NEW YORK, NY.- Eli Wilner & Company revisits the reframing of John Singer Sargent’s Madame X, currently featured prominently in the “Sargent and Paris” exhibition, currently on view at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and traveling to the Musée d’Orsay.

From the New York Times: “The show follows Sargent from his arrival in the French capital as an 18-year-old in 1874 through his Salon triumphs of the early 1880s to the controversy around his arresting portrait ‘Madame X’ of 1883-4”. Full article can be found here: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/arts/design/sargent-madame-x-met-museum.html

As of June 2025, Eli Wilner & Company’s frame funding initiative is announcing another round of $150,000 available for distribution in partial grants. Exciting new projects continue to be submitted on a daily basis by museums across the country. Remaining funds will be committed to new projects by July 31, 2025, and can be used for frame restoration, historic frame replication, or mirror replication projects. Interested institutions can apply by emailing the details of their reframing or frame restoration needs to info@eliwilner.com. No project is too large.

The reframing of Sargent’s “Madame X” by Eli Wilne & Company followed an extensive search of the Metropolitan Museum of Art period frame storage searching for the original frame pictured in an 1884 documentary photograph from Sargent’s studio in Paris. After an extensive search, it was believed that the original frame was likely never sent to America. In the process of searching for the long-lost frame, another period frame, with a prominent New York framemaker label, was discovered in the collection that was deemed an excellent pairing for the painting and was able to be minimally adapted for “Madame X”.


Pictured left: “Madame X” after reframing by Eli Wilner & Company
Pictured right: “Madame X” in its long-lost frame as documented in Sargent’s studio, 1884.

Wilner’s team has had the opportunity to frame many important artworks by Sargent for various institutions in the past four decades. Some examples include:


John Singer Sargent, “Mosquito Net”, 1912 - The White House Reframed by Eli Wilner & Company


John Singer Sargent, “Portrait of Ralph Curtis on the Beach at Schevingen”, c.1880, High Museum of Art, Replica frame by Eli Wilner & Company


John Singer Sargent, “At Calcot”, 1885–90, Yale University Art Gallery Replica frame by Eli Wilner & Company


John Singer Sargent, “Piazza Navona, Rome”, 1906, Colby College Museum of Art Reframed by Eli Wilner & Company

Eli Wilner & Company has completed over 15,000 framing projects for private collectors, museums, and institutions including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and The White House. Wilner was honored by the Historic Charleston Foundation with the Samuel Gaillard Stoney Conservation Craftsmanship Award, for their work in historic picture frame conservation. In 2024, Eli Wilner was presented with an Iris Award for Outstanding Dealer of the Year by the Bard Graduate Center in New York City.