Robert Hughes' Strange Memoir

This would have to be one of the strangest books I’ve ever read, which might explain why I couldn’t find it on the inter library loan system.  The strangeness is highlighted by the fact that the story ends in 1970 when Hughes jets off to the US to become art critic for Time Magazine.  One would have thought that 513 pages would have been sufficient to cover his entire life, rich and varied as it was, but no.  Perhaps there was meant to be a second edition, although he completed this one six years before his death.

Robert Hughes (The Guardian)

Those who remember the Australian art critic and writer Robert Hughes (1938 - 2012) will recognize the irony in the title “Robert Hughes - Things I Didn’t Know”. He was known for his forthright, even rambunctious views on just about everything.  But the book begins with a harrowing account of his near fatal car crash in the north of Western Australia in 1999.  It seems we had a different Robert Hughes, physically and in other respects after that episode. 

He had a Catholic upbringing and was educated at a strict Jesuit boarding school. For mine, he banters on for far too long about his early life.  His distant father whom he clearly idolised was a World War One fighter pilot and later became a solicitor before dying when Robert was only 12.  Hughes was the youngest of four by far and his father’s death affected him greatly.  Although he rambles on and on about his father’s wartime experiences, Hughes does come up with some interesting anecdotes.  Such as Allied high command’s point blank refusal to issue its pilots with parachutes, for the dubious reason that such safety devices would reduce the fighting spirit of the pilots and give them an easy way out.  “This appalling callousness condemned many pilots to be roasted alive, thousands of feet in the air, as their stricken little planes spiraled helplessly to earth…”  Apparently, some pilots chose to simply bail out without parachutes - who could blame them.

Riverview St Ignatius College, Sydney

The eloquence of Hughes’ writing is evident in his summation of the futility of WW1 and the contrast to the objectives of WW2.  “Hitler had to be stopped, and  his defeat did save the human race from unimaginably worse  slaughters.  No such historical necessity excused the deaths of millions of boys in 1914-18.  Because of the killing by a Serbian terrorist of an Austrian archduke whose life wasn’t worth a jackeroo’s finger, because of the ineptitude of Europe’s civil and military leaders and the indifference of old men (including British Prime Minister Lloyd George - I believe) to the fate of the young, they were sucked into the immense vortex of the most vilely useless mass conflict in modern history…” 

Hughes found life in the Jesuit boarding school, Riverview in Sydney, repressive and beatings were common.  However he heaps great praise on Father Wallace who was the headmaster and who allowed Hughes access to books that were outside the limited curriculum of the college.  Father Wallace paved the way to Hughes becoming a fully articulate writer.

As Hughes tells the story, he attained the role of art critic almost by accident.  His predecessor at The Observer in Sydney was sacked after being critical of an exhibition which, as it turned out, he hadn’t seen.  Hughes was an illustrator for the magazine and that was good enough for the editor, the celebrated social commentator Donald Horne.  But as Hughes explained, there was very little art in Australia in the late 1950’s and early ‘60s to be critiquing.  He also briefly wrote criticism for, and contributed cartoons to The Mirror, until Rupert Murdoch took it over and slashed his wages.

Ian Fairweather on Bribie Island c 1966 (Art Gallery of New South Wales)

One of his more amusing anecdotes involved a trip with the artist Jon Molvig to visit the “sage of Bribie Island”, Ian Fairweather.  The trip was hair raising enough due to Molvig’s heavy drinking, but upon arrival they discovered Fairweather in a disheveled state, his front teeth were missing, one foot was wrapped in rags after he’d been bitten by a goanna and he was living in leaky Balinese huts.  It was obvious to Hughes and Molvig that the foot was gangrenous and they had to almost drag him to the mainland for treatment. 

So appalled was Fairweather’s Sydney dealer with the state of his paintings, she sent him a roll of the finest Belgian flax canvas which would have cost a fortune.  Fairweather used the canvas to plug holes in his hut and went on painting on damp cardboard with house paint.

Hughes never felt comfortable in the Australia of his youth.  He disliked the bush and the beach - inside a house, or even better a cafe seemed to be his natural habitat.  Eventually he realised that he had to head off overseas.   He left for Europe in 1964. 

Thanks to contacts he developed with the likes of renowned Australian author Alan Moorehead and art historian Herbert Read, Hughes began his writing career.  He is particularly indebted to Moorehead, having spent some time living with him and his wife in Italy.  He writes at great length about the impact Italian culture had on him (particularly the gardens of Bomarzo), which he was able to enjoy before these sites were “wrecked” by tourism.  But he believes that his years in central Italy, being exposed to great religious art, had transformed him from a guilt ridden, young ex-catholic who was haunted by the critical gaze of strongly catholic family into a relatively guilt free agnostic - more at ease with the world. 

