Page 35 - Studio International - January 1967

is to create diagrams—that is to say models of the way in time when the force of fashion made the transformation
which we experience and observe reality—it must in- of such understanding into actual paintings particularly
creasingly depend upon modern philosophy : philosophy arduous.
not as the academic subject it has become, but as the It was not possible to continue the Poussin tradition of
connexion between specific experience and the generaliza- literary philosophy after the French Revolution. After
tion of many truths. then, the basis of philosophy was more directly related to
Few modern artists have risen to the situation. The maj- the sciences. This is why the diagram comes into its own.
ority have been philosophically self-indulgent. Only a few This is why, despite the obvious inequality of resolved
Poussin modern artists—Juan Gris, Brancusi, Leger (I do not achievement, de Staël can stand the comparisons we have
Inspiration of the poet 1630-1 intend the list to be exclusive) —have understood the true made. Or rather, this is why we need the example of
Oil on canvas nature of the historical choice offered them. In his grop- de Staël in order to understand more clearly the modern
71 1/4 x 83 7/8 in.
The Louvre, Paris ing manner, de Staël also understood it. And did so at a situation of art. q