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Alexa Actionable Analytics for the Web. AmazonGlobal Ship Orders Internationally. Amazon Inspire Digital Educational Resources. The next day, Apollinaire wrote: By calling upon the best composers of his time, such as Debussy,' Ravel, Darius Milhaud, Satie, Poulenc, Sauguet, Hindemith, and Manuel de Falla, this supremely vital organizer built up a work of art — the word is not exaggerated — in which he skillfully combined dancers, poets, painters, and musicians in a unique atmosphere. When he died in 1 , Diaghilev left behind a flourishing tradition that persists to this day, namely, the association between painters and the stage.
Since this era, painters are called upon to do something more than merely provide sets and costumes; they are called upon to assume entire responsi- bility for all the plastic aspects of a display. In this sphere their role has become paramount, and this is entirely due to the Ballets Russes. Ballets Suedois Ten years after Sheherazade, and two years after the end of the war, Rolf de Mare and the dancer Jean Borlin, who founded the Ballets Suedois, came to Paris, since their own country did not offer wide enough scope or sufficient encouragement for their art.
They had the good fortune to be received and aided by Jacques Hebertot, who made the Comedie des Champs- Elysees available to them for their opening performance on October 25, During the next four years the company created about twenty ballets, which owed their success more to the collaboration of poets, painters, and musicians than to the slightly awkward choreography of the Maitre de Ballet.
Without any doubt this collaboration which was tested in Paris, this communion of dancing and poetry, music and painting, is a major reason for the extraordinarily warm wel- come ballet has always had throughout the world. Literature and the Arts The histories of painting and thought cannot be dissociated. And so, without attempting a detailed description of French literature over the last fifty years, it is impossible to overlook some of the master theories which, from Apollinaire to Mal- raux, Andre Breton to Jean-Paul Sartre, played an important part by supplying the spiritual nourishment for L'Ecole de Paris.
In , Apollinaire wrote: It will be pure art, in the same way that music is pure literature. The concepts of pure poetry and pure painting stem from the same source, the desire to express the innermost life of the soul. They are contemporary with Bergsonism "We share Bergson's belief," stated the Futurists, "that life projects over intelligence" and with Freud's theories on the subconscious, which the Surrealists were to espouse.
In spite of a complete awareness of the in- creased fragility of the world, the trend for thought is toward the discovery of new foundations, new ways of confronting reality. Like Cezanne, who had to know a landscape's geologi- cal foundations before painting it, the poet and the writer are today, when listening to this world, in a vastly different position from that of their elders.
In the preface to his important Panorama des idees contem- poraines, Gaetan Picon declares: And yet, we knew that unknown lands were under the same natural laws as ours. Progress in knowledge was linked to our theories of the general structure of things, and attested to the superiority of intellectual powers. We were confident that we would put unsubjugated regions under our control by means of the same ever-successful strategy, and that they would take their places as new provinces under the law of the same em- pire.
Today we are at a loss to know what spiritual laws of navigation will be needed when sailing to virgin lands, or which prevailing winds or currents will carry us there. Some writers, such as Blaise Cendrars, Paul Morand, and Valery Larbaud, endeavored, through their travels, to discover the world, whereas others dedicated themselves to the search for structure, particularly the structure of rhythms. The phys- iological origins of rhythm by Abbe Rousselet, the role of rhythm in poetry and music by Pius Servien, and the share ol rhythm in architectural creation by Matila Ghyka and Boris- savlievitch are all works corresponding to those by Gleizes and Andre Lhote on the laws of rhythm in painting.
Poets and painters have the same preoccupations. With poetry, the basic principle is that the art must be creation and not representation, production and not reproduction, for art is pure knowledge and is, therefore, pure intuition.
In the same way it should not be a reflection or interpretation of existing knowledge, but an original production of a hitherto concealed reality. Poets employ words in other than their usual meaning, and painters break up the pictorial structure. Some modern poetry has also attempted to integrate popular prose with poetic language in order to increase its vitality and warmth. The endeavor to draw upon the vernacular has been very notice- able with such different authors as Charles Peguy, Apollinaire, Claudel, and Jacques Prevert, explaining the verbal style common to works which are reflected on the spoken word, and where even the spelling is altered to give full play to phonetics.
This concern to produce effects of shock, strangeness, and surprise, which is a feature of all modern art but especially of poetry, stems from the poets' twofold obsession, justified firstly in that they have caught a glimpse of a new reality and secondly because they know that everyday speech is closest to poetry and the most likely vehicle for universal language.
On the subject of poetry and the world, Paul Claudel wrote: This is the poetry of Dante. The Surrealists maintain that poetic creation is above all the liberation of speech. With this creation the poet not only expresses himself, but is also a medium for all that is dormant, diffused, and anonymous in others. They have no hesitation in stating: And so, from the "magic" of Surrealist works to the ideological "commitment" of the Sartrian activity, a definite urge to change the structure of the world through the medium of words and vision can be detected.
In his book Situations II, which appeared in , and in which he spoke of the commitment and art of prose, Jean Paul Sartre wrote: It is therefore justifiable to ask him this secondary question: Which aspect of the world do you wish to reveal? What change do you want to offer to the world through this revelation? The 'committed' writer knows that words are action. He knows that to reveal is to bring about change, and that no revelation is made unless this change is anticipated. The influence of contemporary literature and thought has directly affected modern art.