So he left for London and soon found work there, contributing to the Sunday Times and later the Sunday Telegraph.  He was scathing of the youth underground of the sixties in London which he claimed was based on spontaneous  hedonism, the joy of marijuana, spontaneous and uncommitted sex, and culturally illiterate, ignorant of most things older than itself.  And it was within this milieu that Hughes met his future wife, Danne Emerson.

Danne Emerson (xwhos.com)

The marriage was a disaster.  Emerson was also an expat Australian with a Catholic upbringing. Shortly after the birth of their son Danton, Danne announced that she was going to ‘find her own fucks’ and suggested the Hughes do the same.  “If there was ever a misalliance between two emotionally hypercharged and wolfishly immature people. It was our marriage.  I was as unsuited to her as she was to me.  I could no more fulfull or even predict her needs than she could mine.” 

He blames his Catholic upbringing for lacking the courage to end the marriage, at least until 1981.  He said it was like being trapped in the hull of an upturned boat, running out of oxygen yet lacking the courage to dive deeper and escape to the surface.  He claims she contracted the clap from Jimi Hendrix before passing it on to him.  But Hughes’ own track record wasn’t spotless and this was another reason for his reluctance to file for divorce - fear that Danton might become a ward of the courts. 

He is scathing of Brett Whiteley who, he suspected, introduced Danne to harder drugs which was the final nail in the marriage coffin.  He found a drug-free Whiteley to be delightful company but “The shame of addiction…is apt to make junkies into missionaries.  They like, and need, to drag others down with them.  Such aggression compensates for their own weakness and dependency with drugs.” 

Hughes describes Whiteley as a cultural mascot for the semi-cultivated, a disciple (supposedly) of Zen Buddhism who overdosed in a lonely motel room south of Sydney.  Danton died by suicide in 2001 with Hughes once claiming that they hardly knew one another.  Danne died in 2003 from a brain tumor.

The Interior of the Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence (The Guardian)

One of the most significant experiences of Hughes’ life was when he reported on the devastating Florence floods of November 1966 for BBC2.  The flood laid waste to much of the rich cultural heritage of Florence and imbued in Hughes an even greater reverence for art of the past and an antipathy for those of the avant-garde who regard the past as repressive and a dead weight that ‘new’ art had to shake off.  He acknowledges that culture does change but the idea that it can reinvent itself, like a snake shedding its skin is naïve.  He is regarded by some as a cultural conservative. 

Perhaps it was his enquiring, encyclopedic mind that prevented Hughes from reigning in his story to one volume, but it’s worth a read nevertheless.

Giacomo Balla - Futurist Artist

The Futurists, as their name implies, wanted to focus on creating a unique and dynamic vision of the future with artists incorporating images of urban landscapes and modern machinery into their work including trains, cars and aeroplanes.  Their work encompassed a variety of artforms including painting, sculpture, architecture, theatre and music with an emphasis on violence, speed and the working classes.  The movement was in effect a celebration of the machine age, with a deliberately provocative tone. 

The Futurists were based primarily in Italy and were lead by the charismatic poet Filippo Marinetti who produced in 1908 the manifesto below;

“We want to fight ferociously against the fanatical, unconscious and snobbish religion of the past, which is nourished by the evil influence of museums.  We rebel against the supine admiration of old canvases, old statues and old objects, and against the enthusiasm for all that is worm-eaten, dirty and corroded by time; we believe that the common contempt for everything young, new and palpitating with life is unjust and criminal.”

Dynamism Of A Dog On A Leash, 1912, oil on canvas, 90 cm 110 cm

The movement was at it’s most active in the years 1909-14 and influenced the thinking of some artists in Britain (hence the Vorticists).  The depiction of movement or dynamism lay at the heart of much Futurist work, and artists developed some novel techniques to express speed and motion including blurring, repetition, and the use of lines of force.  And here, they adopted methods employed by the cubists.  This brings me to the work of Giacomo Balla.   

Balla was born in Turin in 1871 and is thought to have had little formal training in art.  He moved to Rome in his early 20s and gradually came under the influence of Marinetti.  Unlike most Futurists though, Balla was a lyrical painter and seemed less concerned with modern machines or violence.  His 1909 painting “Street Light - A Study of Light” is a dynamic depiction of light.  Futurism’s fascination with the urgency and energy of modern life is evident in this work.

