Page 32 - Studio International - January 1967

Poussin the de Staël emphasizes the pattern of the Poussin. More
Landscape with figures 1630's
Drawing, pen and bistre wash precisely, the Poussin draws one's attention to the con-
51 x 15f in. tinuity of the black pen-lines in the de Staël: and the de
The Hermitage, Leningrad Staël draws one's attention to the continuity of the white
shapes in the Poussin.
Drawings, however, are relatively simple. Let us now
compare two paintings: Poussin's Nymph carried by a Satyr
and de Staël's Footballers. The movement of the figures in
the de Staël is towards the left and inwards: whereas in
the Poussin it is towards the left and slightly outwards—
towards the spectator. But what is strikingly similar is the
way that both artists organize the movement of their
figures. First by the kind of compositional tension estab-
lished between the group as a whole and the edges of the
canvas. Second by the kind of counter-movements estab-
lished against the progression leftwards: in the Poussin,
the flow of the red drapery: in the de Staël the disposition
of the red blocks; in the Poussin, the upward movement
that begins with the nymph's foot and is finally continued
upwards by the tree trunk: in the de Staël the upward
movement launched by the thin legs of the footballer on
the left and supported by all the white blocks.
I tend to suspect complicated compositional analyses
because it seems to me that in the end the writer can con-
vince himself of anything he wishes. But in this case I
want to do no more than suggest a similar kind of
pictorial intelligence at work—despite totally different
cultural inheritances.
Let us look at another pair: Poussin's Inspiration of the
Poet and de Staël's Street musicians, painted over 300 years
later. Here both artists are concerned with the problem
of presenting a static standing group with the minimum
of recession—as though both groups are standing on a
narrow stage. The problem is how to give movement to
the group and to unite the figures with their background.
Both artists have found similar solutions : the continuity
of the verticals, born of the figures, into the background :
the device of having one vertical strip of approximately
the same colour and tone, running from top to bottom—
the brown strip along the extreme left edge of the Poussin
and the blue strip along the extreme right edge of the de

de Staël
Landscape 1954
Ink on paper
20x 15 3/4 in.
Collection: Atelier de Staël, Paris