HH Arnason - Post Impressionism (Ch. 03)

8/17/2019 HH Arnason - Post Impressionism (Ch. 03)

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P9st-l m presson sm

o vaous nd dstcve were he reacons agnst�

the lgely sensory nature and supposed forlessnessof Impressiosm tht the English cc ger Fry, who was mong the st to tke a comprehesive look at thesedevlopments, could do no beter han s hm up) n1910, wth the vague designaion "PostpressionsmThe nadequacy of the term borne out by he fact tha,une mpressionism it did not become dy used unla qurtercenry er the rst apperce of the rtstc phenomena it purported to descbe Aong oher thigs, it plies that mpressiosm was tself a homogeneoussyle, when n fact it covered a highly dverse range ofistc sensibes. n reaiy he Postmprssionsts wereschooled mpressionism and my of them contiued torespect its exponents and shae much of ther outook

zne, fr example, who could not abide the paigsof Paul Gaugun always admired the work of MonetGaugn on the other hnd, leaned to pnt n part omhe mpressionist· Pissro ad, lke most of those i s crcle came to regard zae as an most legendary ge,even coecg his pnigs Yet both rtsts are consideredkey Postmpressionsts Despite its shortcomngs as a termPostmpressionsm has become a convenient labe for a nnovave group of ists workg in rance in he late neteenth and ealy teneth centies And it does highight he one elemet that Seurat, Czanne, Gaugu, ndV Gogh l had in commonheir determinaon tomove beyond what they regarded as he relavly passiverendering of perceptl expeience pracced by thempressioniss nd to give expression to ides ad emoons

By he 1880s nueous schisms nd ideologic derences ha surfaced withn the Imprssionist ras as hests set about orgaizing their independent exbitonsRenoir Monet, ad Degas as we have seen, were beginning to reconsider ther pntng in the light of theiown tered consiousness The- mressionss were farom mndess or unritcal porayers of bourgeois easend pastor plesures, as they_ have someimes been ced;these arsts were l vibrantly in tune with ther tmes and

capable of ighy subjecive interpretatons f their woy the 1880s, hat wod had begn to chnge rapi ways that coud ony dsess a Europe imbued wh neteenthcentuy p


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1 o Sua, A Say Aen n the Ia a Ganae 4-6 l on cana 6' 0 2 3 1 Te A Inttt ag

separated e wold of avantgarde art from that of soety

at large Whatever their df ferenes, e Postmpressiostsall broght heightened tension and exitement to art byreweightg their vales in favor of he ideal or romatcover the real, of symbol over sight, of the onepal overte perceptaL ss and less were percepon and is aslaon into art seen as an end nto emselves; raer, teybecame a means toward he lowledge of form in e servie of expressive content In arrivg at e natismthat foowed, arsts depended pon ad conterbancedte daltes of d and spirit oht d emoion

The Poetic Science of Color:Seuat and the Ne-Impressionists

Traned in he academi tradion of e Paris ole deseaxrts, Gg St (8599) was a devotee oflassical reek spre and of sh assica masters asPiero della Fransa (see g 3), Possin, and Ingres (seeg 3) He also sed e awings of Hans Hobein,Rembrandt, and Mllet, d leaned priniples of mraldesign from he academic Symbolist Pierre Pvs deChavannes (se g 33) He ely beame fascnated byteories and priples of color organizaon, whih hestdied in the wrings and painngs ofDelacroix, he texts

of te ctcs Charles Blc ad David Stter, and e s-

'" eutc eaises of MichelEgne Cheve, Ogden Rod,and Charles Henry. These researches in opts, aeshes,and color heory sdied, among oher phenomena, e

ways in whh olors affet one anoer when plaed sideby side Aordng to Chevrel, for example, eah olor

will impose its own complementary on its neighbor: redis plaed next to ble, te red wast a green nt on eble, altering it to a greesh ble,1 e e ble posesa pale orange on te red ogh he raona, scencbasis for sch theoes appeaed to Serat, he was no cold,metodcl teost His hghly personal fom of expressionevolved trogh carel expeimens wit is ra.

Worng w his yonger iend Pal Signa he soght tocombine e olor expermens of e Impressioniss thte classial sre inherited om e Renissane,employing e latest onepts f pitoral spae, ratonalillsionis perspeve deph, and reent scen dsoveres he perepton of olor and lght

t is astoshng hat Serat proded sh a body ofmasterpiees so short a fe (he ded at ry-one in adiphtea epide) is greatest work, and one of elandmarks of modern art, is A unday Aernn n theIsland fLa Grande ate (g 3.1) Known as andeae) it was the most notorios pg shown te �ast

H OSTRSSIONIS 47


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of he eight Impressonst exbons, n 1886. Seurat worked for over a year on ts monmenl pnng preparng t wth entyseven prelimnary awngs (g32 nd 1r color sketches Seurats haungly beaufl cont6 cron drawngs reveal terest n masters


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eoge Seua Sudy o au 889 onana � 8J (55 X 47 m) AlgtnoA aley Balo

scentc nd objecve of l the painters of his me is,cuoly so one of he most poetc and mysterious.

In a preparatory ol for a later painng such as the study

for C hahut (g 3.3), the color dots are so large that thegres and he spaal envromentare ssolved in color paterns hatclng to the surface of the picre The paning depicts a provocave ndacrobatc dance, then popular Parsi cfs, which Seurat beaulyorchesrates nto a series of decoraiverhyms givng form to a hencurrent heory at ascenng linesinduce feelgs of gaey n the viewerFor is magery Seuat was cleay

spred by te color posters tat were placed around Pis to advertsethe dnce halls Aroud the study fo C hahut he painted a border of multcolored strokes (as he had for

Pau Sa Op 7 Aga Ea a Bagr Ryc Ba a Ag a ,Porait f M Fx Fo 80 89 on aa 36\"(73.5 95 m Pae olleon

Grade ]ae nd he probably paned he wooden ·med he work s well Van Gogh nd Gaugn soexpressed interet the way the works were framed preferring soluons much smpler han he ornate gldedames usuay placed on ther pangs

Seuat's chief coeague and disciple was a gc(863-1935), who strcly foowed he precepts of NoImpressoism n his landscapes nd portraits Lle scolleagues, Signac regarded his revoluony arsic syleas a form of expresson pare to his radcal poicl arcsm Ts movement was closely ssociated wh otherNo-pressonists Frnce nd Belgium who believed1at oy through absolute creatve freedom cod t hepto bring about social chnge In his later gly colOrstcseascapes Signac provided a transion beeen Nompressonsm nd he Fauvism of Henr Maisse and sfolowers (see chapter 7). And through hs book, D'EugeDelarx au N-pressse ) he was lso the chef pro pagdt and stori of the movement s porrait ofthe crc Fx Fnon (g 34) who had been t s t to

us e the term NoImpressiosm) is a fascinang exmpleof the decorave formasm hat he ists arond Seatavored. The paintng h its spectacula spir backgound spired by patterns Signac had fod n a Japneset contans prvate references to he crtic's deas and tohose of the color heorst Charles enry, wth whchSignac was very fa

n the hnds of other panters� Seuats Nompressonist tecque too oen declined nto a decortveformua for use in narrave eoso1 Ts was also hefate of mpressionism; as _t graduay became acceptedand hen, much later immensey popul oughoUt he

( world, its color and it, quon subects, ra

CHAP POSTMP SSN IM 49


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croppng, and photograpc mmeacy-ally so shockngwere ll too quckl dscovered to be chamg,endering and capable of every kind of lgrizaionSeurats NoImpressioism, on the other hd, affectednot only Fauvs ad certn aspets of Cubism n the earytentieth centry but also some rt Nouveau parsand desgners

Form and Natre Pal zanne

Of a he neteenthcentry panters who mght beconsdered prophe of tenethcentry eeriment,the most sgncat was a n (18391906).zanne struggled lroughout hs life to express panthis ideas about the natre of art, ideas at were mong he most revoluony in the story of t Son of a wetodo merchant trned baker n xenProvence southern France he had to resst prenta sapproval to embarkon s caeer, but once havg won the battle unkeMonet or Gaugn he d not need to struggle for merenancial suival we view the splendid conol dserenty of hs matre panngs (o qualtes that, parculr, becae touchstones for modernst art) t is cult jto reize tat he wa an solate, socally aard man of :a soetes violent isposion Ts aspect of is chrac 'ter s evdent in soe of is early thologicl grescenes, wich were broue ther movement and excte ment At the sae me he was a seous student of the artof the pt, who sted te masters in the Louvre omPalo Veonese to Pouss to Delacrox.

