ANDERS ZORN
Portrait of President William Howard Taft
Etching on van Gelder paper, (Asplund 239)
9 3/16 x 7 7/8 inches plus wide margins, 1911
Signed in pencil lower right

HE name Anders Zorn is often mentioned in the same breath as his American contemporary, John Singer Sargent, and rightly so, as these two were arguably the greatest portraitists of their time. Although today overshadowed by Sargent, Zorn produced masterful etched portraits of three American Presidents: William Howard Taft, Theodore Roosevelt, and Grover Cleveland, and he painted Cleveland and Taft.

Zorn's portrait of Taft, executed in the Blue Room of the White House in 1911, is the likeness of a man burdened by the weight of body and mind. It was done at a time when Taft was becoming deeply concerned about the loyalty of old friends in the face of former President Theodore Roosevelt's impending decision to run against him in 1912. 'The President is so weary that it shows in his face,' Zorn told Taft's Secretary of Commerce and Labor Charles Nagel, 'Can't you come over and talk to him so I can paint him as he really is?' Nagel tried, but Taft remained unchanged. As a result, Zorn's virtuosity and insight left us one of the most powerfully truthful of all Presidential portraits.

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