From this it may be deduced that the evolution of "vision" in art is not an isolated phenomenon, and that the need for a new expression, in the same way as the meticulous and concrete revision of recognized values, is the reply to universal concern. This universalism, for which the fantastic progress of science is so responsible, does not in any way clash with classical humanism. It is a continuation, and if it happens to utilize somewhat disconcerting means, we have no right to disown it, if only to clear the way for it at our leisure: Painting The big event in modern art, from which all present trends derive, lies in the subjective conception of a picture, which has replaced that of "a window open on nature.
Cubism, handed down from Cezanne, and Fauvism, handed down from Van Gogh, are not the only aspects of this subjective conception,' since art was to branch off toward irrealism, Surrealism, and toward plastic abstraction. For a segment of contemporary art, the goal of aesthetics is no longer feeling but the cause of this feeling, in fact the structure. It can be said that the best and most thorough analyses of recent times are structural analyses of basic rhythms, which end in an important transformation in artistic perception. This break of sensitivity with the old regime should not be considered an attack on tradition, but in fact its continuation.
It is a quest for representation of a world which is still "infor- mal" in our eyes. Photography has not destroyed art, nor have Calder's mobiles displaced classical sculpture, and caricatures have nothing to fear from cartoon films. Nevertheless, photog- raphy, mobiles, and cartoons do continue to express a certain realism and progress, two elements which are inseparable in this particularly oppressive age.
There is room enough for all. However, as Rene Huyghe observes: This is perhaps somewhat regrettable, since the Book is nearer to art than the Motion Picture or Television! This is of no importance. Art is gifted with immortal vitality, and just when it seems on the verge of losing its human qualities, it generates vital substance and develops mighty power. Through the study of light, the Impressionists sought and found a visual truth. Through the study of color, today's artists are in the process of exploiting the "magic truth" which Delacroix, Gauguin, and Van Gogh used deliberately. Never have yellows, oranges, and reds vibrated so compellingly as they do today; reds which already flourished like banners under the brushes of Rubens, Fragonard and Renoir; and never has such intense sensuality contained such life.
This prejudice in favor of vivid color, with red predominating, is a sign of ele- mentary strength, a fire by which even the most unfeeling audiences cannot fail to be impressed. Health, like talent, is an irresistible gift. Without considering its purely technical acquisitions, the contemporary painting encompassed in the universally known term the Ecole de Paris has an almost miraculous fertility. From Vuillard and Bonnard, witnesses to a world that dis- appeared with the Comtesse de Noailles and Debussy, to Bernard Buffet, witness to a harsher world, forty years have passed.
Dates are already confusing, theories are blurred, but the works remain. Luster, creativeness, subtlety, and joy contribute to this artistic fund, unique in its diversity. Engraving Apart from easel painting and all too rare mural painting functional architecture has developed further, everywhere, than luxury architecture , our painters have also earned a name through theater decoration and book illustration. A fashion trend, supported by speculation, brought engraving in luxury editions to the fore just after the First World War. At first wood was used, because it lends itself more easily to typography, but Laboureur returned to the burin, which had fallen into disuse; Dunoyer de Segonzac practiced etching and copper engraving, and Luc Albert Moreau, lithography.
In a more recent generation, such artists as Jacquemin, Cour- nault, and Soulas devoted themselves entirely to original en- graving, an austere and meticulous craft. However, this renewed interest in original engraving is not due to its exponents but to painters, for whom engraving is only a minor form of expression. With the exception of Jacques Villon, one of the best-known etchers and one who is devoted to engraving, all our great painters do occasional engravings, and with outstanding skill.
In this field, as in that of theatrical decoration, painters have broken new ground. Work by Pi- casso, Rouault, Matisse, Braque, Vlaminck, Dufy, and Chagall, among others, has given unlimited scope to the field of en- graving, where young artists of today continue their research. Sculpture After the death of Rodin and Bourdelle, sculpture was set, in part, along a course laid by Despiau, that is toward a sober form of art, sparsely transposed and in an exceedingly pure style. Despiau had a following of many young artists, such as Belmondo, who learned from him. In more or less the same spirit as Despiau come sculptors of vigorous talent such as Wlerick, Pommier, Poisson, or Dejean, who were equally familiar with Rodin's teaching.
Maillol was a pure product of the ancient Greek school, accidentally born in our time. His women are goddesses, exuding animality and candor, solidly planted on their heavy limbs. Maillol was the French master who inspired the greatest admiration and imitation abroad. Whether they bear the name "He de France" or "Pomone," all his opulent creations have a family resemblance; they pay matchless tribute to rustic sensuality. After these two great sculptors, Despiau and Maillol, who perpetuated Greco-Latin civilization, the faultless and mys- terious work of Gimond developed, as did the less tranquil work of Couturier, Martin, and Auricoste.