Early Caree and Rlation to Impressionism

Cznes unusual cobnaon of logc and emo,of reason d ureason represented the synthesis athe sought is pnngs Outsde of Degas, themprssions\s n the 1870s lrgely abadoned adionlrawing a eort to comuicate a key vsual phenomenonthat objects in nate re not seen as separated froone anoer by deed contours· In her desire to realethe observed world tugh color wih both the objectsthemselves and he spaces beeen the rendered in tersof color itervals, they tended to desoy objects astreeimensional enes exisg threeimensionalspace Instead they recreated solds d vods as color

shapes cog wtn a lmted depth Because t idnot ale a clear distincon beteen threemensonal mass (objects) d tlreeimensional deph (spaces)Impressiois was cred as formless d nsubstantalEven enoir felt compelled to resdy the drawing of leenssance n order to recaptre some of that rm" whch Impressosm was sad to ave lost nd erat,Gaugun, and Van Gogh, each s own way, consciouslyor coscously, was seeking a kd of expression basedon, but deent o that of the mpressonists

Certainly, zannes convicton that Impressosmgnored uales of Western pang at ad been

50 R SMRSSS

important snce he Renissce prompted is oquote(and euently msnderstood) remark tlat he wanted tale of Impressiosm someg soid le the art ohe mseums" By s he cely d not mean to mtatthe old maste eze qute correcty, ·that arstlike Veronese or Pouss had created eir panings wold lat was siar to but uite disict om the wo

in whch hey livedthat ping resling o thists varous experience created a separate realty n tselIt was ts knd of reat, the reali of te paing tha was nether a rect reecion of life, lke a photographnor a copletely seprate enty whch zae sought s own work nd he felt progressvely at hs source must be nate d he obects of the world whch hved rather an stores or yhs om te past For treason he expressed is desre to do Pouss over agaom nature"

zanne rived at hs matre posion oly aer lond pain hought stdy and struggle wih hs meiumate is e, te theorecal poson that he tred texpress n s dosyncrac language w probably aceveore thugh he iscoveres he made paintg fromnature than trough his stes museums In the art ohe museum he fod corroboraon of what he areadistcively lew In fact he t of hs matre landscapeis in may ways acpated by such a early work as UnDon a a Mon wich epits hs others brohe the wite habit of he Domican order he source Manet ad Corbet are evident but the persontrevealed by the poraie forcel temperaent othe arst hmseis erent om at i he work oeiher predecessor Modeled out o te bluegrgroud n sculpted paint ld on n heav sokes wtthe paette kife, the pinng s not so much a specic portrt as a sdy of passon held in resrant It exeplezannes use of e maix of paint to create a e pictoral stucre, a charactersc of al s work

Throughout he 180s, zanne exorcised is ower conct scenes of murder and rape and, aoun1870 he attempted s own Djeuner ur 'herbe in sange heayhded vait on Manets paing es exposure to the Ipressonsts he retrned to he volence of hese essays n s ae f e (g 5), a curous recastg of he lassic theme of the bacchanal Here h

has oved away om he somber tonaliy and sculpr modeling of the 180s to an approxmaion of he lghblue, green and wite of the Impressonists Nevertheless painng s reote om Impressons n ts subjed effect he arst subdues s greens wih grays anblas d eresses obsession h the sexal ferocihe s porag that s notably ifferent from the statebacchanas of and een more ntense than he

parable scenes of ubes At is stage he is stll explornthe problem of ntegrang gres or objec ad sronng space he gures ae cely outlned, and thuest sculprlly n space However, ter broken contour


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aul Cann c 1 88 l on canas 1 1 8" 378 2 m Natona Gal o Ar anon Csomemes seemingly idependent of te cream-color areaof their esh, begin to dssolve solids nd integrate gureswith e shaped cloud that in n advancing backgroundreiterate the cnal struggles of he bacchanal

te 1880s a of Czne's ideas of natre and pinting came nto focus i a magnicent series of lndscapes

sill lfes and portris During most of s period hewas ving at lrgely isolated fr the Psian twold The ay 'aque (g 36 is today so mil

iar om countless reproductions hat i t is dcult to realize how revoluoy it was at the ime Viewed om thells above te redled hoes of e vllage ofLEstaqueand loong toward the Bay of Mrseiles the scene doesnot recede into a perspecve of ini in e Rnaissanceor Baroque mner Buldings in ·the foreground re

massed close to the spectator nd presented as simpledcubes with he side elevation bighly lit They assert theiructatng ideit bot as frontal color shapes prllel tote pictre plne and as e walls of bldgs at rightgles to t The bugs and ntervenng res re composed in ocher yellow orangered and green wi litle

dierentiaon as objects recede om he eye zeonce explined to a end that snght cnnot be "rproduced but that it must be represeted by some other

mes hat means was color He wihed to recreate narewith color eling hat awngwas a consequence of hecorrect se of color e y fr L )Eaque ) contoursare the meeng of o reas of color Since thee colorsvry substanally n vlue conrasts or in hue the edgesare perfectly dened However, he natur of the deion

tends to allow color ples to sde or "pass into oeanoer thus to join nd mY surface and deph rathern to sepaate them in he manne of tradtonl oune

awng he composion of tis paintng revelszannes niive realization tat the eye tles n a sceneboth cosecuvely and simultaeoly wit profoudimplicatons for constction of he pnng and for thetre of modern paintng

he midle dstance of The ay que is thebay itself n intense area of dense but vried blue stretchng om oe sde of the caas to the oter nd bult upof meculouly blended brushtrokes Bend his is the

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6 Pau Czan The Bay fro L'Estaque c 1885 O nva, 3 � X 3 80 06 m)Th su Ccag

crving horzontl rnge of he h n above hese, heighter soer blue of he sk wth only the fntest touchesof rose. The abrupt mer n whch e arst cuts osspace at the sdes of he pntng has he effect of denyngthe lluson of recesson n deph The blue of the bayasserts tsef even more songly thn he ochers nd res ofthe foreground wh the rest hat space becomes bohambguous d homogeneous The paning must be readsmutaneously as a panorama in deph nd as n rrangement of color shapes on the surce

Even at the end of hs lfe, Czanne never had any desreto abadon natue enrely When he spoke of "the cone,the cnder, and the sphere he was not g of thesegeometrc shapes as the end result the l absaconnto whch he wantd to anslate the lndscape or hes lfe, as has sometmes been assumed Absacon forhm was a method of sppng o the visual rrelevancesof nare n order to begn rebg he naura scene asn independent pintng Thus he end result was easlyrecogizabe m he orgina mo as photographs ofze's stes have prove, but t s essenay derent:he panng s a prallel but stnct and unque realt

Later CaeerFew arsts n stor have devoted hemselves as ntelyas zanne to the separate hemes of landscape porat

