To Monsieur Jean Sardou
Extract from Ruskin:
The most remarkable Turner I know depicts M. Jean Sardou coming out of
the Odéon in the oblique light of one of those glorious sunsets that the
painter excels in reproducing; since the young scholar is placed in front
of the stage door, the naive English spectator might imagine that the
uniform he is wearing is a theatrical costume, although it is not. In
actual fact it is merely the realization, in its watery appearance of
cherry-red velvet, of the scarlet rays that tinge the adjacent Salute in
Venice and in Dido at Carthage. It is in this way that Turner leaves
Salvator and Claude far behind, should he be thus obliged to lend to the
doctor and poet the appearance of a fallacious assistant major. Beside him
is a rather comical figure who is offering him a seat in a taxi. Such at
least appears to be the signification of the rather absurd gesture that he
has sketched. But perhaps this is not the case, the background characters
being added by Turner merely for variety and of no importance in his eyes.
At the very least, the smell of petrol rising from the disdained taxi,
does it not bestow a great beauty into the the light that permeates
through it in cascades of topaz and amethyst.
"Extract" from Modern Painters.
Dedication written over three pages of Sésame et les Lys,
June 1906.
Created 29.04.18