Simultaneous to Braque and Picasso, others such as Lipschitz, Arp, Zadkine, and Giacometti were breaking away progressively from the imitation of reality. This is at exactly the opposite pole from Rodin, the whole for the part, it is, as Maillol wished it, twenty forms in one. It is even, if preferred, matter dominated by solely intellectual theory. And this sculpture resembles the quest made by certain painters at a period which might appear to be an episode in the pictorial revolution, but which has nevertheless contributed to uphold this theory. Nearer, no doubt, to abstraction than to naturalism, it not only discards nature as a source of inspiration, but it exploits nature in order to incor- porate its elements according to certain spiritual precepts, into a sculpturally plastic world By the most direct and intense expression of these precepts, it combines the mediums proper to sculpture, volume and rhythm.
Distortion must therefore necessarily take place, a feature of all plastic art which is remote from humanistic aesthetics, 'zoographical,' renascent or Hellenic forms of art. This is proof, perhaps, that we are in an experimental era. But in any case the need for the invention of forms dominates all others. A sculptor no longer copies nature, he no longer imitates aspects, he creates them, in the same way that nature creates a mountain or a man or a rock.
His sculptured form takes the place of reality, and is destined to supersede it. In general, all theories aside, it must be said that France is a country with great sculptors who set an example of a widely varying and constantly resurgent creation. Decorative Arts After the First World War, when money was in more active circulation, the trend toward decoration grew. With better renumeration artisans in furniture, glass, ironwork, and porce- lain were able to return to a perfection of craftsmanship that had been somewhat lacking. In this respect the Decorative Arts Exhibition of marked the zenith of a revolutionary, invigorating style which rapidly spread to the provinces.
This decorative arts trend, with resolutely modern ideals, drew [19] such a flood of recrimination that something akin to a negative period followed: It was at this exhibition that a renewal in the art of stained glass in architecture was noted. Glass which was stained and shaded throughout, along medieval lines, took the place of fragile and uncertain painting on glass. With names such as Labouret, Decorchement, Barillet and Paul Bony, who later transposed Rouault's sketches for the church at Assy, and Max Ingrand, a whole thriving tradition is encompassed.
However, without doubt, the main contemporary acquisition is that of the art of tapestry, which had been fading out ever since the eighteenth century, and which experienced a com- plete resurrection in the first quarter of the twentieth century, with Jean Lurcat one of the instigators. By attempting to simplify composition through a return to the mural, and by reducing the number of colors employed — which were of vegetable, not chemical, dye— Jean Lurcat tackled the very root of the problem, technique.
As for the spirit in which this work was undertaken both by him and by his excellent group of specialized painters Coutaud, Guigne- bert, Lagrange, Picart le Doux, Saint-Saens and Vogensky , the outstanding works produced by Aubusson manufacturers offer proof enough. Many recognized and expert painters followed the decorator Jacques Adnet to Aubusson— Savin, Brianchon, Legueult, Roland Oudot — where they created tapestries of a less system- atic inspiration than Lurcat's, with colors of great subtlety.
Other branches of decorative arts came to the fore: Since the exhibition, the field of furniture has been explored by Ruhlmann who can be called the direct descend- ant of eighteenth-century cabinetmakers and by Pierre Chareau and Rene Prou, whose work was the forerunner to the many variations designed by Franck, Moreux, Jacques Adnet, Rene-Herbst, Serge Roche, Arbus, Nacenta, and So- gnot, to mention only a few From geometrical nudity to a cer- tain complicated baroque style which appeared during the period of the World Exhibition, at the same time as the "French Family Home," where talented decorators displayed furniture for ordinary homes, a trend toward a sound style can be detected.
It is balanced and functional; ornamentation is not scorned, but is used soberly, in the manner of the great [20] periods; the aim is to provide an ideal harmony between furni- ture and its setting. Although the Societe des Artistes Decorateurs was founded more than fifty years ago, it has not lost its enthusiasm and youth; it is well aware that this period is critical.
Here is an extract from an introduction to one of their recent catalogues: We believe that man reflects what he sees around him, as much as what he hears or what he reads, and that a nation which is well and attractively 'equipped' will be of a higher intellectual standard than a nation which neglects the question of the ever-present background to life.
Montmartre Imagine a town such as Paris, where the best brains of a vast kingdom have gathered in one point, where they interpenetrate and provoke mutual inspiration. Consider this Universal City where every street leads to a bridge or a square where a great event from the past is conjured up, where every street corner has taken some part in history. Goethe to Eckermann Montmartre is the most famous village in France, and anyone who knew it at the start of this century — with the last of its windmills, its country inns where drinks were served under the arbors, the chimes of the old church, and the convolvulus- covered houses — would agree that Montmartre was the most charming village in the world.
Today, from the neo-Romanesque basilica of the Sacre Coeur to the Place Dancour, from the Place du Tertre to the Lapin a Gill, Montmartre always means a special way of being frivolous, inimitable, and Bohemian, which singles it out as one of the most privileged parts of Paris. But to return to painting Even before Jongkind, forerun- ner of modern art, came from his native Holland to live at Place Pigalle, Theodore Rousseau, the famous Barbizon artist, had already, at the age of twelve, put brush to his first canvas while in Montmartre.
And this took place on a scene almost as wild, under a tormented sky in the best Ruysdael manner, as those painted by the elder of Montmartre painters, the roman- tic landscape painter, Georges Michel, nicknamed "Michel- de-Montmartre. The Impressionists, who were rediscovering nature, were delighted to find a village so near to Paris where tiny gardens, alleyways, and taverns had remained so unspoiled.