52 CAR S-MS SO NS M

and stll fe It s mporant to uderstnd that hhese subjecs nvolved smlar problems l of hem

was concerned wh he recreaon the reizaon of tscene the object, or the person The sinaton of the slfe for zanne, as for generaons of pinters before hnd aer les n the fact that its subect s conollable as nlandscape or portrait ster can possbly be n S i iak o pls (g 37) he carelly rranged the wbote nd ted basket of apples, scattered the oher appcasualy over he tablecloh and placed the plate of bsuat he ba of the table thus setg up he relatonsbeeen these elements on wch he na painng woube based The apple obsessed Czanne as a hree-imesonal form that was dcult to control as a snct objeand to assimlate into he lrger of he canvas Tattin is gol nd at the same tme to preserve he naof he nvdu objec he moduated he crculr for wh sm� at brushsokes storted the shapes, aloosened or broke he contours to set up spaa tensoamong the objecs nd un hem as color eas By tlthe wne botle out of the vercl aening and storthe perspecve of the plate or chngng he recon the tabe edge der he coh, ze was able, whmaininng he apperance of actual objects, to concetrate on the reaons nd tensons exstng among hem Roger F1 observed the sublees rough wch Czan


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Pal Canne, t Base Apps 895 Ol anas,4 X 3" (6 .9 787 ) At Instte f hago

ganed n rest "sll ournge or pmial apprehenson. However, we can coprehend that he was oneof he great constructors nd coorsts n he hstory of

pnng one of the os peneratng observers nd oneof he ost subtle nds

zne's gure ses, sch as the varous versons ofTh Card Players (g 38), rend one her assve,losed archtecre of hs pantngs of qurres. The artstbrgs great soley to ths gere subject by hs grandly

balanced coposon, by he apde of the gures who soldly occupy ther space d by scardng tl1e usulnarraves cluded n older pnngs on ths thee sucha the card-shrk subecs of Cravaggo All1ough hesers were local farhands h who the rst was

8 Paul ann, e a Pays 89-9Ol on ana, 25 32 (65 89 Th Meopolan Muse of A, w or.

�robably long acquaned here s ltle sense of parculed porratre n The Card Player

zne sualy reed on frends or faly ebers asodels, ost equenly s patent wfe, Horese Pqe,but for y i a Red Waistcat (g 39 he red a yog

9 Pal zane, By a Re Wata 88 8-95 Ol onanas, 35 X 8% 895 73 . atonal Gall of At,ashngton, D.C

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Itan boy as a model Ding a esdence n Ps beeen1888 and 890, he pnted fou poa of e seemnglymelcholy boy n the same whte st, blue cavat, andbllant ed wastcoat. Only n ths composton, howeverd he ast state s sbject ontally, to mxmzthe elxed conapposto of the boy's la toso He scenteed agant a lge swag of apey so vaegated by

patches of colo at loc hu e s ndetemnate The pang s contucted as much by ts netok of bokenes as by le all-ove tesselaton of ts at, plana sokes e same tme that the es conto foms nd endowthem h an tl(able ess, hey lso ntesectand conne om edge to edge, acoss ge nd gounae, theeby tegang he whole of the eld to a kndof asymmetcal amae smla eqlbm of volmeand ple occus n the buhwok, whee e squash,"consucve stokes ·bld p foms whle clag thesuface as a nsac paen of nslcent, pntey slabs

Ae 890 Cznne's bshsokes became lge and

moe absacy expessve, the contous moe boken andssolved, wth colo oag acoss the canvas, sstngts own dent ndependent of he objects t deedThese tendences wee to lead to he wondely fee pnngs done at he ve end of he asts lfe, of whch

Mont Sainte-ctoire Senm Les Lauves of9026 s onof e speme examples g 3) Hee e bushwokac he pat of he ndvdl muscan a supebly tegad sympho ochesa Each soke ests f y n ow ght but each s eveheless subonated to hamony of the whole Ts s both a scted nd a lycl png, one whch he at has aceved e nte

gaon of sce d colo, of nate nd png Ibelongs to geat aon of Rnssance and Boqlnscape, seen, oweve, an te accmaton ondvdal peceptons These ae lyzed by the panteto the absct components and then econsucted ntothe ne et of the png

To he end of s fe Czae held fast to hs deam oemlng Poss ae natue, conuo sgglng the poblem of how to pose classcally o heocally nd

ges open lndscape Fo he lgest canvas he ee woked znne panted Poussn had donehat om s magnato-nd eled on yes of pl

expeence to eoke Impessost fesess Th LawBathr g 3, n my ways he cnaon of t yes of expement wh e subject of female baes n notdoo setg, was pnted the yea of zes deatand s hed n t he ast subsumed te ec

10 al Czann, a au, 92 O on anas, X (48 x8 ). Colectn M Lui C Madra, Gadwyne, Pennylvana.

4 HAR MM


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3 au Can a 06 O n anva 6' 0" 8' ( .5 ). hiladhiaMm of At

emotons eressed n he earier Batt f L (see g shl see a conscious progam Gaug's pnngs, st

35) within the grandeur of is total concepon Thus the small sts olony of Pont·Aven in Bittay and wle the gures have been so formzed as to seem pt later in te South Seas In bot places the subjects he purof the oveal pictorial arcitecre the eroc potenl sued were those of the omanc adon: the exoc the now chrges he scene It can be sensed as muh in he otherworldly the myscal ts, Gaugn d the tsts gh-valted rees as he sensuous smmeg beauy who were associated with m at Pont-Aven and late at Lof e bushwok wih its nYing touches of rosy sh Poldu in Brny as we as very erent pntes ke

tones and eathy ochers scaeed houghout e delicate Oon edn d Gustave Moreau were affected by he

bluegreen haze of sk nd foliage Larg Bathrs, in its Smbost spiit maculous ntegraon of ine stucture and paitely Symbosm n teare nd the visul rts was a popufeedom of fom d colo of eye and idea provided the lf aclmovement of he late neteenth ceny a touchstone model fo Fauves nd Cubists alike, as well as rect descendat of he omtcism of the eighteenh te immedate ntecedent for such ladmak, yet dispate nd e ely neteenh cenes hat stemmed om a

pntngs as Masses Bnhur d ir (see g 76) d reacon aginst em in t nd agt mateilm inPicassos Ls Dmss d'Ann (see g 106) fe. n liteatue, its fonders were mnly poes Chrles

Visual Language of the Heartand Soul: Symbolism

he formulaon of moden t at he end of he nine

teenh centuy volved not only a sech fo new formsbut also a sech fo new content d new pincipls of

pictemakng ls seh ws meaningl n itself it was not simply a contnuaton of ouworn clichs taken omantqui rench istory o mholog t became, as we

Baudelaie and Grd de evl; he leaders at he loseof the centy were Jean Mo�s Stphane Mallmad Paul Vrlane n musc the Gema chard Wagner

was a great foce ad luence as ws Claude Debussy the outstanng rench master Baudelare had deedRomancism as "neithe a choice of subjects no exactuth, but a mode of feeing sometng fod tn

ather th outside he vidual"macy spitat,color, aspraton towad the ite Symbolism oseom the nve ideas of the Romcs it was an

A MR M 55


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appoach to n ulmate eli, a pue essence that an-scended pticul physcl expeience. The beef that the wok of t should sping :om he emotons, om the1e sprit of the atist athe han epresening obsevednatu�, dominated the atttudes of he Symbolist ss and

was to ecu contnually n the pilosopies of twentiehcentuy pessionsts, Dadiss, Suealsts, and even ofMondan and othe mes of absact at

Fo the Symbolsts he ealty of the ne idea, of therea o symbol, was pamount, but could be expessedonly obliquely, as a seies of images o nalogies out of which the nal evelaon mght emege Symbolsm ledsome poe ts nd paintes back to oganized eigion, soeto myscism and acane elgous cults, nd othes to aesthetic ceeds that wee essenlly ntelgious Durng the1880s at the moment when atss wee pusuing the ideaof e eam, Sigmund Feud was beging the siesthat wee to lead to his theoies of the sigcnce ofdeams nd e subconscous In the visual ats SymbolsmWs manfested in a divese ange of sles Pa Gaugn,one of the movement's leadng exponents, sought n hs

pinngs what he temed a "syn1esis of f and colodeived om the obsevaion of he donant element He advised a felow painte not to copy nte too mc At is n abstacon; deve hs abstacon from nate ( whle eag befoe it, but tk moe of ceatng anhe actul esult