Street Light, 1909, oil on canvas, 175 cm x 115 cm

In 1912 Balla produced “Dynamism Of A Dog On A Leash”, a playful exploration in the depiction of movement.  The influence of cubism is thought to be evident in this painting.  Reference has also been made to the principle of simultaneity in this work, that is; the rendering of motion by simultaneously showing many aspects of a moving object.  

During the First World War, Balla produced a number of abstract works in which he further explored the depiction of speed through the use of planes of colour.  These paintings are the most abstract of any produced by the futurists.  The exploration into the optical possibilities of photo-scientific research carried out by Eadweard Muybridge and others were also thought to be influential in the work of Balla.  This research gave Balla the opportunity to study the true nature of movement.  The French impressionist Edgar Degas was also heavily influenced by Muybridge’s work.

Abstract Speed & Sound, 1914, oil on board, 55 cm x 77 cm

The horrors of the First World War saw many artists turn away from the ideals of Futurism.  In his series “A History Of British Art” the art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon makes reference to the ‘machine gun’ philosophizing of the Vorticists and their joyful celebration of 20th Century technology.  He believes this worshiping of the modern and the streamlined was eventually to be seen as a hollow pose due to WW1.  “How can you celebrate technology when in war it can so effortlessly turn the human face into a bloodied abstract.”

Abstract Speed - The Car Has Passed, 1913, oil on canvas, 50 cm x 65 cm

The Futurist artists Umberto Boccioni and Antonio Sant’Elia both died in military service during WW1 and the influence of Futurism as a force in contemporary art waned after the conflict.  However, Balla remained true to the early principals of Futurism (without the violence) and later in his career returned to more figurative work.  He also designed futurist furniture and “anti-neutral” clothing.  He died in 1958.

References; 

The Art Story

A History of British Art - BBC TV

Brittanica.com

Wikipedia

The Photography Of Max Dupain

A major upcoming exhibition of photography at the National Gallery of Victoria brings to mind one of Australia’s most revered photographers - Max Dupain (1911 - 1992).  

Dupain produced in 1938 one of the most iconic images of 20th Century Australian photography - The Sunbaker.  It was in the 1970’s that this image really came to prominence as it was thought to represent an image of a carefree, post Vietnam War, beach loving society which gave it a social context.  There was much discussion at the time of the notion of an Australian identity - what is was to be Australian.  Apparently, Dupain regarded the image as just a holiday snap shot and he became increasingly uncomfortable with how the average viewer might add their interpretations to the image.

The Sunbaker, 1938

There is more than one version of this image, taken by Dupain at Culburra, south of Sydney.  Perhaps one of the ironies of The Sunbaker is that the subject is an English migrant, Harold Salvage who was a close friend of Dupain’s.  A print of the photograph was purchased by the National Gallery of Australia in 1976. 

Sunbaker inspired artist Julie Rrap to produce her own interpretation of the image in bronze and steel.  Believing Australia to no longer be the casual, fun loving place it was once perceived to be, she decided on trying to imagine the pose from underneath, as if the model is lying on a sheet of perspex, in order to explore the underbelly of society.

Julie Rrap, Speechless, 2017 bronze & steel (Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery)

Dupain received his first camera at the age of 12 and later joined the Photographic Society of New South Wales.  After serving in the second world war, his objectives in photography changed and he aimed to achieve a documentary truth in his image making.  He claimed that he wanted to abandon the "cosmetic lie of fashion photography or advertising illustration".

Impassioned Clay, 1936, double exposure, (National Gallery of Victoria)

Dupain embraced almost all genres in his photography - portraits, nudes, still life and later in his career, architecture including images of the Sydney Opera House under construction.  He only ever photographed in black and white, believing that this enabled him to achieve a simplicity and directness, in addition to allowing the viewer to add their own interpretation.

Collins Street Melbourne, 1946

Shortly before his death in 1992, Dupain bequeathed to his longtime studio manager and photographer Jill White, 28000 exhibition archive negatives for use by her.  Dupain was appointed an OBE in the 1982 New Years Honours list and 10 years later was made a Companion of the Order of Australia.

Australia Square Through A Keyhole, 1975

References; 

The Guardian

Wikipedia

www.maxdupain.com.au

YouTube - ABC News

The Salvator Mundi - Art World Insanity

I’ve heard of rampant inflation, but this is insane.  How can a painting explode in value from $1175 in 2005 to $450 million in the space of 12 years?  It’s a story of greed and power that has captivated many in the art world including critic Ben Lewis, who wrote a book on the subject called “The Last Leonardo - The Secret Lives of the World’s Most Expensive Painting”.  It’s basically a biography of a painting.  A feature length documentary has also been produced on the subject. 

