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Anna Bowman Blake Dodd 1848–1929
An inveterate traveler who spent much of her life in France, the American writer Anna Bowman Dodd had a gift for lively descriptions of the people and places she encountered. She was a popular and prolific author, writing for periodicals such as the New York Evening Post and Harper's Magazine and publishing more than twenty-five books, including vivid travelogues. Reflecting her skepticism toward socialism and feminism, Dodd's dystopian novella The Republic of the Future (1887) takes place in New York Socialist City in 2050. It envisions the deadening effect of an egalitarian and conformist society in which citizens "have the look of people who have come to the end of things and who have failed to find it amusing."
Sargent likely made this portrait while he and Dodd were both in Paris. She remained in France during World War I, carrying out relief work and raising funds for families in need.
Charcoal on paper, c. 1900
American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York; bequest of Anna Bowman Blake Dodd, 1928
This is the National Portrait Gallery sign in the exhibit. |