In these satements may be found m of the conceptsof wenehcentuy expement pining, fom the ideaof colo used abtaily athe an to desbe an objectvsully, to 1e pmacy of he ceaive act, to paining asabstactn Gauguins ideas, which he cled Synthetsm,

olved a synthesis of subject and idea with fom andcoO},so that hs pnings ae given te yste) the visionayqulit, by the absact colo pattens

Symbolsm n pantngthe seach fo new foms, tinatlisic necessy, to expess a new content based onemoton (athe than ntlect o objecve obsevation, ntuition, and the idea beyond appeancemay be inte peted boay to include most of e expeimental ss who ucceeded he Impessonsts nd opposed he stcgoals The Symbolist movement, whle centeed n Fance,

was ntenatonal n scope nd had aheents n Ameica,Begium, England, nd elsewhee in E·ope These aists

had a common concen th poblems of pesonal expession and pctoal s·uctue They wee ncipated,nspre and abetted by two olde acadec mastersGustave Moreau and Pee Puvis de Chavannesd soby lon don, an ast bon nto the geneaton of eIpessioists who attained his atisic matuy much late an his exact contempoaes

Moeau ad he Fin-de-SicleGustav Moau 82698 was apponted pofesso atthe cole des BeaAts n 892 and isplayed remkable tents as a teache His sdents included He

56 TER OT�OM

Maisse and Geoges Rouault, as wel as othes who weto be dubbed the auves, o wld beasts, of ely moden pnng nspied by omanic pintes such aDelacoix, Moeaus exemplied the spit of the madusJc) n endofhecentuy tendenc towad pofounmelancholy o soul sickness, oen expessed n t anlteature though decadent and mobid subject mae

sevel composions aound 1876 Moeau ntepete

e biblical subect of Salom, he young pncess wdanced fo he stepte Heod, demnng n etun thexecuon of Sant John the Bapst The bloody head othe snt appeas in Moeaus pantg as cled foth a gotesque halucinaon (g 3.12) He conveys is sub

ject with metculous dsmanship and an obsessive pofusion of exoc detail combined with ewelke color nd ic pant texue

Moeaus spangled, languiy volupous t id mucto glamoize decadence n he fom of the fmm faal ofal womn The concept of woman as n eoc andesucive foce was fosteed by Baudels geat poemLs Flurs du Mal h Frs ofEvil 857) and e midcent pessimisc posophy of Ah Schopenhaue

Among scoes of mae tsts n the last decades of the neteent centuy, Slom fequently seved as the achetpof a ctang female who emboded l that is debased

12 Guae Morea, a, c. 87. O oncana, X 7 54 X cm Fogg rt Mueum,Harard Unie Ar Mu Cabridge Maachuet


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sexuly predatory, d perverse. The femme faae also played a cental role in the work of such composers asWagner nd Richard Srauss wters includg GustaveHaubert, Joris-Kl uysmans (who aded Moreau's panng enormously) Stphane Malarm Oscar lde,ad Marcel Proust, and a great number of arsts rangngom Rosset d Moreau to such ndeie gues as Redon, Aubrey Beadsley, Edvard Much, nd Gustav

imt Moreover, he dealy temptress hrived wel to heenteth centry, as she resurced Picassos LeDemee dAnon (see g 06), he pnngs anddaw

gs ofEgon Scele, nd he amur fu ("mad love)art of he Surealsts (see chapter 15)

Although i ui d Chavann (182498), wths simple, nive spiit, bleached colors and neararchachandlng would seem to have stood at he opposite polefrom he elaborate hothouse art of Moreau, e to panters were ake a certain acadecism and in thecurous a·acton tis hed for the youger generaon Puvis he reasons for such an anomaly can be realydisceed is l pnng Summer (g 3.13) Theallegoical subject and its nrave reaent are ghlytraonal but he orgzaion in lge at subduedcolor areas nd he maner in wich he plne of he wallis respected nd even asserted eboed a compellinguth in the minds of arss who were seaching for a newideaism in pnng ough the absact qualies of themural are particularly apparent to us today the classicl withdrawal of the gresas sl ad qet as those Piero della Francesca and Seuat nsforms them intoemblems of that er ght wich the Symbosts extoled

Symbosm paintg foud one of its eariest and most

chactersc exponents

Odon Rdon (184096), 6clled the prince of mysterious eams by he criic dnovest uysmans is sc roos were in nineteenthceny Romncism, wle s progeny ws he enethcenty Surrests Red�n felt Impressionism lacked theambig that he sought in s rt and thoug he

1 Piere uis de Cavaes, ue 89 Ol oavas, 4' " X 7 ( 5 23 ) he Clevelad Mueuo At

frequently found is subjects in he study of natre, atmes observed der he microscope, they were tnsformed in s hands into beaul or monsous fatasies

Redon stuied for a me n Pais wth he panter JeanLCon GCrme, but he was not temperaentally sited tohe rigors of acadeic ing e suered from periocdepressionwhat he clled "habitul state of melancholyand much of s ely work stems om memoesof an uhappy clhood d od Bordeaux, insouthwest France Like Seurat Redn was a great colorist

who also exceled at composing in black and white, nd hest tenty yes of his career were devoted most exclusively to monochrome dwing, etcing, and hogaphy works he referred to s his "nirs or works bla isacvity in printmakig contrbuted to the rse populiyof etcing n he 860s prompted i prt by a new appreciaon in France of Rebrandts pr ts wch Redonespecialy admired for their expressive eects of ligt andsadow don sted etcg with dolphe Bresn, asnge and soitary ast who ceated a graphic world of

meclously deted fntasy based on he work of thenorhernEuopean masters Drer d Rembrandt Redonater found a closer iniy wih he grapics of Francisco1oya the greatest prinler of e ealy nineteenthenry (see g 14) don imself became one of hemodern masters of he meum of lithography in wch heinvented a wold of reams and nightmares based not olyon he examples of past artsts but also on s close dscienc sdy of anatomy

Redn's own predlecon for fanasy nd the macabreew him natraly into the orbit of Dlacrox, Baudelairend the Romantcs is aings nd liogaphs wherehe pushed is rich vvey blacks to exteme limits ofexpression he developed nd rened he fantasies ofBresin in ghtare visions of monsters, or tracromanc thems tken from myhology or teraue Redn wasclose to the Symboist poes and was lmost the only artst who was successl in anslang heir words into visualequivlences e decated a porolio of is lihographsto Edgar lln Poe, wose works had been tanslated byBaudelre d MllarmC, and e created ree seres ofthogaphs spired by Gustave auberts Tempain fSt. Anthny a nove that acieved cult stats aongSymbolist wters ad artiss in the 880s uysmns

revewed Redn's exbitions enthusiascaly at the seme hat he was himsef mo g away om :ile Zola's

naurism and into the Symboist stream with novel oftstic decadence ains he Grain ) which he scussedat length the art of Redn and of Gustave Moreau

er 890, _Redon begn to work serously in coloramost immeatey demonstrang a capacty for exquisiteorgnal hmoies boh ol nd pastel, hat cangedthe character of s t om he macabre nd he somberto he joyous nd brlliant Gone are he nigtmarishvisios of previous decades, replaced by a new enhsiasmfor reigious nd myologica subjects Yet in Rger and

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l

1 Odon Redon a c 190 Pastel onpap o nvas 36 X 2 92 X 3 m\ Museof Moden t Yok

Anglica (g 34), the subjectthe rescue of ngelicab he hero Rger based on a Renaissnce poeme'most ncetal We cn hary decipher the o ny ges oger on a ged horselike ppogriff, at e ndngeca at right naked and chied to a ro The relost ad couds of brnt, morphous colo, where nothng is ed n space and everg is subsumed in anamosphere of overpowerng seuali