The painting in question is ‘Salvator Mundi’, thought to have been the work of Leonardo da Vinci.  Or is it?  Concerns over the authenticity of the painting revolve around a number of areas - including the state it was in after centuries of overpainting was removed during a recent restoration.  It’s thought that such is the extent of the restoration that little of it now bears the hand of the master.

Salvator Mundi, c.1500, Oil on board, 65.6 cm x 45.4 cm

Another concern about the painting’s authenticity relates to its provenance.  In his book, Lewis writes of the limitations that investigations into the provenance of paintings produced prior to the 19th Century can have.  “The result is that provenance histories for works of art from before the 19th century are frequently assembled from a range of probabilities, which reinforce each other. Such structures can be precarious, wobbling between the likely and the hypothetical. The evidence is often circumstantial…”  He writes of the tendency to meld fact with fantasy. 

Like many artists of his day (and even some today), Leonardo had a studio where he employed assistants and it’s not clear if the Salvator Mundi is an ‘autographed Leonardo’ - that is; designed and painted by him, or a ‘Leonardo plus workshop’ where an assistant painted it, perhaps under the guidance of the master. The problem is that there is a huge price differential between the two possibilities.  And to complicate matters further, there is thought to be at least 20 copies of the painting floating around the world. 

Leonardo was a celebrity by the time the Salvator Mundi was produced, and yet there is almost no documentation from the time indicating that he painted it.  Which is unlike almost anything else he produced, no hype, no mention of it in his notebooks.  According to Lewis, the greatest Leonardo experts in the world are divided over this painting which makes it such a fascinating topic.

After the overpainting had been removed by Dianne Modestini

It’s beyond the scope of this blog to trace the history of this painting, murky as it is, but in 1908 it appears in a photograph at the Cook Collection in poor condition, heavily overpainted.  The painting remains in the collection until 1958 when the Cook family hold an auction and whilst every major art dealer in Europe is in attendance, no one buys the Salvator Mundi.  That is, until an American couple who were travelling through the UK purchase it for 45 pounds before returning to the US on a cargo ship. 

The painting remains in their household in New Orleans for nearly 50 years, during which time the couple die and a relative decides to sell their collection of paintings.  A representative of Christies visits the home and ignores the painting which is eventually sold at a “forth division auction house” in 2005 to two New Orleans art dealers, Alex Parish and Robert Simon, for $1175.  They later claimed they spent $10,000 because they wanted to give the painting more credibility. 

And here the story becomes really intriguing.  Although the painting was in poor condition, it was the depiction of Christ’s hand that convinced them that it was worth restoring.  So they took the painting to one of America’s foremost restorers Dianne Modestini to weave her magic.  After removing all the overpainting the picture appeared as above.  A large crack that leads down to a knot appears in the painting and this is another argument used by those who question the painting’s authenticity.  Although Leonardo painted on board, he was thought to be a perfectionist and would never paint on a board containing a knot, due to the possibility that it would make the board unstable.  But during the restoration process, which took roughly six years, Modestini formed the view that it was a genuine Leonardo. 

As Lewis points out, the problem with restorations is that there are no guidelines or limits on how far a restorer can go to repair a work of art.  Therefore auction houses such as Christies are not required to warrant the condition of an artwork, or its restoration.  All they have to do is warrant that the painting is by, say, Leonardo. 

The Salvator Mundi first came to the public’s attention in 2011 when it was included in a major Leonardo exhibition held at the National Gallery in London, having been touted as a genuine Leonardo.  Afterwards, Simon and Parish decide it’s time to sell. 

Enter the Swiss art dealer Yves Bouvier.  For a decade, Bouvier had acted as an agent for the Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, selling him $2 billion dollars worth of art.  What Rybolovlev didn’t realise was that these purchases included a $1 billion dollar markup.  Bouvier’s negotiations with Sothebys for the purchase of Salvator Mundi on behalf of Rybolovlev in 2013 was a sham.  He purchased the painting for himself for $83 million and sold it the next day to Rybolovlev for $127.5 million.  He claims to have warned Rybolovlev not to buy the painting as he didn’t consider it a sound investment, but Rybolovlev insisted he wanted the painting.

Bouvier developed the concept of the ‘freeport’, which are armoured warehouses located usually within the perimeter of an airport or shipping terminal where people can store valuable items free from import duties.  These items can be bought and sold through the freeport system without any taxes being paid because the items are considered to be in transit.  It’s thought that billions of dollars of art are stored in these freeports as financial assets only.   

