most successful portrait painter of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. But he wasn’t free from detractors. Among them, French Impressionist painter Camille Pissarro once criticized Sargent saying “he is not an enthusiast but rather an adroit performer.”[1] Pissarro implied that Sargent’s work, while well practiced, was constructed without passion.

Whether or not he believed Pissarro’s critique to be true, late in his life Sargent veered sharply away from portraiture, opting to spend his time painting vivid watercolors that depicted his worldwide travels. It could be supposed, then, that having secured himself financially through commissioned portraiture, Sargent decided to more closely pursue his passion toward the end of his life via his watercolors.

Or maybe for Sargent, painting was his passion all along; simply painting. And maybe painting alone was enough to sustain him creatively, regardless of the subject matter. If that were true, then he had been creating something his entire career, even by Bruce Sykes’ standards.

Santa Maria della Salute, John Singer Sargent (1904). Brooklyn Museum of Art, New York

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1. Rewald, John: Camille Pissarro: Letters to his Son Lucien, page 183. Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980.