The Nave A of Hei RoseaAlthough H ussau 8190 was actuallyfour yers oler ha Paul Gaugn, nme tends to benked wh a youger generaton of atists, ncudng

Pcasso and obert Daunay, becaue of remarkabletsc crces with which he ssociated sometmes unwtngly, n Pars Though ousseau shred may formal concerns wth hs Postmpressiost contemporries such asGaugun and Seuat, he s oen regarded as a phenomenonaprt om hem for he worked n soaon aed academic painters hey abhorred and was "covereby several younger avntgrde artst. In i reecton oftaditional usosm and search for a poetc, glypersonzed magery, s work partes of concerns heldb mny Symbolist arst at the end of he century Foryounger arts however, hs work cmed wth their

58 ER 3 POMPR!OM

growing interest in "primtve twhether the pretoric or f rt of Europe or he rt of other ctures anpeoples whose works were toched by what they saw athe dead hand ofWeste acaec raditon

n 189, ouseau rered from a lme position aan inspector at a mucpl to staton i Pars. Henown as the Dounier because he was thought to hav

been a customs ispector one of many myh about self taught pnter Once he tned hs l energies tpainng, ouseau seems to have developed a nativab into a sopisticated tecque and an rc vsothat, despte ts ngenuousness, a not without aeshetsncerit or slf-awreness.

Rousseau ws a fascatng mixure of naVe, nocence, nd wsdom. Seemngly humoress he combnedstange magnaon wih a way of seeng hat was magcasrp and drect n 1886, he ebited s st paintnCarial Evning (g 35), at the Saon des Idpendnts The bla sihouettes of the ees nd hoe dra n panstakng det-he accretve approach pcy used by sef-taught pters Color roughout is lowked, as be a ght scene, but he ghted bak o: coud beneath the dark sky creates a see of cler, wntrmooight, as do the o ny gures n carva cosme

· n the foregron who glow wth an ner ght Despithe laborously worked srface ad the nve of s drawg, the st s panng wth poe and a see odreamy ureai

By 1890 Rousseau had ehbited some en pntgat he Son des Indpendant. His work had acievedcern pubc notoret due to he cotnt mockery endured n the press but it aso ncreangly excted hnterest of serous ists d such important wrters as thpoet nd paght ed Jrry n somehat lateGuaume Aponire edn had aready seen somethique in he art of Rousseau, ad drng he 1890s aders ncluded Degas, Heri de TolouseLauec even nor Depite such recogiton, ousseau nvmade a sgcnt vg om png nd spent moof is postrerement yers n desperate povert His sepori ened Ms Porait Lancap extols hgreat 889 Exposion Uversele n Paris nd shows Eel Tower, a hotar balloon a agdecked shp, nan ron bridge over the Sene he Pont ds rt In tl

oreground stnd he bearded rst dressed i blac nwth a bla beret He holds s brush d plenscrbed wth names of s past nd present veRusseau whose codence n own tlent bordered ohe deusioa, abashely presents himself as a mastof mode panng

Wh pnstakg ce nd deberaon, useacontiuay panted nd scen of Paris sl fes, potraits of his iends nd neighbors, nd etls of pltleaves, and nims His romntic psson for jgles eth strnge terror nd beau recrred in sever of hbest-known cnvases ile such subecs had precede


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in Son paintng, Rossea's opical pinngs re worldsaway from the clichd academic scenes of North Mricaor other exoc locales. Yet to the end of is fe sseacontined is nuitical adaon for the Salon pters,

prticlay for the tecnicl ish of ther works Thpng Gypsy (g 316) is one of the most entancng andagical pangs in mode art By this tme he cold

create mood throgh a few eements, broadly conceivedbt meticlosly rendered The compositon has a cri

oly abstact qity (the mndoin nd boe foretelCbist stdo pops; see gs. 07, 02, bt the tone

is overpoweringly stange and eee-a vast and lonely

landscape amg a mysterios scene In tis work, in others, Rossea expressed aites of sngenessthat were nvoced, nexpressible rather th apparent,

anciptng the stndard vocablry of the SrreaistTis painting was lost for yers ntil it was redscoveredin 92 in a col dealers shop by Lois Vaxceles, theart critc who had created the term "Faves fact, ithas been sggested that the term, meng ld beast,occrred to Vaxceles becase one of sseas jnglepantings was exbited very near the works of atsse dis colleages at the notoros 905 Son dAtomne

( se� chapter 7)

315 Hr Russau 1 6 Ol o c 46 X 35 (1 1 6 X 92 )hlph Mu f Art.

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316 Hi Russa Mod rt Nw Yrk. (

The last series panted by Rousseau, and the acme ofvision, aso present scenes of e junge. The anmls andplts he obseved in the Pas Zoo and Botc Gardenwere tansfomed in hs pgs nto scenes of ropicalmystery The setng n each is a mass of broad-leaved j·gle foge, gogous ochis exotc fruits and cuous

mas peeing out of e undebrush The max ouchscenes is The Drea of 90 usseau's last geat wokpnted not long before he ed e midst of a wilyabndnt jungle, wih its wde-eyed ions, brillant brds,pe moon d d-snned ute player, a nude womanrests congruously on a splend Victorin so usseau's chamgly simple explanaon of is improbablecreaton was that he woman on te couch reamed herselfsported to he midst of e junge

Duing his later years, Rousseau becme someg of acelebriy for the new geneaton of atists and critics Heheld egul music sores at sto 908 Picassoscoverg a portait of a woman by Rousseau at a jushop (though he no doubt new ousseaus wor already)purhased it fo ve frs d gave a lage pt for him inhs sto a p that has gone down e hstoy ofmodern pnng It was hlf tended as a joe n heocent old pinte, who too himsef so seriously as nrtst but moe an affeconate tibute to a naive man recognized to be a geus 90 he yer of his death,Rousseau's st solo exhibion was held n New Yor atAed Segitzs Galery 29 aks to e efforts of heyoung Americn painter Mx Weber see g 8 whohad befiended ousseau in Pris

60 PR OS-RE SSO S

X 2 ) Ms of

nnocence n ExperienceGgin n n Gog

Gauguil Gu (848903 was unquesonably e mpower nd uentl rtist to be assoated w

te Symbolist movement But whe he becme inmwith Symboist poets especially Mall 1d enjoher suppot Gaug epoed he literr content traditiona m of such aists as Moeau and Puvis. so ejected e opca nm of the Impressionwhile iily etaning he ainbow palette d vasty extending its potent f puely decorave effeFor Gaugu, t was an absacton to be dreamed presence of nate, not an ilustaton but a synthesnatual foms renvented imagnatvey His purpose in ang such an antRealist rt ws to expess vsible, sjectve meanngs and emoons He attempted to

hmself om he corupng sophiscaton of he modndustrial wor, nd renew his spt by contact wan nocence and sense of mste at he sought in nindustrial soiees He constanty descibed pangtems of an alog wth music, of color harmoniescolor d nes as forms of abstact expression In sehe was attracted to a greater degree even tha moshis generaon to socaled "pmve at s artnd the ogns of mode pmtvsm, the desire to crd the accumulaion ofWestern cultre and he esultindustrilization and urbizaton Gauguin trned awom ese coupt forces to what were egrded as


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eleent veues of "priiive soaees, wheher heeigios rt of Breon pesnts in orthwest Frnce or hedions of he Mori peoples in Polesi. By estbshing contct with spposely ('ncivzCd clres so he went e enlightened s cod be in toch wie priitive side of his or her own ne nd epress itrogh Of corse sch noions were forged e

hen Emopen contes were ggressively colonizng thevery sociees Wesern tiss sogh to elte sercing for the life of svge, no French ist

ved frter o e reches of Weste rbn fe nGgin He hs becoe soeies to he derient of seios considerion of rontic sybol, the

personicton of he rist s rebel gins socey eryes of wndeng rs in he erchn re hen inhe French n h seled d in 1871 to prosc bsccess ife s sockbroker in Pris· ried Dnishwon nd hd ve cilren For he nex telve yersthe ony odi his respectble borgeois existence wse ct t he beg ping rs s hobby nd enh incresng seriosness H� even nged to show pinng i te Son of 1876 nd o exhibi in foIpressios exhibions o 1879 o 1882 He lost sjob probbly de to stock-ket rsh d by 188er severl yes of fily conct nd ttepts new

srs in Ren nd openhgen, he hd lgely severedis fily es isolted hisef nd becoe iolved wihthe pressioists