In 2014 Rybolovlev saw an article in the New York Times which stated the true price that was paid for the Salvator Mundi.  Feeling that he’d been taken advantage by Bouvier, Rybolovlev directs Bouvier to sell all his paintings by Christmas 2014, or face the consequences.  This directive was given on 22nd November.  As a result of the actions taken against him, Bouvier claims to have lost everything. 

And this brings us to the auction of Rybolovlev’s collection (which include works by Gauguin, Rothko, Magritte, Picasso) at Christies in 2017 and that record $450 million dollar sale of the Salvator Mundi, considered to be the black sheep in the collection.  Christies embarked on an outrageous advertising campaign to generate the necessary hype surrounding the painting.  They promoted it as the male Mona Lisa and produced a video which contains very little footage of the painting.  Instead we see people seemingly gobsmacked whilst looking at it - the cast includes Leonardo DiCaprio.  

Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman & his yacht. (The Times)

These art auctions are pure theatre, and once the bidding on the Salvator Mundi reached $180 million, it had exceeded the previous record price for an artwork, anywhere.  The buyer turned out to be the ruler of Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.  And now, the whereabouts of the painting is unknown.  It was a no-show at a major exhibition of Leonardo’s work that was held at the Louvre to commemorate the 500th anniversary of his death in 1519.  There was to have been an official unveiling of the painting in Abu Dhabi in 2018, but it was canceled 2 weeks prior.   It’s thought that the painting is stored on the Prince’s private super yacht. 

According to one critic, after drugs and prostitution, the art market is the most unregulated market in the world; a totally opaque world in which no one knows the true value of a work, who’s buying it and who’s selling it. 

References;

‘The Last Leonardo - With Ben Lewis’,  the Art Law Podcast, 2019

‘The Lost Leonardo’, 2021 documentary directed by Andreas Koefoed

My Latest Exhibition At Tacit Galleries

Interiors can include passageways to light, avenues for escape and architecture  to inspire.  Sigmund Freud had plenty to say about the significance of interiors and doorways in his book “The Interpretation of Dreams”.  If buildings are meant to shelter us from the world as Freud suggests, then what kind of shelter is being provided.  If buildings are our little kingdom, then what kind of kingdom are we rulers of?

My latest exhibition “Chambers Of The Mind” is based on paintings of fantasy church interiors and architectural capriccios produced by a number of artists in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. These works gave the artists an opportunity to show off their technical skill, and in order to enhance the grandeur of the scenes, they employed the rather dubious tactic of populated them with figures that were far too small.  And yet there is a coldness, a clinical quality to some of these paintings that appealed to me.

Late For The Wedding, oil on canvas, 71 cm x 101 cm

The settings for these classical paintings may have been imaginary, but in my re imaginings of them I have removed the figures in order to draw the viewer into the scene and explore it.  These interiors can be contemplative, exploratory and perhaps not entirely sane.

Banqueting Hall, oil on canvas, 66 cm x 86 cm

There are no religious overtones to this series.  I’m not a religious person but I do acknowledge the wonderful contribution religion has made to architecture.  It’s a matter of separating the corporeal  from the spiritual and it probably helps to be super sensitive to atmospheres.

The Cloister, oil on canvas, 71 cm x 101 cm

My art practice often includes taking the backward step of producing a drawing from an image I’ve encountered on the Net or elsewhere, so I can develop a relationship with the scene.  Occasionally I alter the composition and colours to achieve the desired effect.  The images in this series include claustrophobic spaces and vast empty ones to present different states of mind.

Searching For The Exit, oil on canvas, 51 cm x 46 cm

Inside the brain there is a storehouse of impressions, memory and experiences that can surface at different moments and it’s a matter of capturing those moments when creating.  External events impinge on our mental processes and they can spill out onto the canvas.

The Door Is Always Open, oil on canvas, 76 cm x 91 cm

The exhibition is being held at Tacit Galleries, level 1/189 Johnston Street Collingwood and runs until 29th July.

Art And Design: Bonnard At The NGV

The Bonnard Exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria is a revelation in curation.  The gallery engaged the services of award winning architect and designer India Mahdavi to create a “unique and immersive scenography” for their 2023 Winter Masterpieces exhibition.  In fact, the full title of the exhibition is “Pierre Bonnard: Designed by India Mahdavi.”

(Geoff Harrison)

Iranian born, but now based in Paris, Mahdavi produces immersive environments around the world for exhibitions and restaurants.  In her studio, she endeavors to merge the worlds of architecture, interior design, furniture design, fashion and exhibition design.  Initially, Mahdavi wanted to be a film maker, but the opportunities in Paris for women were very limited so she decided to study architecture instead.  She then went to New York and took classes in product design, graphic design and furniture design which introduced her to something “more tactile, more emotional.”