Although he worked at Pontoise, Pissarro kept his pied-a-terre in Mont- martre, and Cezanne, when he visited him, tarried in the Rue des Saules, which had already been immortalized by Corot. Until he left for the south of France, that most Parisian of Impressionists, Renoir, stayed in Montmartre.
His celebrated "Moulin de la Galette," painted in , is a crowning glory to youth and the joy of ordinary people. He was fascinated with the pictures of the new school, met Degas, Pissarro, Gauguin, Seurat, and enrolled at the Cormon studio, where he struck up a friendship with Toulouse-Lautrec, who was passionately attached to Montmartre. From this period we have the famous portrait of Pere Tanguy, who, in his picturesque shop in the Rue Clauzel, was the first dealer for the Impressionists.
And so it was not by chance that Montmartre became the chosen ground for the independent painters of Van Dongen at first, and then Picasso, were to be found in an extra- ordinary group of shanties — made up of beams and boards, it is true, and sumptuously called "studios," but so unsteady and so dangerous, built on such haphazard foundations, that Max Jacob dubbed the site the Bateau-Lavoir floating washhouse. On stormy nights the construction rocked alarmingly, and did, in fact, remind one of the rickety floating washhouses which were then moored along the Seine.
Owing to certain mysterious excavations which had been carried out, it was also known as the Maison du Trappeur. It was here, at 13 Rue Ravignan, looking onto a shady vacant lot now known as the Place Emile Goudeau, after a Montmartre humorist, that modern art was born. From onward, artists and writers gradually took pos- session of the Bateau-Lavoir. In spite of daily material trials, which were borne joyously, schools were formed. Fauvism, led by Vlaminck and Derain,' was already emerging triumphantly from the Ecole de Cha- tou.
And here, in the studio owned by Picasso and Juan Gris, as in the neighboring cafes, a new form of art, Cubism, was being born from the interminable discussions which Braque, Derain, Metzinger, Apollinaire, Andre Salmon, the art critic Maurice Raynal and the mathematician Princet held day and night. This was one of the great moments in the history of con- temporary art. Apart from the painters, some of the first tenants of the Bateau-Lavoir were a costermonger, a laundress, and a restorer of old paintings, a solemn gentleman with a white beard.
Maurice Raynal claimed that he was the person presented as the Minister of Fine Arts to the Douanier Rous- seau the day Picasso gave the still famous banquet for him in his studio. To a background of garlanded Chinese lanterns, the Doua- nier had presided over the modest table and free-flowing wine, organized in his honor, during which speeches extolling his glory were given with humor and kindliness. The Douanier, much affected by the praise and wine, sang songs he himself had composed, accompanying himself on the violin.
Bursting with happiness, he even confided to Picasso: But the echo of their enthusiasm, their work, their festivities, and their hopes persists in Mont- martre, where clouds of vivid pink, the same as those painted by Utrillo, are strewn tenderly over the firmament, as they are nowhere else. Montpamasse If the fame of Montpamasse really dates only from 19 10, at No.
All that Montpamasse means is contained in the span of time and glory allotted to these two names. Gauguin left Montpamasse to live out his mad quest; Modig- liani left his beloved Italy to end up in the one place in the world where, out of all eternity, he knew his genius would emerge. In the early years of the century, the district basked in an undeniable reputation.
Baudelaire had frequented the Grande Chaumiere. At a later date, in order to attend the Tuesday reunions held [21] by the review Verse and Prose, which was founded by Paul Fort and which had Andre Salmon as secretary, Picasso and his followers came down from Montmartre more often than not by foot. They had to cross all Paris, but the atmosphere of La Closerie was worth it. Here, in a colossal uproar, everyone drank and reconstructed the world, after having carefully pulled it to pieces. New arrivals were greeted by the booming voice of Moreas, who would ironically call out such phrases as: In , everything changed.
When the artists' Montmartre was invaded by the new rich and the pseudo-artist, another suitable colony had to be found. In 1 9 1 1 Picasso moved in, preceded by Rousseau, and followed by Vlaminck and Pas- cin. Until , the pavement Cafe de la Rotonde was one of the best-known haunts in the world. It was there that Lenin hatched plans which were to overthrow the political structure of the world. From Russian terrorism to international Marxism, from popular songs to the select few versed in geometrical poetry, from pro-Cubist art to anti-Cubist art, from a super- fluity of amorous ladies to a superfluity of hermaphrodites, from a surfeit of discouraged painters to a surfeit of unlucky ones, from too much life to too much death — all this was to surge upward and burst forth in one incredible, brightly hued, powerful movement, so rich in its variety that the effect was confusion.
It was all this that Andre Warnod was to christen Ecole de Paris a few years later. After the Armistice in , Jean Cocteau rented a vast studio through a courtyard at No. By this initiative, which already showed him to be something of a talent scout, Cocteau led the snobbish set's discovery of this extraordinary meeting point, which stretched from the Gare Montparnasse to Ras- pail.