Ggin hd spent e erly yers of his chihood inPer, nd he sees los lwys o hve hd noslgifor o eoic plces Ths feelig ley ystlizedin he convicion ht his slvion, nd perhps ht of

conteporry ists, ly in bndoing odern civlizon to retrn o soe sipler ore eleentl ptern offe Fro 1886 to 1891 he oved beteen Pris nd theBreton lges ofPontAven nd Le Pold wth sevenont inerde in Pn nd Mniqe in 1887 nd tepesoUs bt prodcve visit wih Vn Gogh in rese followng ye 1891 he sled for Thii, retgto Frnce for to yers in 1893 before seting te SoSes for good His nl ip, e wle of yes of ilnessnd sering ws o he islnd ofHivo in he MqessIslnds where he died in 19 03

The eliest pcre in which Ggi ly reizedhis revolony ides is Vio ar h Srmon ) pnedin 1888 in PonAven g 37) Tis stling ndpivol work pern of red ble blk, nd whie iedgeher by crvig, sios lines d depicng Breonpsts bibicl vision of Jcob resng e ngelhe innovions sed here were desined to ffec he ides

1 al Gagn, a 1 888 Oil on caas, 28% 36 7 X 92. em) atial Galryof Sca dibugh

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of yonger groups sch as the Nabis and the FauvesPerhas the greatest sgle deprtre is the rbiry seofcolor he domnatng red eld witn which te pro-tagonists sggle their forms borrowed om a Japanesert. Gaug has here consicted hs space to such extent that the dominant red of the backgrond vislytrusts itelf forward beyond he losey viewed heads of

the peasnts the foreground. hogh he brliant redhue may have been stmated b hs memory of a loca:eligos celebraon which clded reworks and bonres the es, ts inng was one of the st competestatements of color as an expressive end itsef.

From he beginnng of is ife as an rtst Gagi ddnot restrict hmself to paintng. He crved sclres marble d wood d lerned te ruments of ceramcsto become one of the most inovative ceramcists of theceny. (It is a featre of modern art in general that artistsincuding Picasso Masse and many others have beeness consined by the bondries beteen the academcdscipnes of nng and scltre or beteen socledert and cra racce, han tsts of earier post-Renissnce generatons) By the late 1880s Gaugnhad ventred to prtmking, another meium to whi4he brought his experiment genis. One of moseigmatc work made in Bttany during an especit·

318 al agn, Be in ve and W Be Hap1 9 Pant wood l, 37� X 2 W 953 X 72 mMsu of Ats, Boston

62 R -RSSS

319 al agn, Wee D We me m? Wh AeWe Wee We Gg 1 979 l on anas% 1 23 1 X 37 m Ms o Ats, Bosto

despondent erod for he arist is a wooden pane thatcarved low relief painte, and titld with the cadmonion B in Lv and Yu Wi B Happ (g 31Here a womn "whom a demon tkes by te hand the forces of temptaton symboized in pt by a sma Such themes, the strgge beteen knowledge d n�ence, good and , ife d death recr i Gaugahiti compositions Aong the faes in t relthe one wih its thmb in its moth at the pr rgis the artst mse

Gaugin as dsapoted upon hs arriva in Tahtiiscover how extesively Western missionaries and onias had enroahed pon natve life The caital ofPawas ed witl rench goveent ocials and the bl ahian women oen covere temseves in an

ength missionary dresses or was the isand led vithgenos carvgs of anent gods Gagin had opfr so he set abot mking his own dols based in tEgptan d Buddhist scptres he e\v from ographs One sh nvenon can be seen at the et ingrand phiosopical painting Whr D W Cm a Ar W r Ar W Ging? (g 319) Otelve feet (5 m) long tis is te most ambitios ag of Ggin;s career t presents a smmaon oPoynesi imagery ed wit Thitians of all ages siaat ease witn a teest paras devod o n sinErope civilizaton "ts no a canvas done e a P


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de Chavanns" Gaugn sad, wh ses fom natu appant n hs ely gslandscap tslf had hen pemny catoons etc. It s l dashed o vth th xpssv motonl sigcancp of he bush on bulap ll of knos nd wls so e s expose to he Impessosts n Ps Vanhat ts appeance s tbly og The mlpl foms Gog cangd and lghtened hs pette nded he dsand dp spaces of hs complx composion ed coveed hs deepst sngl lov n colobant umodtogth by ts ovea tonas n gn nd blue t was ulatd coloh n hs hnds took on a chaactr

hs elmntolothat he st called �'a mysteous / 1 acy ffeent fo th colo of h Impessosts·lnguag a lnguag of he eam" Even when h used mpssonst techiques he pea

Van GghWhees Gaugn was an conoclast causc n spechcyncal nient and at tims butl to ohes Vmntv g ( 18 53 90 ) was lld wh a spt of nthusasm fo s fellow atsts d ovewhlmig lov fohmnt Ths love had led hm e a shotvedexpeenc as an deal and an aempt to foow heologca stes to bcom a lay pache in a Blgn coalmng aa The he st bgn to aw n 88 e

study i Bussels h Hage and Antwep he went toas n 886 whe he met TououseLauec SatSgnac and Gaugn as we as mmbs of the ogmpessost goup

n hs ly awngs Vn Gogh vald hs oots nadonal Dutch lndscape poat and gn panngusng he same pespecve suces nd dpctng thboad elds and low-hgng sks hat sventnthcenuy asts had lovd Van Gogh neve abandonedpespecve even n lat yeas when he devloped a stlwth geat emphass on the lnea movement of pant ovthe sface of he canvas Fo hmnd s s aady

ntns of is son gav th eslt a spcc nd nvdl qalt that could neve b mstaken

Th passon i Vn Gohs at aos fom his ntenseovpoweng esponse to h wold n whch h lved ndto th pople whom he knw Hs mn obles ethough not wll destood a famos pat of hs lagethanf putaon as t devopd dung t twnicnty. Sch psodes as the ncdent n whch he slcedo pt of s a ng Gagns st hav ovshadowd a easond undstnig of hs wo Mo than any

ohe ast Van Gogh has come to tpY th g ofhe lone stgus spuned and msundstood bysoce Ts legend s only py bo out by th mocomplex ey of hs lf d wok Vn Gog may hasffeed om a neuologc isode pehaps a sevefom of plpsy hat was no doubt xacebated by physcal ilments d excessv dnkng He was pone todepesson nd sed acutely _dng sus but hepantd dung long peos of luc bgng emdous ntegnce nd magnation to hs wok H leesto hs bothe Tho n at de who d n van to da maket fo Vncents wok ae among he most movng

A OSIRSSOS 6


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k· [I

nd iormave narratives by an arst hat we have Theyreve wide knowledge o rt nd iterature, nd a hgysenstive percepon hat s ly equal to hs emoonaresponse He was shrply awre o the exaordnry eecs

he was achevng through expressve use o Glor"Instead of ryng to reproduce exacy what I have beorey eyes use color more rb·riy he rote n orderto express myselorcbly Echong he SymboliBt ideas oauguin Van ogh told The that he "was ryng to exaggerate he essenl nd to leave he obvous vague

Vn ogh could also present the darker side o existence Thus o h Nht Caf (g 20 he says: "I havered to express the teible passons o humnit by menso red and gree Nht Cafs a ghe o deepgreen ceig, blood�red wls and scordant greens oture The perspecve o the bilant yellow oor s

ted so precptously hat he contens o the roomtheaten to slide towad the vewer The esult s a terrig expeience o causophobic compression hat antcpates he Srelist exploraons o ntasc perspecivenone o whch has ever qute matched t n emove orce