(Peta Tranquille)

Her work is closely aligned with the film industry.  “Many of the environments I create are very cinematic….they are saturated with life…”  She explains her objectives thus, “In general, I think that your environment has an impact on your mood, right?  I like to bring a sense of joy and happiness to whatever I do, because it puts you in a good mood.  So really, that’s my approach, in general.” 

Mahdavi’s “scenography” certainly succeeded with the current exhibition as I have never been able to entirely understand Bonnard as an artist, yet I thoroughly enjoyed the experience.  As is often the case when I struggle to appreciate an artist, I turn to that excellent critic, Robert Rosenblum.  By the 1880’s, some artists were looking for more in their art practice than merely recording the landscape as an objective.  The impressionists were becoming passe for many artists who wanted to explore the psychology behind a scene, that is; what can be seen behind closed as well as open eyes.  They wanted to evoke nuanced and nameless emotions in their art using a wide variety of techniques - flat bold colour with clear outlines in some cases (Gauguin for instance), or hazy darkness in others.

Bonnard, Twilight (The Crocket Party), 1892, 130 x 162 cm (Pubhist)

Pierre Bonnard and Edouard Vuillard have been dubbed the Intimistes for their depictions of domestic scenes infused with a “mysterious, elusive sensibility.”  In this exhibition you can see how Bonnard’s technique evolved over time.  His early scenes are viewed through a tapestry of patterns and textures which blend in with the physical elements of the scene.  Later in his career, Bonnard seems to have abandoned this technique entirely.

Bonnard, Man And Woman 1900, 115 x 72.5 cm (Wikimedia Commons)

One striking aspect of this exhibition is how the artists appear to break all the rules of composition, yet come up with paintings that still work.  A classic example is Bonnard’s “Man And Woman” from 1900, in which a screen divides our view and perhaps sets up a duality of male and female.  It gives a charge to a scene that might otherwise be regarded as one of quiet domesticity.

Vallotton, Dinner By Lamplight, 1899, 57 x 90 cm (Wikiart)

But it’s the ‘support acts’ of this exhibition that add extra enjoyment, especially the paintings of Felix Vallotton - two in particular which appear in a catalogue of the Musee d’Orsay that I have always wanted to see first hand.  One is “Dinner By Lamplight” from 1899 in which we see the menacing silhouette of the artist himself in the foreground and his step-daughter in the distance.  Apparently, Vallotton was a master wood engraver, hence the strong colours and outlines.  Rosenblum refers to the “Halloween-like spookiness” of the scene.

Vallotton, Poker 1902, 52.5 x 67.5 cm (Paintings In The Musee D'Orsay)

The other painting is “Poker” from 1902.  A large empty table dominates the scene and suggests that dinner is over and a card game is the aftermath.  There is a theatrical element to this scene which is illuminated by the same intense, even eerie lamplight. 

“Pierre Bonnard: Designed by India Mahdavi” is on at NGV International and runs until 8th October. 

References;

NGV Magazine

“Paintings Of The Musee D’Orsay - Robert Roseblum 

Hello, my name is Geoff. You may be interested to know that I’m a fulltime artist these days and regularly exhibit my work in Victoria, but particularly in Melbourne. You may wish to check out my work using the following link; https://geoffharrisonarts.com

Paris - The Luminous Years

Shortly before losing its arts channel to Foxtel Arts, SBS screened one of the best arts documentaries I’ve even seen.  “Paris - the Luminous Years” is an American PBS production focusing on the years 1905-1930, “when for an incandescent moment Paris was a mecca, a magnetic centre of a new world of the arts, a laboratory of experiment and innovation.  It attracted an international avant-garde and became part of the making of the modern”.

“If you succeeded in Paris, all doors were open to you” - Joan Miro.

(Perry Miller Adato)

All the arts are covered in this two-parter from 2010, performing and visual as well as literature.  Suddenly the arts of the past, including impressionism seemed obsolete.  

Origins

The so-called rebels of the arts were drawn to Mont Marte which was still semi rural in those days, high on a hillside and thus cut off from the rest of Paris. Artists crossed paths regularly, exchanging gossip whilst their favourite meeting places were just down the hill - the Lapin Agile and the Moulin Rouge.  

(Wikimedia Commons)

They had their predecessors at Mont Marte of course, Van Gogh and Gauguin among them.  

Major retrospectives of Gauguin in 1903 and Cezanne in 1907 in Paris had a considerable impact on artists of the period.  Gauguin is considered the father of Fauvism, Cezanne the father of cubism.  When Henri Matisse exhibited his ‘Woman With A Hat’ at the 1905 Salon d’Automne it was ridiculed by the public.  Later, Gertrude Stein who was a collector of modern art, bought it.

