“The Barbaro is a sort of Fontaine de Jouvence, for it sends one back twenty years, besides making the present seem remarkably all right” - John Singer Sargent, 1898 (Halsby 114)
To call the Palazzo Barbaro, the Venice home of his relatives, the Daniel Sargent Curtis family, a “fountain of youth,” proves that Venice became more than just one of the many stops Sargent and his family made throughout his life. Sargent’s ties to Venice began early in his teenage years when his family first visit briefly both in 1870 and 1874. However, by September 1880, his family moved into the Hotel d’Italie, and Sargent stayed behind at 290 Piazza San Marco until 1881, even after his parents left. During this stay of ten months, Sargent produced several paintings from his Venetian Studies, and upon returning to Venice in 1882 he continued to paint the series. This time, however, he stayed at the elegant Palazzo Barbaro, located on the Grand Canal near the Academia Bridge, which he returned to several times during his trips to Venice in the late 1890s and early 1900s (he later painted the interior and the Curtis family in his 1899 An Interior in Venice). 
Sargent was relieved that he didn’t have to spend his retreats with tourists in hotels, and he also visited other Americans’ homes, such as Casa Alvisi, the home of Mrs. Arthur Bronson (Halsby 117). Sargent, along with regular visitors Henry James and Robert Browning, visited homes like this and the Palazzo Dario, which was occupied by the Comtesse de Baume and Madame Bulteau. Poets, artists, and writers would attend their regularly held conversazioni, and Halsby accounts that “Sargent’s charm, wit, and modesty…made him a popular guest in Venetian society” (Halsby 118). Furthermore, Sargent was especially fond of his trips to Venice when accompanied by good friends like Wilfrid de Glehn and Walter Gay, among the circle of friends that were rooted in Venice. However, with the onset of the World War I, Sargent visited Venice one last time in 1913, and this also marked the end of these Anglo-Americans meetings in Venice. Throughout the years Sargent was not only drawn by the architecture and beauty of Venice, but also the people he met there. Thus, to Sargent, Venice meant both the aesthetic splendor of the city and being circled by the people he loved.
Image of the Palazzo Barbaro from Whittick, Arnold. Ed. Ruskin’s Venice. New York: Watson-Guptill Publications, 1976.
Sargent, John Singer. An Interior in Venice. 1898. Royal Academy of Arts, London.
