Bergdorf Goodman is unveiling a public exhibition by the artist Jason Bard Yarmosky. Titled “Timeless Women in New York,” the show features five 7-foot portraits of inspiring women who the artist selected for their contributions to the cultural, artistic and social fabric of the city.

The exhibition spans five of Bergdorf’s Fifth Avenue windows. With this exhibition, Yarmosky seeks to revive the fusion of fashion and portraiture which in recent decades has been replaced by photography. His work features 17th- and 18th-century painting techniques.

“I’m inspired by the overlap between costume and fashion; how a dress can convey personal style and yet create a persona. The right garment can embolden a sitter to reveal themselves, expressing identity and personality. Each portrait unveils a timeless woman, mirrored in fashion, revealing unique qualities I find to be of New York,” said Yarmosky.

The subjects of the portraits are art patron Carla Shen; fashion models Cate Underwood and JoAni Johnson; chef and activist Sophia Roe, and Bergdorf Goodman’s Linda Fargo. They are depicted in looks by designers Marc Jacobs, Christopher John Rogers, Gaurav Gupta, Schiaparelli and Thom Browne, which are all carried by Bergdorf’s.

“Bergdorf Goodman is more than a luxury department store; we consider ourselves to be a part of the cultural landscape of New York,” said Fargo, the retailer’s senior vice president, women’s fashion and director of store presentation. “We always keep an eye out for exceptional talent in both fashion as well as art and have found a unique talent in Jason Bard Yarmosky. We felt his large-scale paintings of five creative women wearing distinctive fashion choices are perfectly synced with the current moment in New York.”

She added, “Bergdorf’s is at its best expression when we’re in the zone that bridges fashion with artistry. We’re always looking for authentic and original ways to express this synergy. We were introduced to Jason in the beginning of the year, and we were deeply impressed with his masterful, yet easy style, which recalled the gestural yet realistic technique of John Singer Sargent.”

Yarmosky graduated with a BFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York and has since exhibited works at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, San Antonio Museum of Art, Addison Gallery of American Art, Brigham Young University Museum of Art, South Dakota Art Museum, Yellowstone Art Museum, Huntsville Museum of Art, among others. He has had solo exhibitions at the Huntington Museum of Art and the University of Maine Museum of Art.

In an interview last week, Yarmosky said he’s always been intrigued with costumes and fashion. After graduating from SVA, he said he explored aging, and his grandparents were his subjects.

“I used costume as a way to challenge society’s expectation of what that means. Over the years, it’s always been a pillar for me, and last year I made a painting for an exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum — a portrait of two friends of mine honoring their mother who had recently passed,” he said.

The portrait was of L’Enchanteur codesigners Dynasty and Soull Ogun, who won the 2024 CFDA/Vogue Fashion Award. “That was the first painting where I felt that overlap between costume and fashion, and I loved painting the garments and the jewelry, and in a sense that was the springboard to this,” he said.

Yarmosky said he met with Fargo and they discussed this project to do the windows, which was inspired by Sargent, considered the leading portrait painter of his generation. who died in 1925.

“I feel that photography has become so over-accessible and has replaced what painting was able to do in its relationship with fashion back then. In a way, this project is bringing that back to the forefront in that sense,” said Yarmosky.

Discussing the criteria in choosing the women he painted, he said about Underwood, for example, “We’ve been friends for a long time and she represents this fabulous New York. And she’s in Paris as well. She’s already in the fashion world. Linda [Fargo] has this amazing, surrealist fashion sensibility. My friend JoAni has this beautiful silver hair, and she represents this aging beauty in a way. Carla is not only supportive of the arts, but does this ‘Carla’s Camo’ and has fashion made for her where she blends in and looks like the art,” he said.

Describing the portraiture experience, Fargo said, “As to personally being a subject and having one’s portrait done through the labor of love or painting is an ultimate honor, although admittedly fraught with some hesitations, too. I felt more comfortable being an active collaborator in the pose and styling and perhaps partially hidden behind a theatrical mask. The whole project has ultimately been a celebration of humanity, personality, and artistry — the beauty of the hand — a break from technology.”

He and Fargo collaborated on choosing and styling the designer looks that the women wore in their portraits. They initially did a photo shoot with the women in their outfits, and Yarmosky was able to use these photo references as he painted. Yarmosky said he has an 84-inch screen, and he would have the image next to the screen as if they were there in person.

Fargo said she worked through the corresponding fashion selection from the designers’ spring 2025 curation.

Overall, the project took a little over three months. Yarmosky worked on all five women’s portraits at the same time.

“What was really fun was being able to style them not just with the garments but also with the paintings.” Each painting has a different quality. In one of them, Cate is wearing Schiaparelli, an olive suit, and he put her in a blue chair sitting against a dark green background that Sargent did of his teacher, Carolus-Duran.

This is the first time Bergdorf’s has had a painting depicting fashion in its windows. There will be a video on the second floor showing the process, and the prices are available “upon request.”

Asked what surprised him most about the project, Yarmosky said, “I’m not used to working in such a collaborative way where there are many factors in play. Usually I’m just by myself. In a way, it surprised me that I really enjoyed that process. For me, it was making sure with the time frame I was given, I was able to represent today’s women in the way that I see them, along with fashion which beautifully mirrored each one of them in my opinion.”

In their paintings, two of them are sitting, three are standing. Two of them have more painterly backgrounds, and two of them have very detailed interiors. The fifth is a little more dreamy, he said.

Underwood wore Schiaparelli, Johnson is wearing Thom Browne, Roe is wearing Marc Jacobs, Shen is wearing Christopher John Rogers and Fargo is wearing Gaurav Gupta. “Linda’s is a great dress. You have this sculpted black off-the-shoulder dress which is somewhat of a hint to Madame X,” he said, referencing Sargent’s iconic painting that is now the focus of an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

As for future projects, Yarmosky said he will have a solo exhibition at Guild Hall in East Hampton in February 2026. He also has some commissions and works with Beth DeWoody in Palm Beach and will have an exhibition around Art Basel in Miami.

The exhibition goes in Wednesday.

“The windows will function as a gallery from which the paintings can be viewed and sold, and will remain open until May 26. The timing intentionally coincides with an energetic cross cultural moment in New York — a moment where fashion and art intersect, simultaneously with our windows at Bergdorf’s,” said Fargo.