Vncent vn ogh cred on the great Neherlanshtraion o porure rom hs st essays n awing tohis last se-porrs pinted a ew months beore suicde in 890 The intense SPorrait om 888 wasmade n Ales and was dedicated to augn g 21 Itormed part o n exchnge o seportrits among Vanogh's st ens to support hs noion o an ide

64 CHAP TR 3 SMSSOSM

320 Vinent vanGog e , 1 88 8 Oil oanvas 7! X 36. 889 Yale niversy tGaley, New ave

31 Vinent van Gog e 1 888 Ol on anvas4 X 20 62 X 2 ) ogg At Mse, HarvaUniversiy Art Mses, Cabidge ssasetts


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broerhood of painters. The beautlly slped head(whh Va Gogh sd resembled that of a Buddhist moc)d te soly modeled torso are shoueed agast

a vibrant eld of liner rhms painted aorng to theatst in "ple malahite. The olorsti d rhm

integraton of all prts te ael progession ofemphases om head to torso to bakground all demonsate rst superb ontol of hs plasi means "In a

piture he wrote to Theo I want to say somethg omrng as musi want to pat men d women wit atsomeng of the eteal wh te hlo used to mbolize,

ad h we seek to ge by te atual aane d vibra

ion of our olorgs The uerse ofVn Gogh is forever stated in e Sarry

Nh ( 322. Ts work w pated Je 889 atte sanatorim of St-Rmy in souern Fre wherehe had been tken aer s seond breacdon. The oloris predomly blue nd violet pulsatng wth te slangyeow of he sts. e arr Nh is both an mate d a vast ldsape seen om a high vatage point

e manner of he sxeenthenty ladsapst PieterBrueghel te Elder. n t the peae lage wi itspromnent hurh spre is a remembrane of a Duthrater than a Frenh town he geat poplar ee in thereground shudders before our eyes, we above wrlad explode a the stars ad planets of te iverse V

Gogh was igued by te idea of pnng a noturnallandsape ·om hs imagnaon Sholrs have red toexpln he ontent of e paing rough literatureastonomy and religion Though tl1e stuies have shedlight on Va Gogh's teress none has tapped a deiivesore that aouts for he astoshg impat of hispaing whh today ralcs among te most mous worksof rt ever made hen we hik of expressiom paint

g we tend to assoate with it a br brush geseising ·om he spontaneous or tive at of expressiond ndependent ofraional proesses of hought or preisetehque. The omaly of Va Goghs patngs is tl1athey ae suernatal or at least ex:asensoy experienesevoked wth a touh as metulous as though the artistwere pny d exatly opg what he s obsergbefore his eyes.

ew Generation of Pphets:The abis

Nompressonism te quasisen handlng of oloeated by Seat and Signa made its appeaane i 884en a nmber oas who were to be assoiated it mvement exbited togeter at he Groupe deststes ndpendans in Pas Later hat yea te Soitdes Arstes dpendants was orgaed tlough the

3 Vcet an Gog, e , 88_ Ol on ca, 9 X 36" (737 9 I ThMse of Moe A, ew or

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I'!.

eorts of Seurat, Henri-Emond Cross, Redon, ad others, ad was to become importnt to he advcementof erly tenethcenty rt as a exibiion foum.so importt were he exhibitons ofLes (Les Vigtor "The Twen) n Brussels Vn Gogh, Gaugui,TolouseLaurec nd Czne exibited at bo heIndpendnts nd Les . James Ensor, Hery va deVelde, ad Ja Toorop exibited regnlary at s ndits successor, Libre Eshque, whose shows becameincreasngly dominated rst by the atttdes of theNeoImpressionsts nd he by he Nabis

The Nabis, who took ther name from he Hebrewword for prophet were a somewhat eclecc grop ofss whose pncipl conibutonswit some ousdng excepionslay n a synhesizng approach to mastersof te erer geeraion, not ony to Seurat but so tone, edon, and Gaug prtcularly the last, for st theor as wel as he rect exmple of s pig

Gaugui had been affected by the ideas of his yongied mile Bernard when te two were worig together

n PontAve i the summer of 1888 He may wel havederved import lemens of sle om Berard'soon of loionnime ) a sle based o meieval end staiedglass niques, n wich at eas of

col

r

e bouded by drk emphatic contors ertny arbitrry nondescriptve color he at reasbouded by ear patters, the denil ofdepth and scptur modeingl statedby Gaugu i Viion aer te Sermon (seeg 317)were congeal to nd unialfor e Nabis as wel as for rt Nouveaudecoraon (see apter 5.

Pa Seri 863927) oe of theyoung arsts under Gaugns spel at Potve, expeienced someig of a epiphaywhe he older master ndertook to demosrate his method dug a pinng sessionin a picturesque wood lown as the Boisdmour: How do you see these reesGaugi aske hey re yellow Wel thenput down yellow nd hat shadow is raterblue Render it wh pure lrne Thosered leaves? Use vermiio This permitted hemesmeized rusier to pt a ty work o

a cigarbox lid (g 323), wich proved sodarng i form, even vergg on pure abstacion, hat e arst and s inds ought itvirly ve wi supernatural power d sothey entled he pg e aman nddubbed hemselves the Nabis The group

al Sur h Talsman cp fh Boi 'Am 1 Ol o woo cgorboxcoe, 0� [267 X 2 ) ivacolcton.

66 T ER PMRESM

cluded Sier, Maurce Deis, Pierre Br,ason, ad later risde Mailol, douard Vllrd, FValloon Ker· Xavier osel and rmand Sgin.Nabis were s of g abites, but ncluded ousning tlents Bnnard, Vuilard nd Mlol

The Nabis were smptomac of he varous iterand ethusiasms of the ed of cent mog were iterry tendencies towrd orgaized hory and eorate clebraons of mysica ritls enis ad Sruwrote extensively o the eoy of mode paintand enis was responsible for the formulaon of famous prase, a picrebefore beg a warhorsfemle nude or some necdoteis essenaly a at scovered wh colors sembled n a prtcular order TNabis sought a syhesis of all he ars tough conacit n itecrl pnng, the design of glassdecorae srees book uson, poster design, st�ge design for he advaced heater of Ibsen MauMaetelincl, Stindberg, Wde nd notably for Jarry's shocg saricl rce Ubu Roi (g Ubu)

La Revue Blane a magaine fonded n 891, becone of the cef orgas of expressio for Symbost wrad panters Nabis nd oher rss of e avatgaBnad, Vilard, eis Vallotton, nd Toouseau(who was never ocily a Nabi, lhough associated w


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the group) ,ll made posters and lltaton for ReeBanche. The magazine wa a meetng grond for expemental art and writers om every part of Eropeinclng Van de Velde Edvad Mnch Mrcel ProstAndr Gide Ibsen Stndbeg Wlde Mxim Gor andFlippo Manet.

