Georges Petit Gallery
INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION OF PAINTING
Small room, small pictures, and
I was going to say, unjustly, small art.
No, there are in this limited group several
artists of great talent such as Messrs Edelfelt, Dinet, Zorn; and
if we are disconcerted at first glance, we are then enchanted
with the variety in this evidence of present-day art.
I ask myself exactly what must be the state of
mind of a young man, intending himself for painting, who visits
the Louvre in the morning and rue de Sèze1
in the evening?
"What good," he asks himself,
"is classical education, the science of composition, long
years spent studying the old masters? A bit of instinct, some
taste (and who lacks that these days?), a few Japanese albums,
lots of snapshot photographs, isn't that all that is required for
those dazzling sketches that attract the public and make
reputations?
"Why listen to all that solemn stuff that
those old codgers tell us, only to have to free ourselves
straightaway from school formulas, backwards looking education
and rediscover in the face of reality an original and personal
view of things?"
The rebellion of youth stirred up by
present-day tendencies is perfectly natural; it exists in
literature, in poetry, in the theatre. It is latent in the air we
breathe, in the education we receive. And it requires great
strength of character to resist the flow. However in literature
we can immediately detect someone with a limited classical
knowledge, someone who has in his youth neglected what our
forefathers would have called the "humanities";
similarly in painting we recognize those who, not having studied
sufficiently, have no other resource in their art but
improvisation. However much a particular master of the modern
school may wish to forget them, his dexterity, his marvellously
assured drawing, his infallible eye, serve to remind us that he
could have won the Prix de Rome.
The same with Dinet, a young man, a
conscientious seeker, who is exhibiting nos 49, 50,
51, in whom we recognize a finely accomplished education.
He shows us three very different aspects of his
talent: Young Dancer from Laghouat, The Encampment,
After Bathing.
In the Dancer, harsh light, full sun
(from the Sahara), - the flesh appears pierced by it, - scarcely
a few thin blue shadows. It is dazzling.
The Encampment is a study in matt, a
study of night, dark yet transparent.
After Bathing shows us a young,
semi-naked woman, in the morning, in a flowery corner of our own
France; this is not Chloë, it is a little, undressed village
girl. An intimate poetry reaches out to us standing before this
picture.
Zorn. - Very beautiful portrait of Mme T. - The
artist, in a very rare exception, has been able to overcome the
difficulties of this sad and transitory age in a woman's life
when she is no longer young and has not even the charm of
white hair, of acknowledged wrinkles.
M. Zorn is re-exhibiting his pretty study from
the Champ de Mars salon, delicious with light.
Why should it be that the attitude of the
woman, a bit thick-set, legs apart, is done in a disagreeable
line?
The Little Strawberry Pickers by
Edelfelt are exquisite; they are descending a mountain behind
which you can see a fjord; you must see the strange and
attractive character of their little childish faces surrounded by
pale golden hair underneath their red hoods. Beautiful portrait
of a man by the same artist, - the hands very well executed.
White gives us five versions of the
same young girl in blue; she is charming, but, multiplied by the
psyche that reflects her, that makes too many blue young girls.
Those nos 18 and 22, very well painted, would have
been quite enough.
M. Desboutin's pretty studies are in pastel. I
know because I read it in the catalogue, because nowadays it is
very difficult to distinguish pastels from paint. The motto of
the modern school of painting is: "Matt means
sincere". - To avoid a glossy surface, they coat the
canvases and paint with wax. See M. Dinet's canvases where he
uses this new technique. But then don't, as some others have
done, put glass over your matt painting; it gives a shine that is
really just as disagreeable as the glossiness of oil or varnish.
Let's pass on to the landscapes.
Those by M. Montenard are sparkling.
M. Dauphin also likes the Midi, which he
renders well. His seascapes, of which he is a past master, are
much superior to his landscapes. Lagarde, evening, dusk,
small grey canvases full of the poetry that Cazin has initiated
us into, but with something more.
M. Billotte shows us that even the most humble
subjects can have their interest, because he chooses the really
unpromising corners of our town, the business quarters and
fortifications, the wastelands.
Similarly M. Barrau, - the Grande-Jatte, and
Courbevoie in the sunshine.
I have kept for last Forain, landscapist. Yes,
a real landscape with trees, sky, foliage; but you never thought
that Forain would be able to show a meadow unless it was bedecked
with coquettes, and his Journey in the Province, in
spite of its title and its size, is hardly done in his usual
style.
DE BRABANT
Le Mensuel no 3 Dec 1890. Reprinted in Proust, Écrits sur l'art. GF Flammarion 1999.
1. The Exposition
internationale de peinture was held at the Georges Petit
Gallery, 8, Rue de Sèze, Paris from 20 Dec 1890 to 28 Jan 1891.