During our recent C4C trip to Paris, we were able to view the historic retrospective exhibition being held from March 29^th to July 23^rd at the Louvre Museum featuring 180 works by one of the titans of French painting—Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863). The last major retrospective was held in Paris in 1963 on the 100^th anniversary of the painter’s death. 

While Delacroix is universally celebrated as the leading proponent of the “Romanticism” movement of the 1800’s this exhibition does not focus on the age-old debates about the competing 19^th century “isms” and how his work did or did not qualify as “romantic,” but rather, invites the viewer to learn more about the artists’ character, his multi-faceted interests and the inspirations behind his successful 40-year career. 

Two of the most striking observations about his character and interests are that he was extremely ambitious, entrepreneurial and successful at a young age and was a dedicated writer as well as painter. Writing was a regular activity for him as he wrote brilliant letters to friends, penned articles attacking art critics and wrote the “Journal” that was an important account of himself and his life. The writings of others were also strong influences on him and his work, including Byron, Goethe and Shakespeare (with the latter two being the sources of many lithographs produced by Delacroix in the late 1820’s). Indeed, rather than surrounding himself with his fellow artists, Delacroix’ passion for literature as well as music lead him to develop relationships with writers such as Alexandre Dumas and George Sand and the composer Frederic Chopin. And while he preferred the company of such friends, Delacroix also appreciated the importance of cultivating relationships that would further his career which is why he frequented salons and was even a member of the Paris City Council.

As the youngest child of a bourgeois family of the Napoleonic empire (his father was an ambassador and prefect and his brother, a general and baron) that was financially ruined and left him an orphan at the age of 17, Delacroix had a driving need for fame and glory which he sought to achieve through his painting. In his youth, at the age of 26, he achieved acclaim for his masterful contemporary history painting, The Massacre at Chios (1821 Greek revolt against Ottoman Empire occupation), which Delacroix painted in 1824 and exhibited in the Salon that year (building on the earlier success of The Barque of Dante exhibited in the Salon of 1822). And nearly two centuries later, when the 21^st century viewer stands in front of this monumental (4 meters in height) breathtaking depiction of the massacre of twenty thousand men, women and children, it is no wonder that the work received so much attention and praise by writers of the day such as Baudelaire who was so moved by its powerful portrayal of the barbarism of man. 

Having established himself as a prominent and successful French painter, Delacroix turned his attention away from history paintings. Inspired by the landscapes of John Constable and portraits by Thomas Lawrence, in 1825, he traveled to England and thereafter began experimenting with compositions that combined the lesser painting genres such as portraits or still life with a landscape as well as animal scenes that were given the gravitas of a portrait such as Young Tiger Playing with its Mother. 

In 1827, having achieved so much success, and inspired by Lord Byron’s poem of 1821 about the slaying of all of the possessions (wives, pages, horses and dogs) of the Assyrian King Sardanapalus prior to his own suicide, Delacroix abandoned any need to embrace classical and moral conventions and focused on the surface (gleaming skin and shimmering fabrics) of the canvas rather than its structure and anatomical accuracy by painting The Death of Sardanapalus. While the drama, emotion and opulence of the painting firmly established Delacroix as a “romantic” painter, the writhing orgiastic figures were considered scandalous and were subsequently rejected by the Salon.

After his successful iconic painting of the more acceptable Liberty Leading the People (shown above on opening wall of exhibition and hung in the Salon of 1831) which depicted the 1830 revolt by the people of Paris, Delacroix sought new inspiration during his 1832 travels to Morocco. There, he became enthralled with the colorful and exotic scenes of contemporary Moroccan society that were more akin to reenactments of classical history than the urban scenes that were now becoming the subject of the realist movement in France. Unlike The Death of Sardanapalus, as noted in this exhibition, with works such as the Women of Algiers in their Apartment, which he exhibited at the Salon of 1834, Delacroix was “able to explore the decorative force of his painting without depending on drama and passion.” 

Indeed, seeing so many of these Moroccan inspired decorative works in one exhibition was noteworthy. It was also interesting to examine his albums of drawings and notes which inspired Delacroix to paint over 72 paintings based on Morocco over the remainder of his life.

In conclusion, the exhibit curators summarized: “Delacroix’s oeuvre, which retained its coherence despite its successive changes, seems best defined by a quest for singularity and a belief in the expressive power of painting, rather than by the elusive term ‘Romanticism’.”

Shannon Robinson is the curator and chairperson of the biannual exhibition Windows to the Divine and the annual events by Collectors for Connoisseurship (most recently April 12-14, 2018 in Denver and May 23-26 in Paris).

More about Shannon…

While many Western art enthusiasts of the works of Vincent Van Gogh are well aware of the artist’s fascination with the art and culture of Japan, and the particular clamor for all things Japanese that was the rage in Paris in the late 18^th century (“Japonisme”), we may not be aware of the ongoing love affair by the Japanese for all things Van Gogh.  This past week, on the day before the exhibition closed in Tokyo, I found myself sandwiched in a crowd of hundreds of Japanese museum goers waiting patiently for admission to the Van Gogh & Japan exhibition staged at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The ambitious exhibition not only included 40 works by Van Gogh on loan from private collections and museums (Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam made key loans such as well-known works, The Sower (1888) and The Bedroom (1888)), but also included some of Van Gogh’s ukiyo-e prints from his own collection which make evident the Japanese influence on Van Gogh’s work (notably his cropping of images, lack of horizon, use of diagonals and strong colors and reverence for the importance of nature and its spirituality) as seen in the exhibition work, Les Alyscamps shown below.