Viad and BnnardThe Nabi prodced to painters of geni EdourdVurd (188194) and Pierre Bnnard whoe longworng live nked the at of ndeile rance temidtenteth cenuy. Both were mch adred; theirreputations however were for a long tme pvate rather�than publc. Ther wold is an intmate one consisngof corners of the studio the livng room the famiarview om the window and portats of mily and cloefend In is eay works Vullrd ued the broken pantd smal brshtroe of Seurt or Signac but wihouttheir rigorous scientc methods n oman in Blue ihChi (g 324) he portayed the Prisian apament ofThade Natanon cofounder of La Revue Banhe and mouly beautl and tlented wife Miia who isdepicted n the paintng playing wth her ece. wsoen i practice Vuillard probably ed s own photograph of the apartment as an aidemmoirewhle workngp his composton It a typal trnof-the-centry nterior sumptuosly decorated with owered wallpaper gred upholstery and oaments. n Villard's hands the

interior became a dazzlg urface pattern of mted blues reds and yellows comparable to a Persi panting in its

harmono rihness Space may be ncated by the tiltedperspecve of the chase longue and the anged folds ofthe tanng screen bt te form of the woman and cildare attened so s to be vrtally nistngushable omthe surroundng proion of patten Such qet scenesof Parii mddlecla domestcity have been clledinimite; in them the at jigsaw pzzle of coctngpatterns generate mmerg emages that eem todaw from everyday lfe an ineffable sense of tangenessand magic

Of all the Nabis i Band (1819) was thelosest to Vlrd and the to men remained friends ntlthe latter death. Like illard Bnard ived a qiet andunobtive life but whereas Vllad tayed a bachlorBonnard erly became attached to a young woman whomhe ultmately med 1925 It i he who appea n omany o his painngs a a nude bating or combng herhair or as a hado but ever-present ge eated atthe brelst table appearng at the window or boatingon_the Seine

er recevng rig both in the law and the ne!ts Bonard oon gned a reptaon maing lithographs poter and iustrated boos Hi most mportantearly nuences were te wor of Gaug d Japaneeprint The impact of e latter can be een in his adaptaion of the japone approach to te ted pac and

34 Edouard Vullard, Ble with Chd c 1 8. Oil on carboar, 1 22(8 6 X 565 m Glagow Art Gale and Mum, Kevinove

CR 3 • OSRSSIOS 67


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325 Pere Ba, Promnd of th Numds, Fz o crs, 1 8 Coor ogrp oor pe eh 54 8 [ 1 3 . 46 m e Mueum of Moer r New York

326 Pere Bar a ont j (Nud gn he Lgh), 08 i ocava 4 X 42W [ 1 24 X 10 8 m. M oyaux e eart eBelgique, ruel

68 OSR SOS


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decoraive inear rhms of his paintings. But ·om thebegnng Bnnd also evinced a love of pat texureThis led im from the relatively subdued palette ofs ealywors to the ll luosity of high-keyed color renderedin agmented brushsrokes, a development that may welowe someting to both te late works of Monet and theFauve paintngs ofMatisse

The lge folding screen menade f the Nuremaid,Frieze f Fiare (g 32) is made of fo hographs,bsed on a smarly pnted screen With i ited perspectives and abbreated, sihouetted forms, t shows Bonnadat his mostapnite and decoratve At the same tme, thegures of moher and cdren, the ee heaily caped•nses and he marcg le of acres or cariages, reveala touch of gne satie that wel caracterizes the pene·ang observation Bonnard could con1bne th a briantsimplicit of design Like is feow Nabis, Bnnardbeieved in enang barriers between the relms of poplar decoraive t d he ghart tradons of paintigand sclpte He ensioned an art of "everyday application that cold extend to fans prnts rre or in thiscase, color ithographs adapted to he format of a foptJapanese screen

In Nude agai the Lht (g. 326), Bnnard hasmoved from he pubic sphere of Psian steet to he intmate wold of he nude n a domestic interor, a subject heexploited oughout his caeer as a means to investigateligt and color Bnnad sihouetted he mod is everyouh fe Mahe, agat the sun-denched Sfacesof her boudoir Light falls trough he tall French wndows, srongly illuinatng the side of he woman uedfrom ou iew but visible he iror at le his e ofreecons to enlge and enrich he pictoal space to

stand as a picre th a pice became a comon stegy of Bnnards as well as Matisse's inteiors (see g7.8 But in its qet solemni ad complete absence ofsefcosciosness Bnnards nude is deeply indebted tohe precedent of Degass bahers even to he detil of heround tub (see g 235) ile l10se of he older rstBnnds composion is discipned and complex care

y strucred o ren he eye to the soid form of henude wich he surrods ith a mlde of texuresshapes, and colors But Bnd creates an expressivemood a on she douses herself with perme, hemodl seems lmost transed by he warm raant ightthat permeates he scene

Bards color became progessivly brighter By heme he painted Dining Rm n the Garden, in 19335(g 327 he had long since recovered the ene specn of luminous color and had learned from zannet1at color cold ction consuctively as well as sensuly.n ts ambiious cvas Bod tacled the icultproblem ofdepicting an terior scene wh a view toughhe wndow to a gaden beyond, setng he solated,geometrc forms of a tabletop sti life aganst a lush exe

ior landscape Now 1e mode, his wife Martl1e is posioned to one side an incidental and ghosly presencen is sumpous isplay By he idirtes virtallyall the great primary revoluons of twentiehcentypainng had aeady occurred, incuding Fauism wih itrbitrary, expressve color, and Cubism with is reorgizaton of Renaissce pictoal space Moreover, paintinghad fo1d it way to pue abstaction in varous formserfecly aware of l s, Bnard w nonetheless content to go is

way e work seen here, for nstnce,

here is evdence hat he had looked cosy at Fauve and

3 Pire oarDnng Rm n eGard 134-3.Ol o v 50 X53; ( 273 X1 3. m) SoomoR GugghmMeum w Yk.

3 , OSTRSOI 69


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I

,:l,i

, I

Cubist pntngs, pcully the works of Masse-whowas a devoted admer of isd had used what hewanted of the new approaches thout at any me changing s basc attdes

lse·ateloughHe de Te (86490 maybe seen as the her of Daier in the eld of prinmaghe also served, along ih s contemporries Gauginand Vn Gogh, as one of the prncpl bridges beweennneteenthcentry avantgarde pnng and the earlywentiethceny expermens of Edvd Munch PabloPcasso, d Hei Masse Lurec as nterested n Goaand the ine angs of ngres but he was above ll a passionate isciple of egas bo n s admiraton of Degs'sdrsmnship nd in the sengaged aide and clculated forml sateges he brought to the depicon of hs ·ote subjectshe theaters, brohs nd bohencabares of Pis

70 A OTMR M

Due to yers ofnbreeding n is old stocrac fayLauec was permanently isgured from a congetisease hat welened his bones Aganst is fmil'wishes he psued t as a professon e recevng neducaion in he private Parisian stuos of Lon Boad Fernand Cormon pters who provded sudenih a more open nd tolernt aosphere han hat foun

in e cole des Beauxs In Cormn's sdo auemet Bernard d Vn Gogh both of whom he renderen erly portrits

auec is best lown for his colo thogrphs in h80s of performers in Montmarre dnce hs but in hprevous decade he d proved se to be a sensivporrast ih pintings and rawings of a colorl csof characters nclug Cmen Gauin the wom porayed in «A Monouge»osa Rouge g 32 harist was awn to he simple clohes, ur red hr toug} loo of is young worngclass wom who armdngg informally, averts her face as she is momentil

328 Henri d eac, "A e e 886-l caa, 8¥ X19W 24 X 48 em

e Bane ndatMn nnlana


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329 en e TulueLaue M R-L G 1 8 1 . llhgap, 6'3" 4' 1 X 1 m Vcta a Alber Meum nn

souttd aganst t gtd wndow Laut atss smpld omposon out o s caatsllylong soks o oo n wm subdud tonas. But t

somb mood o t panng as also to do wt tssubjt aut's pnng was nspd by a gusomsong wrttn by boman nd, t nous abatsng Astd Buant about a post wo onsprs tokl clnts

natualsm o Laut's aly potats gav way nt 180s to t bgtly olod and slzd woks tatmal nam synonymous wt totntuy

Pas s lst tograp post, dsgnd o tnotoous dan al ad t Mon Roug (g 32),ats t sandalous tants o a Goulu (th gdy

on) a dan nownd o gymntc and ontptaons o t chahut h dan tat ad aatdSuat n 1889 (s g ) Laur's supb gap sn-sblty s appant n yatng saps tat, albtabbvatd, w sult o ong obsvaon Tsnappy cuvs and sp soutts w bon o n AtNouau as (s apt 5) that domnatd t atsaoss Eop at t m

Documents

HH Arnason - Post Impressionism (Ch. 03)