Picasso's studio on the Rue Ravignan, (Wikipedia)

The Cafe

Pablo Picasso’s first studio was on the Rue Ravignan in Mont Marte from 1904-1910 where he shared lodgings with other artists and poets.  Being short of cash, they appreciated the cheap rents and camaraderie.  Picasso believes he really found himself as an artist during this period.  Many artist studios and apartments of that era had no gas, no electricity and thus were freezing in winter.  The cafe offered warmth, a cheap meal, a toilet, and an opportunity to sketch, write, plan exhibitions and gossip.  Writers could find publishers and vice-versa.

Cafe Dome, Montparnasse (Wikipedia)

Artists and Poets

The “Picasso Gang” was formed in 1905 which included the poets Guillaume Apollinaire and Andre Salmon as charter members.  With the exception of Georges Braque, poets were Picasso’s closest friends.  Painters tend to have trouble explaining themselves and thus poets were useful in putting into words the artists’ objectives.  Using his connections as an impresario and skill as a writer, Apollinaire was always willing to defend what was new and exciting in the arts.  Apollinaire’s poetry acted as a clarion call to all avant-garde artists of that era.

La Ruche

Often referred to as the bee-hive, a communal space of over 70 studios near the slaughter house in Montparnasse occupied by Leger, Modigliani, Diego Rivera and others including painters and sculptors from Russia.  In those studios lived the artistic Bohemia of every land, according to Marc Chagall.  Many of the artists who practised at La Ruche had come from poor villages in Eastern Europe and beyond so poverty was not an issue for them.  The artists of La Ruche didn’t identify with any “isms” of the era, they had no manifesto, instead they developed their own individual styles which were transformed by the experiences there.

La Ruche, Montparnasse (Pinterest)

Collaborations and Falling Outs

The close collaboration between Picasso and Georges Braque is covered.  Braque once described the two of them as being like mountain climbers clinging to the same rope together.  At one point, their work was almost indistinguishable.  Then came WW1, Braque enlisted but Picasso didn’t, and that was the end of their friendship.  Later Braque took exception to Picasso describing him as his ex-wife.

And then there was the falling out between the writers Gertrude Stein and Ernest Hemingway.  For some years each had been supportive of the others work in Paris, until Hemingway asked her to write a favourable review of a new series of his short stories in 1925.  She was less than impressed and said so.  Hemingway took exception to this and Stein responded “when a man writes continually about sex and death you can be assured that he is impotent, both as a man and a writer”. Ouch! 

Ballet Ruse

The Russian impresario Serge Diaghilev brought his Ballet Ruse to Paris in 1909.  With Igor Stravinsky’s scores, they reinvented the ballet.  Diaghilev brought together dancers, writers, composers, musicians, choreographers and artists (including Picasso who designed some of the sets for his productions) and is considered one of the most influential figures in the art world at the time. 

World War One - the Aftermath

The war tended to alienate those artists who enlisted from those who didn’t.  It’s argued that the war gave the conservative right in French society the opportunity to rail against avant-garde art by portraying it as German.  Avant-garde artists grew concerned that anything they produced that couldn’t be readily understood might be interpreted as German inspired.  The paint on their cubist works had barely dried before they began churning out conservative portraits.  A neo-classical movement had arisen - lead by Picasso.  To make matters worse for them, the main dealer in cubist works, Daniel H. Kahnweiler (a German) was forced into exile.  Apollinaire served in the war and was badly injured before dying of the Spanish Flu two days before the armistice was signed in 1918.

Paintings by Robert Delaunay from 1912 (left) & 1914 (Wikimedia Commons)

Among the more significant art movements that arose in the early 1920’s was Dada, a protest movement born out of the horror of the First World War.  It was subversive and provocative and it eventually evolved into Surrealism.  The contribution of Marcel Duchamp is discussed with his ‘readymades’ leading to a never ending argument about what constitutes art. 

The Americans

Many American writers who had served in Europe during the war returned to Paris in the early 1920’s and were inspired by the freedom, the mood for experimentation and the art of Picasso (back to his cubist phase again) and others.  This was in marked contrast to the repression, censorship and prohibition that constituted life back in the States - all the things they had fought against in Europe.  So it was little wonder that they couldn’t get back to Paris quickly enough.  And life was so cheap, you almost didn’t have to hold down a job to survive.

American women artists and writers found particular freedom in Paris compared to life in the States where they were expected to marry young and raise families.  American jazz represented modernity to the French and it had a major influence on French composers and artists.

