Page 21 - Studio International - April 1965

Editorial

In the expenditure of public money, the Trustees of quoted above, Pablo Picasso finished an oil painting
our national galleries of art have perforce to plan how entitled Three Dancers in Monte Carlo. It has now
best to acquire works that will justify their cost. It is come into the collection of the Tate Gallery at a price
remarkable that in recent months two purchases, one that apparently exceeded the £50,000 of the special
by the National Gallery and the other by the Tate, have annual grant for early 20th century paintings by so
displayed not a boldness but outright timidity in their much that the Friends of the Tate and the Contem-
efforts that makes one despair of ever finding controlling porary Art Society had to make handsome contribu-
bodies of taste and discernment for public collections tions in order to complete the transaction. The bene-
in this country. (It is not, of course, peculiar to Great ficiary in this case is the artist himself for which we can
Britain alone—the administrators of both the Louvre and at least be thankful. He had apparently steadfastly
the Luxembourg have in the past shown both short refused to part with it except for exhibition purposes. It
sight and cold feet in considering possible gifts of was in the large Picasso exhibition at the Tate in 1960
outstanding works.) when it evoked little interest visa vis such earlier and
For a sum nearing half a million pounds, the Cezanne later works as Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and
Les Grandes Baigneuses was acquired by the National Guernica.
Gallery from the family of Auguste Pellerin who bought Now, however, the Tate informs us that in common
it soon after the artist's death in 1906. He did in fact with another recent acquisition Cezanne's Grandes
possess dozens of works by the Master of Aix. What Baigneuses, Les Trois Danseuses is not a picture which
were the Trustees of our National Galleries doing that courts popularity. 'Each was far beyond even the
they could have been surpassed in knowledge by a enlightened taste of its day. It will be a generation or so
man of business, a so-called 'margarine king'? The before Les Trois Danseuses is accepted by everybody'.
painting, of course, was not unknown. Roger Fry, Since it is the Tate that has bracketed the two works
although English, was such a world-renowned cham- we are not searching for special comparisons but the
pion of Cezanne that a French publisher invited him assertion that the galleries concerned are acting as
more than forty years ago to write an essay to accom- pioneers of taste is so lamentably untrue one cannot
pany a complete series of reproductions of Cezanne's wonder why we may not expect a special exhibition of
paintings in Mr. Pellerin's collection. The essay was purchases that will carry this title 'Far beyond even
enlarged and published in French, then later in English. * enlightened taste'. As for expecting the Picasso to be
For our present assessment of the painting let us con- accepted by everybody in a generation or so, this will
sider what Roger Fry had to say about it, never forget- never happen. The painting itself represents no more
ting that he had sponsored Cezanne and the post- distinction than that it is described as bringing 'into
Impressionists as early as 1910 and 1912 when he action a new disquieting sense of movement and the
organised exhibitions of their works in London. He dislocation of the human form which is prophetic of
compares it, to its disadvantage, with another larger even more violent impression in the future'. Maybe, but
work on the same theme and dated a few years earlier the fact that it coincides with his early association with
—this painting has been in the United States for many the surrealists removes it from the factual associations
years. Fry writes: 'It is touching to see the unyielding so clearly seen in Guernica and Bullfight. Why use the
pertinacity with which Cézanne returns again and theme of dances to express violence? Movement, yes,
again to the attack, to his old effort to overcome his but violence—it conflicts even with the musical link;
fundamental inaptitude for invention ; thus up to the jazz was not so spastically disjointed even then.
end, obsessed by the idea of rivalling a Titian or at least Why should both our national collections of paintings
a Delacroix, he refused to accept his own limitations be so self-congratulatory about these recent pur-
and to take his place among those great imaginative chases ? Perhaps Sir Charles Wheeler, President of the
artists to whom some actual vision is necessary as a Royal Academy, though scarcely claiming to be a per-
point of departure'. spicacious critic of modern art was on the right track
And 'For many years Cezanne's fear of the model had when he commented to The Times on the purchase of
deprived him of all observations of nature that his Les Grandes Baigneuses: 'This is one of the largest and
power of conjuring up a credible image to his inner therefore one of the most important works of Cezanne.'
eye, never remarkable, has by now become extremely It measures 4 ft. 3 in. by 6 ft. 4 in. The Picasso, even
feeble . . . These bodies have become almost geometric larger, measures 7 ft. 1 in. by 4 ft. 8 in.
abstractions with which he seeks desperately to estab- There we have it: if the picture is big enough, it is
lish significant combinations'. bound to be more important. And even if it takes a
In concluding his reference to this work, Fry's remarks generation or so before these works are accepted by
have ironic point. He writes : 'Those of us who love everybody we can at least ponder on the fact that in the
Cezanne to the point of infatuation find, no doubt, our case of the Cezanne, it took the National no less than
profit even in these efforts of the aged artist but good sixty years and for the Picasso, the Tate took forty
sense must prevent us from trying to impose them on years to discover their price but not, it is sure, their
the world at large as we feel we have the right to do value. n
with regard to the masterpieces of portraiture and land-
scape'.
Well, the world at large or at least that part of it that
comes to Trafalgar Square expecting master works
has Les Grandes Baigneuses by Cezanne imposed
upon it and may even find its profit (though not, of
course, like that enjoyed by the heirs of Mr. Pellerin).
Studio International About the time Roger Fry was writing the words
Volume CLXIX No. 864
April, 1965