This second invasion was necessary. The outsiders completed the Montparnasse of the artists, and led it to complete fulfill- ment. While painters were being discovered at the Dome pave- ment cafe, others discovered the wonderful Rue de la Gaite, with its theater run by Gaston Baty, the odd little cafes, its local underworld, and Bobino, its lively music hall. The Bal Negre in the Rue Blomet became fashionable. Everyone dined chez Rosalie, Rue Campagne Premiere, where Modigliani was a habitue, where one could meet Foujita with his slits of eyes under a severe fringe and golden rings in his ears , where one could even strike up an acquaintance with Marie Wassi- lieff; she would recount her life with Granowski, the Polish painter, who was always in the background, dressed as a cowboy.
Elsewhere, such girls as the beautiful and charming Kiki, artists' models like the dusky Aicha and Youki, Foujita's wife before she became that of the poet Desnos, shot to world fame. This is not an overstatement. People flocked here from all over the world, either to study the academies did a flourishing trade or to breathe the air of Montparnasse.
Not to mention adorable women, if somewhat mad. But work went on in Montparnasse too. Painters and sculp- tors built up a collective expression. The activity of La Ruche, this community dwelling on the outskirts of Montparnasse, in Vaugirard, Passage Dantzig, has only to be recalled. What else can be said about Montparnasse, which is so near and yet so far? Gauguin, who left his studio at the Rue de la Grande Chaumiere for a more spacious one on the Rue Ver- cingetorix, decorated it with a painting in the Maori manner and entitled it "Te Faruru" [Here, We Love]. And, in fact, love was the order of the day in Montparnasse.
Today it is more subdued. Although only the "flower vendors" and "ghosts" remain, as Leon-Paul Fargue, the magician of words, wrote, he also added: And nothing is so moving to those passing by the Montparnasse cafes at night than to remember that this was once the back- ground for joie de vivre, in the purest, widest meaning of the term. It is a memory of an incredible intellectual feast, of a momentous period in the Ecole de Paris.
This was the adolescence of the century. All talked about the subtle quips uttered by poet Robert de ' Montesquiou-Fezensac, the aesthete, the Folies of Boni de Castellane, and the recent reception given by the strange Marquise Casatti Wiener and Doucet played at the two pianos. The upper class came in tails; the painters, in sweaters. Some women were in suits, and others decked out in pearls and diamonds. We took some of the glitter from all these stars away with us. The war had just been won, a lot of money was being "made," and morals were more and more lax.
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It all took place under the benevolent aegis of Moyses, the host and friend to all of Paris. All this provided an ideal sounding board for mediums such as psychoanalysis, for "The Beggar's Opera," Rene Clair's first films, the Negro Revue, music by Erik Satie or Florent Schmitt, theories upheld by architect Le Corbusier, books by Proust, Gide, or Cocteau, the avant-garde theater, the first paintings by the youthful Christian Berard, and the beginnings of Surrealism.
Mechanical progress no longer surprised anyone. Even the definition by Fernand Leger, "A bolt more beautiful than a rose," offered it an aesthetic future. Quotations were freely made from Paul Morand's book Rien que la terre. Vlaminck bought his racing cars, and by night, in his studio, painted his violent night landscapes and haggard perspectives in the full glare of the headlights.
Meanwhile, at Le Bceuf, to a background of Charlestons, blues, and gin-fizzes, the hours from midnight to dawn saw the celebration of vitality in its most voluptuous form. How strange and crazy these times were The accounts written by Blaise Cendrars and Valery Larbaud were breaking down the frontiers. The "blue train," even though only re- cently started, became a commuter convenience, and everyone flocked to the "Pacifies" and the "Trans-Siberians.
Le Bceuf was madly up to date. After its transfer to the Rue de Penthievre, the Bceuf-sur-le- Toit was never replaced. This blend of elegance, reckless eroticism, and culture belongs only to the era. Florent Fels, one of the original witnesses, wrote: A different view of the modern world started at Le Bceuf-sur-le-Toit. It is not out of place in this book. Saint-Germain-des-Pres "You cannot bathe in the same river twice," said Heraclitus. This is borne out by the evidence that, after Montmartre and Montparnasse, Saint-Germain-des-Pres is today the chosen site for artists and intellectuals. And yet the people are still the same as are found in this Paris, full of surprises; far from being at odds with each other, past and present are good neighbors in this district, like the forty members of the Academy, called "Immortals," and the two thousand students of both sexes who are at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.
The district of Saint-Germain-des-Pres with its old man- [23] sions, antique shops, booksellers and bouquinistes on the quays, and its delightful streets, is one of the Paris districts where the atmosphere of the past has been retained best. It is easy to wander about there at leisure, and memories abound. Saint Germain himself, Bishop of Paris, was buried in near the basilica which now bears his name. Pope Alexander III consecrated the new choir in the church during the twelfth century. Three hundred years later, Henry V climbed its church steeple, casting a last glance to see whether Paris was really worth a Mass Racine dwelt on the Rue Visconti, then called the Rue des Marais, where Balzac later took up printing.
In , Ingres worked at No. It was around this period, at an hour when the kindly Corot was leaving the Rue des Beaux- Arts at dawn to reach the scene of a picture, that a pale, weary man passed him unseeingly on this street where he also lodged. That would have been the poverty-stricken and marvelous Gerard de Nerval, returning from his strange walks through the night Many of them came here and are still living here, like Dunoyer de Segonzac.