Matisse, Woman With A Hat, 1905 (Wikipedia)

Serge Diaghilev died in August 1929 and the Ballet Ruse would close shortly after.  Two months later came the Wall Street crash, the effects of which would reverberate across Europe.  It would devastate the avant-garde in Paris and most expatriot American artists would return home.  Eventually Braque and Picasso would reconcile - to a point. 

This documentary includes interviews with academics, art historians and contains archival footage of interviews with Joan Miro, Marc Chagall, Jean Cocteau, D. H. Kahnweiler and many others. If there is a criticism I could level against this series, it’s that there is no mention of the artists who didn’t make it and what became of them.  Perhaps there is a tendency to romanticize the era to some degree.

Hello, my name is Geoff. You may be interested to know that I’m a fulltime artist these days and regularly exhibit my work in Victoria, but particularly in Melbourne. You may wish to check out my work using the following link; https://geoffharrisonarts.com

Melbourne Now

I made the mistake of reading some of the guff in the NGV Magazine prior to attending the ‘Melbourne Now’ exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria, Federation Square and was thus a little wary - but not for long.  This enormous (and free) exhibition spreads across all three levels of the gallery and showcases the work of over 200 Victorian-based artists, designers, studios and firms. 

It’s the first time since 2012 that such an exhibition had been held and it encompasses all the arts; painting, printmaking, sound, installation, video, fashion, photography, sculpture and design.  Without wanting to denigrate the exhibition, I felt like a school kid roaming around a fairground with something new to discover around every corner.

The highlight is arguably “Temple”, an installation piece by Melbourne based artist Rel Pham.  The NGV magazine describes this work as ‘an installation exploring, recontextualising, and evaluating the contemporary digital experience using Caodaist, Buddhist and Taoist concepts and structures’.  Yes, well……all I suggest is that you wander around it and absorb the experience.  But the magazine makes the good point that like much digital technology, “Temple” is difficult to synthesize in a handful of words.  It’s an intersection of technology and ancient culture.  To some degree, it is a reference to excessive consumption, social media and climate change. 

Another installation piece called “DataBaes” by Georgia Banks is a blending of reality TV dating shows and AI.  It’s disturbing in its content, but only because of the reality of ego in modern technology and our dependence on it.

“Vessels” is a collaboration between the NGV and Craft Victoria and presents the work of fifteen artists, craftspeople and designers.  The exhibit ‘expands the parameters of that useful, enduring and familiar object’.

If, by contrast, you are looking for some nostalgia, I recommend the glazed earthenware work of Lisa Reid.  Here, she presents a variety of objects from the 1950s in a form of gaudy realism.

“Fashion Now” presents the work of emerging as well as established practitioners in the realm of fashion, and it’s meant to reflect the way we feel about ourselves and the times we live in.  Walking around this exhibit had me feeling uncomfortably under-dressed.

From Taree Mackenzie comes the work “Pepper’s Ghost Effect, Circles, 4 Variations”.  According to the accompanying label, Mackenzie explores and expands on the ‘Peppers Ghost’ effect, a technique originating in 19th Century theatre which employs light and colour to create the illusion of a ghostly figure.

Hey look, a painting!!  This large scale acrylic is titled “Massa Pecatti: The 7 Deadly Sins” by the enduring Vivienne Shark Lewitt.

This is “Sky Whispers” by Meagen Streader and consists of light tape, another work commissioned by the NGV.  It’s interesting how reading the accompanying literature does nothing to enhance the  appreciation of some of these works - for me anyhow.

During the pandemic, artist Martin Bell produced this enormous work “Worthless priceless, Priceless worthless, Everything nothing, Nothing everything, No thing a thing, A thing no thing”  It’s pencil and ink on 75 sheets of Arches paper and it’s worth studying this work closely to appreciate its humour and playfulness, even nostalgia.

Martin Bell, “Worthless Priceless….” detail

For some reason, the NGV aims to acquire this work from Troy Emery called “Mountain Climber” and is seeking donations from the public to assist.  Emery’s work references taxidermy animals in museums and their removal from the context of nature which often signals their demise.  This may be the case, but I believe the gallery needs to be a little careful in its acquisition program, as work such as this is bordering on kitsch.   

I have just scratched the surface of the this exhibition with this blog, but I left it mightily impressed with the depth of talent we have in this state, and that can’t be a bad thing.

Hello, my name is Geoff. You may be interested to know that I’m a fulltime artist these days and regularly exhibit my work in Victoria, but particularly in Melbourne. You may wish to check out my work using the following link; https://geoffharrisonarts.com