Notably, the exhibition contained many passionate quotations by Van Gogh regarding his keen admiration of the Japanese approach to art and life equating the culture to an artistic utopia particularly with respect to its fraternity amongst artists (which he sought unsuccessfully to replicate in Arles with artists such as Gauguin). Ironically, although Van Gogh never traveled to his beloved Japan, it would be the Japanese who would make pilgrimages to Arles (as evidenced by the guestbooks filled with the names of Japanese artists who visited the home of Paul Gachet Jr., the son of Van Gogh’s doctor that were on loan from the Musée Guimet in Paris) and whose works as shown in the exhibition would be so influenced by Van Gogh.

If you missed it and will be in Europe this Spring, the exhibition will travel to the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam for its final showing from March 23^rd to June 24^th.

 

Shannon Robinson is the curator and chairperson of the biennial exhibition Windows to the Divine (April 12-18, 2018) and the C4C Arts Weekends (Denver April 12-14 and Paris May 23-26 of 2018). More about Shannon…

In our ongoing series of reviews of exhibitions around the world that we personally visit, we move from the retrospective of the abstract works of Agnes Martin at LACMA in California last year to a century earlier and a retrospective in Spain of Pierre Auguste Renoir.  You may recall that the presence of such artist’s works in acclaimed museum collections such as the Norton Simon, BFA and the Met were the subject of protests in the U.S. in 2015 with organizers calling his work “aesthetic terrorism” (See FB Oct 17, 2015 post).

Despite such objections, it appears that the artist’s reputation and popularity remain alive and well as evidenced by the success of the first retrospective exhibition held in Spain of his work, entitled Renoir: Intimacy that just closed at the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid and has moved on to the Museu de Bellas Artes de Bilbao from Feb 7 to May 15 2017.

While most of us associate Renoir with outdoor group scenes of frolicking Parisians, this survey exhibition of 78 works from public and private collections around the world presents a wide range of genres ranging from portraits, nudes, still life to landscape.

As indicated by the theme and title, the retrospective emphasizes the artist’s compelling sense of intimacy produced not only via subject, setting and technique (emphasis on physical proximity with close-ups of the model), but notably through Renoir’s focus on the tactile sensation created by his use of volume, material and texture.

And while Renoir’s fleshy nudes of his later period continue to be the subject of controversy amongst critics, and others have disparaged his many portraits of women as saccharine, even the doubters have to admire the serious tenor, dignified beauty and impressive technique of the exhibit’s lesser known realist portraits of his earlier periods such as the Portrait of Marie-Zelie LaPorte seen here.

Interestingly, there are also a number of portraits of Renoir’s family members and domestic servants that provide intimate insights into the painter’s personal life and influences.

Perhaps, the most surprising and refreshing body of works were the small landscapes of France and Italy painted by Renoir as a means of escaping the stresses of executing figurative works that were the overwhelming mainstay of his oeuvre. With landscapes, Renoir could experiment freely with color and his creative techniques.

More importantly, consistent with the intent of the exhibit curators and organizers, the retrospective invites the viewer to not only appreciate the visual elements of Renoir’s work, but to savor the sensory delights presented by room after room of works that bombard all of the senses from sight to touch to sound. Indeed, the exhibit culminates in an installation that includes a sound track coupled with a reproduction in relief of a landscape (Woman with a Parasol in a Garden) that beckons the viewer to touch the painting and experience its textures and smell the array of flowers depicted there in the garden (fragrances are contained in various containers) while listening to the breeze and buzzing of bees and children’s voices contained in the audio guide.

Although there is no substitute for seeing the exhibition in person which I was thrilled to do during my recent trip to Spain, take a few minutes and enjoy the museum’s virtual tour or consider taking that trip to Barcelona that you have been contemplating!

Shannon Robinson is the curator and chairperson of the biannual exhibition Windows to the Divine and the annual symposia by Collectors for Connoisseurship (Oct 13-15, 2017 in NYC).

More about Shannon…

With the approach of our 2016 symposium and exhibition Abstraction & Representation: Finding Common Ground (Nov 17-Dec 3) at Space Gallery, we wanted to encourage our artists and collectors to learn more about Agnes Martin (1912-2004), one of the pioneers of abstraction.  Martin’s legacy is explored in a wide ranging retrospective organized by Tate Modern in collaboration with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Dusseldorf and Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, New York.  The Agnes Martin Exhibition is the first retrospective of Martin’s work in the U.S. since 1992 and was presented at LACMA this year from April to September.  For those who missed this extraordinary exhibition, it can be seen at the Guggenheim in NYC from Oct 7-Jan 11, 2017.

From her earlier biomorphic abstraction to the grids and striped canvases that made her famous, in room after room the viewer experiences her strong yet delicate and restrained works in which she sought to instill “beauty, innocence and happiness.” LACMA Exhibition Advisory. In the 1960’s, her groundbreaking grid paintings employing gently inscribed pencil grid lines onto monochromatic surfaces became a bridge between Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism.

Martin withdrew from the art world from 1967-1973 settling in a remote mesa of New Mexico, but returned to painting in 1974. Influenced by the desert landscape, for the next 30 years, Martin would refine her aesthetic employing “six-foot square canvases marked by bands or stripes of acrylic wash finely outlined in graphite.” LACMA Exhibition Advisory.

Indeed, Martin’s works are so fine and subtle that they simply must be viewed in person so if you are headed to NYC in the coming months, be sure to stop in at the Guggenheim.

Shannon Robinson is the curator and chairperson of the national biennial exhibition Windows to the Divine (Nov 17-Dec 3, 2016) and the annual symposia sponsored by Collectors for Connoisseurship (2015 Denver Art Museum; 2016 Space Gallery; 2017 NYC).

More about Shannon…