Chardin, one of the purest artists in French painting, was born on the Rue de Seine, where his father was a carpenter, and he lived and died on the Rue Princesse. It can therefore be seen that Saint-Germain-des-Pres, the intellectual capital of Paris, existed before the Liberation of Paris in And the scene was perfectly suited to its unique destiny. Its own charm, the proximity of the Latin Quarter and the Grandes Ecoles Faculties , the fact that Montparnasse was so near and that there was a tradition in literary cafes which extended from the Procope, where Verlaine was per- petually drunk, on the Rue de l'Ancienne Comedie, to the Soleil d'Or, Place Saint-Michel, where the celebrated Soirees de la Plume were held at the beginning of the century — all this added up to Saint-Germain-des-Pres.
It should be added that the fame and fortune of this area, a magic name today in the two hemispheres, are due mainly to the magnetic attrac- tion of three celebrated cafes — Les Deux Magots, the Cafe de Flore, and the Brasserie Lipp, which have been for many years friendly meeting grounds for publishers, professors, literary men, art connoisseurs, and artists.
Moreover, it should be said that at the beginning the success of this Big Three was not due to a more or less corrupt feminine presence. These cafes were mainly for men, artists and writers, and were a faithful reflection of the extraordinary calm of this provincial district in the heart of Paris. Toward the atmosphere changed, at a time when the writer and diplomat, Jean Giralidoux, took his coffee at the Cafe des Deux Magots every morning, where Andre Breton, leader of Surrealism, issued his biting manifestoes from the next table.
All exponents of modern literature, painting, architecture, and music lived, loved, worked, and drank in the shadow of the ancient church. Poets from all over the world came there to test their youth, to shake the world with their reviews, nocturnal frenzies, manifestoes, and laments The rest was made up of anybody from anywhere with nothing much to do, but the fact remains that, until , Saint-Germain-des-Pres was more or less a place for the elect. Less than ten years later this happy isle had become a sort of Mont-Saint-Michel, where French intellect and the western tourist trade were combined.
It is not our place to give a list here of all the cafes which, from the Montana to the Rhumerie Martiniquaise and from the Pergola to the Reine Blanche, offer asylum to diverse youths with highly advanced ideas, in the throes of real or simulated solitude, who are neither better nor worse than their predecessors.
Jean Clair
To quote an old saying: God looks after his own! What does it matter that Saint-Germain-des-Pres has become Saint-Germain-des-Caves cellars , and that the kings of jazz come there to flatter the foreigners visiting Paris by night, or those passing through by accident, or the reputedly dissolute intelligentsia? What does matter is, not the export brand of existentialism advertised, but the actual quality and, no doubt, the novelty of Jean Paul Sartre's works. What counts is, not the behavior — nor the abhorrent company — of a habitue of the Cafe de Flore, but the emotion aroused in him by the play at the Theatre de Vieux Colombier.
It is the degree of intimacy with which he feels the art of Nicolas de Stael, another child of this century. In reality, stripped of its nocturnal trappings, Saint-Germain-des-Pres remains a hallowed place which furnishes prodigious intellectual stimulation. Tradition is intact there, under a thousand travesties — in the bookshops, in the antique shops, in the picture galleries, to say nothing of the nearby Louvre — and it lives alongside the new order in one of the only places where such coexistence is possible, often on the same street, and sometimes in the same shop.
One feature is common to people and places: In Saint-Germain-des-Pres the air [24] breathed, the people observed, the things encountered — all combine to stimulate curiosity, which leads to culture in the most direct way. Xo doubt creative thought flows where it chooses, but it knows the right addresses! The success of the tourist trade in Saint-Germain-des-Pres is a surface element, built on age-old foundations. In a century, in ten years, Le Bar Vert or La Rose Rouge will have been forgotten, but l'Ecole des Beaux- Arts on the Rue Bonaparte will flourish as it does today, and voices will be raised in amazement when reading Cocteau, to think of the impertinent youth of certain members of the Academy circa The Seine will still inspire the passers-by and their dreams.
Time will wear itself out against Saint- Germain-des-Pres, which, through its natural situation as much as its special sort of attraction, will always be one of the essentials of French culture. Montmartre is a tavern; Montparnasse, a crossroads. Saint-Germain-des-Pres is an age-old quartier, one of the com- pass points of intelligence in Paris, and maybe even its in- tellectual capital.
The publicity surrounding its name has added nothing to its glory, which is too deeply rooted, but it has attracted youth from all over the world. With each journey over, a new course is set. Therefore, nothing is lost. Painting The Societe des Artistes Francais was founded in The famous Salon held in the Palais de l'lndustrie in the Champs Elysees was more or less the only link between artists and the public. A high court, consisting of ninety examiners who were respectfully obedient to the members of the Institut Academy of Fine Arts , carried tremendous power.
However, not a single work of any of the official "masters" of that time — Toudouze, Chartran, Blavette, Schommer, Popelin, Fournier, Pinta, Moulin, or Amedee Gibert — is remembered today, whereas in this same year, , the forty-year-old Renoir was painting one of his most radiant pictures, "Le Dejeuner des Canotiers.
