Greene discusses John Singer Sargent with the New York Times

Alumna Nikki Greene, an art history professor at Wellesley College, recently spoke to the New York Times about artist John Singer Sargent and his series of preparatory drawings for a mural in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Part of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's permanent collection, the sketches depict the same man, Thomas McKeller, an African American elevator operator during the early 20th century. Each figure in the final mural was modeled after McKeller; however, his skin is never accurately portrayed.

"Sargent treats McKeller's 'body with a lot of care, but we also know there's no trace of him--it's a whitewashing of this man and his history and his body and his face,'" Greene said in the article "John Singer Sargent's Secret Muse."

The exhibition Boston's​ Apollo, on view through May 17, presents the work of a long-established artist from the new perspective of race--a current trend prevalent in museums across the country according to Greene.