This prize carried with it a twofold interest. From the master's point of view, the aim was to have successful students, which increased his reputation; for the student, winning the Prix de Rome meant being assured of an enviable and lucrative position in life. A glance at reproductions of certain pictures painted by these "masters" is enough to imagine the works of the students!
Whether they represented legendary scenes such as the in- credible "Deluge" by Commere, historical pictures such as "La Mort de Baby lone" by Rochegrosse, or "Le Salut aux Vieux Brave" by Monge, or, more simply, "La Femme Libellule" by Landelle, whether they represented religious scenes, portraits, or life studies, they all show a conventional stamp, a superficial search for effect, and a pretention to earnestness. These Academistes of the 1 s were constantly talking of tradition, but rarely have painters displayed such a total lack of understanding for the great pictorial tradition.
Diligent and solemn as they were, bent on winning ribbons and medals or honorable mentions, if they did happen to study the great masters of the past, mainly to copy them, they received no valid message, since they never consulted them other than superficially. It fell to "barbarians" such as Claude Monet, who was admiring Watteau's "Embarquement pour Cythere" at the Louvre, or Renoir, "Les Noces de Cana" which was his favorite masterpiece, and which he asked to see again before his death , and to all the others who were contemptuous of the fashionable painters, to pick up the strands of tradition, which throughout the ages has enabled succeeding generations to contribute new conquests to the fund of human knowledge.
It is recognized that Impression- ism was more than a new technique. It interpreted a special ' way of feeling, direct communion with nature, a desire for truth and spontaneity. Cezanne made no mistake when he thought that he had "repainted Poussin from nature" and, by escaping from the confusion of feelings, "he had re-established reality. With the exception of the Surrealists, modern art is entirely based on these principles, and all schools of painting find a justification in them, including the abstracts.
Neo-Impressionism, led by Seurat, is the logical continua- tion. It too tended to split up color, but tone was divided in a scientific way. Works by Seurat or Signac were painted solely in pure colors, which were separated and balanced, and which present a visual combination according to a calculated method embodying the basic principles of Neo-Impressionism. During a slightly later period, at a time when Gauguin, at Pouldu, was in search of elements for his synthesis, the painter-theorist Maurice Denis suggested, in an article in Art and Criticism which appeared in , the name of Neo-Traditionism, which was in balanced contrast to that of Neo-Impressionism.
The canvases by Gauguin, Emile Bernard, Daniel, Laval, Anquetin and Schuffenecker which were exhibited, among others, at the Cafe Volpini in , were powerfully colored and heavily outlined. It was because of this that the terms. Cloisonnism or Japanism were frequently bandied about. In these unusual works, the naivete of Breton calvaries and images d'Epinal popular colored prints were detected, to- gether with the influence of Japanese prints and Romanesque stylization. Symbolism was born from the sum of this study of synthesis. From the start of this period the diversity of temperaments supplied the critics with varying themes, while Albert Aurier and I were expounding the philosophy inherent to the new expression.
As a reaction against commonplace and petty naturalism, which imitators of the great Impressionists also exploited, we provided the conception of a picture which was a 'flat surface covered with color arranged in a certain order. As for academic art, if it survives as an episodic feature, if it does appear even in abstract art, it is no longer recognized or represented by any authoritative body.
This turning of the tables after such a long servitude was logical and necessary; it is in the order of eternally live classicism. Fauvism For knowledge of any particular thing, it is absolutely vital to know how it was brought about. How can the Symbolist phenomenon be portrayed if nothing is known of the Im- pressionism and the Neo-Impressionism that preceded it?
No thing, no person, is isolated. Odilon Redon was far from being a seer, imprisoned in his visions; he was also a connois- seur of workmanship, admiring Corot, copying Delacroix, and striving to reach Rembrandt and Diirer through the medium of Bresdin. It would be difficult to understand Cubism or Expressionism and the varying movements which have fused in the crucible of the Ecole de Paris if the spirit and aims of Fauvism were not evoked.
Fauvism was the first artistic revolution of the twentieth century. It was not a school with theories and manifestoes but a result of the fellowship of a few painters, temporarily in agreement over the principle of rapture over pure color, handed down from Van Gogh. They were all weary of the inconsistency of certain followers of Impressionism, and Cezanne's lesson had not yet been learned. Matisse, working in Gustave Moreau's studio, employed a Divisionist technique, but he soon observed that this mechanical system of breaking up hues led to a breaking up of structure, and that all that remained, in fact, was "a tactile animation comparable to the vibrations of the voice.
Thus many varied and outstanding individuals had no common denominator other than their opposition to official conventions, and certainly their not inconsiderable tempera- ments! When speaking of Fauvism, it would be unthinkable to overlook Gustave Moreau's teaching at the Ecole des Beaux- Arts; he played a great part in the liberation of many a young artist of this period. Gustave Moreau, who was himself under the influence of the Symbolists and Pre-Raphaelites, was immoderately fond of the florid style and ornamentation, which earned him a reputation as "the hanger of watch chains on Olympian Gods!
The creative spirit took precedence over technique. I believe only in what I do not see, and solely in what I feel. Only inner mood seems to me eternal and undeniably sure. The Fauves retained only the best, and were not distracted from the work of Van Gogh, which seemed to them to be definitive. Vlaminck, said by Derain to be "the most painter plus peinlre of all of us," stated: A classical painter is not one who takes up and adapts what has been well done once. The classical painter recreates the world for himself, in the same way as life is given. He does not bother about others, but about himself.
The Primitives created the world in which they lived, and they saw it through their own eyes, according to their own vision, and not from a model. The first man that I was to love was my father, and yet I never took him as a model to beget a picture — or a child. There is no model other than life; to serve is not to be a servant.
From Matisse's words, "I seek only to apply colors which reflect what I feel," it seemed clear that the supremacy of the individual, and of his sensations, was here to stay. It was on this twofold revolutionary assump- tion that Fauvism worked itself out. It has already taken its place in the history of art as one of the most dynamic move- ments in contemporary painting, and it is entirely due to this movement that live art has its place in the modern world.
But this common source of inspiration did not prevent the Cubists from thinking that the Fauves had demanded "more from color than color could give. The main point is that Cubism was a collective research in plastic creation, which brought about complete freedom in the art of painting. The Cubists were always seeking rhythms and geometrical patterns, and Apollinaire stated, "Geometry is to the plastic arts what grammar is to the writer. The spirituality of Cubist painters is evident in their state- ments.
The eye is no longer king. It should leave a goodly share to intui- tion and intellect, alternating with one another. The Cubist pictures were painted in the spirit of humility; they were, according to Gleizes, "angular, gray, and austere. During the analytical period, these neutrally toned pictures with their weak light are remarkable for their attempt at impersonality.
On the other hand, the compelling severity of forms met the rigors of a collective discipline which did not hesitate to use systematic means to become more obvious and intelligible. The Impressionists adored light; the Fauves, movement. Nothing of the sort with the Cubists. Their light did not come from the sun, but from a laboratory; it was an abstract element in the demonstration. When one considers that the aim of this quest for stability was the full expression of reality, from all its physical aspects the absolute independence of the picture-object — in contrast to existing conventions — and the viewers summoning a sym- phonic kind of appreciation as little connected to the visible as music appreciation is to reality, it must be admitted that Cu- bism will be considered, basically, one of the most remarkable modern endeavors to liberate the mind through vision.
Much has been written on Cubism and its creators. No attempt will be made here to define the creative part played by each of its founders in this collective venture, neither to scrutinize Picasso's work to find out if it "reaches beyond the normal conditions of art," nor to study the work of Braque to underline the aesthetic link between this painter and Chardin.
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The exhibition Les Createurs du Cubisme, which was or- ganized in by the Gazette des Beaux- Arts and the weekly Beaux- Arts, provided an expressive summary of Cubist activity up to The term Cubism originated with a remark by Matisse, who thought that certain landscapes painted by Braque seemed composed of "cubes. By this new expression was growing increasingly abstract. In 1, at the Salon des Indepen- dants, the first exhibition by this school grouped the works of many of its followers, joined by Delaunay and La Fresnaye, who exhibited his "Le Cuirassier.
This highly success- ful event touched off a collective awareness which was to have a bearing on a large section of modern aesthetics. The second and last exhibition of the Section d'Or was held in 3 on the Rue de la Boetie. In 19 14, war broke out Art historians agree that the Cubist movement took place between and 19 Of course this means the period of transformation and ascent; for example, some of Picasso's most perfected Cubist canvases those of the Musiciens period were painted toward At a later date, around , after [32] the Surrealist venture, Picasso reverted to a figurative form ot art which was expressive, even expressionist, and which led him to paint simultaneously the front and profile views of his faces.
And so the Cubist principles which took shape in with the prophetic "Demoiselles d'Avignon" were still as vigorous a quarter of a century later. Braque considerably softened his original style by removing a too obvious geometrical layout, static architecture, and a breaking up which was too facile; but this ex-Cubist retained the simultaneous vision of the object and its method of develop- ment on the same plane, according to a reversed concept of space.
Another Cubist is Jacques Villon, and so is Andre Lhote, the creator of a "sensitive Cubism" with ornamental tendencies. This persistence of an expression which has had a consider- able influence on fashion and the decorative arts of our time has other aspects in its favor, and is attested to by Maurice Raynal, who says: From now on art will go through periodic phases of cubism, enabling it to recapture, through a tem- porary retreat, the necessary elements of uninvolved purity, in order to fully exploit the field of artistic sensibility.
All new plastic languages evoke and lay bare the world anew, and it is known that they invite the eye not only to see "differently," but to see "something different. The aim sought after by all, which Braque summed up in the phrase, "Not to reconstitute anecdotal facts, but to con- stitute pictorial facts," seemed attained. Futurism Marinetti had already published his manifesto in Paris the previous year when he met his countrymen, the painters Carlo Carra, Umberto Boccioni, and Luigi Russolo, in Milan during the year 19 They decided to issue a second manifesto to young artists, also signed by Giacomo Balla, who lived in Rome, and by Gino Severini, who was in Paris.
The following main points are quoted: When painting a figure on a balcony, seen from the room, we do not restrict the scene to the vision afforded by the frame of the window, but endeavor to convey the visual sensations of the street in their entirety: