Art Of The Day Weekly
#296 - from 28 March 2013 to 3 April 2013
Caspar David Friedrich, The Tree of Crows, ca 1822, oil on canvas, 59x73 cm, Musée du Louvre. © RMN Grand Palais (musée du Louvre)/Michel Urtado/Presse.
IN THE AIR
Why is German painting not better known?
All the major European countries have accumulated, from the Renaissance to Impressionism, a list of famous painters, of ‘household names’ as we like to call them to feel them closer to us. Yet, when we turn to Germany, once we have passed Durer and Holbein, its total silence until we reach the expressionists. While other counties saw Leonardo, Titian, Vélasquez, Poussin, Goya, Turner, Courbet, or Monet, what did we have in Germany? Maybe Friedrich, while his torn landscapes are better known than his own name. But who could mention Overbeck, Carus, Runge, Tischbein, Feuerbach or von Marées? They were all excellent artists, and yet they have an ounce of the popularity of their French and Italian cousins. The musée du Louvre tries to solve this mystery through a retrospective that goes beyond the usual chronological limits. It could be due to the tendency of German painting of being a painting of ideas rather than of emotions and in its political commitment to build a nation that never pleased its neighbors. Whether one is convinced or not, this procedure is original and surprising in regard to other more conventional retrospectives in which beautiful international loans are hung up side by side. Art helps us to see but also to think, it explains history but also sheds light on current events: a beautiful conclusion for Henri Loyrette, who will be stepping down from the museum’s leadership on 12 April 2013.
• The exhibition De l’Allemagne. De Friedrich à Beckmann (1800-1939) will be held at the musée du Louvre from 28 March to 24 June 2013. Catalogue: Hazan/Louvre éditions (€45).
EXHIBITIONS
Plaster cast of a dog. From the House of Orpheus, Pompeii, AD 79 © Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Napoli e Pompei
Pompei, it's like being there
LONDON - Catastrophies have always fascinated man, even hypnotized him. From the earthquake in Lisbon to the sinking of the Titanic, they have endlessly inspired literature and movies. The most remarquable example is undoubtedly the end of Pompei, buried under the ashes of the Vesuvio in 79. That was two thousand years ago and the drama continues to be represented. The Maillol museum in Paris held an exhibition just a few months ago, now the British Museum comes up with its own approach. It focuses on the bright, openly hedonist daily life with nearly 250 objects of which many had never left Italy before. There are mosaics and frescoes that were miraculously kept as well as recent discoveries from Herculanum, the small town that faced the same destiny, such as these sculpted panels in ivory and marble. Th emost moving eleent remains the mouldings of dogs, petrified by the blazing heat, or the burnt baby crib, both tangible proof of an instant catastrophy.
• Life and Death in Pompei and Herculanum at the British Museum, from 28 March to 29 September 2013.
These exhibitions also open this week…
Fernand Léger's urban side
BIOT - Métropolis, Fernand Léger et la ville shows at the Musée national Fernand Léger the relationship between the painter and the large urban settings, with an ideal of social progress. From 23 March to 7 October 2013.
Signac, a man from the sea
GIVERNY - He was one of the theorists of neo-Impressionism, commonly called 'pointillisme'. But Signac was also a great interpreter of coasts, ports and in particular of the Mediterranean . From 29 March to 2 July 2013.
The fragile beauty of Murano
PARIS - Murano is synonym of a centuries-old tradition, practiced on the small island of the Venitian lagoon. The exhibition at the Maillol museum shows how that production has always maintained a close tie with contemporary art.
AUCTIONS
Cornette's week
PARIS – Following last year's success – revenue at €21 million - the Cornette de Saint-Cyr auction house is presenting a marathon of 16 sales, from 25 to 29 March 2013, at the elegant Salomon de Rothschild hotel. As this article is being printed the most awaited lots are still up for sale, those are the ones dedicated to Sacha Guitry, to art brut and to contemporary art. In the first the most awaited piece is Renoir's Femme nue, with its strange destiny as Guitry encouraged his father to buy it on 22 March 1922, that is two days before his father's death. It is estimated at €80 000. In the case of the other two, aside from Botero's Homme assis, estimated at €500 000, art brut is the most remarkable one with two works by Martín Ramírez - who enjoyed a beautiful exhibition at the Reina Sofia museum in Madrid a few years ago - and Henry Darger, 1892-1973. This recluse from Chicago left an endless Human Comedy in which enslaved children revolt against the adults who torture them. One of the gouache drawings is expected to go for more than €120 000.
• Florilèges by Cornette de Saint-Cyr, until 29 March 2013, at the hôtel Salomon de Rothschild (11 rue Berryer, 75008 Paris).
ARTIST OF THE WEEK
Olivier Catté, Cityscape 1242, mixed media on cardboard, 2012, 120x120 cm. Courtesy galerie Lazarew, Paris.
Catté, towns in cardboard
In an era where artists can choose among an unlimited array of 'media', be it pensil,neon, acrylic or video, his favorite means is the poorest among the poor, simple corrugated cardboard. Olivier Catté, born in 1957 works far from the lime lights, in a workshp in Rouen, where he first covers the cardboard with black paint. Then, in a manner similar to the painters of the Renaissance or the mannerist decorators in Prague, he does a sort of "sgraffiti" by scratching that coat, digging and torturing the cardboard, covering it with wrapping tape. What is surprising about htis process that has something of Arte Povera and of Gutai, is the figurative object. Catté wishes to reveal geometric architectures, cities of dreams, halfway between the rational forms of the Pentagone and the vertical delirium conceived by Saint'Elia or Tony Garnier.
• Olivier Catté, Cityscapes at the galerie Lazarew from 28 March to 11 May 2013
OPENINGS OF THE WEEK
BOOKS
Jacoulet in the country of the rising sun
Here is another French artist, who like Bernard Buffet, is better known in Japan than in his own country. It is true that Paul Jacoulet -1896-1960- was the son of a French professor who taught in Tokyo, where he arrived at the age of three, and he lived longer in Asia than in Paris. He was an international traveller who led expeditions between 1929 and 1933 to the islands of Micronesia and immortalized their tatoos and traditional wear before they lost all meaning and became simple tourist attractions. In 1933 he founded an engraving workshop presenting himself as the heir of Hiroshige and Hokusai in the demanding discipline of ukyo-e, wood engraving. Every year he produced a series of prints of flowers, butterflies, beautiful courtesans and respectable elderly men, which collectors faught over avidly. The catalogue describes the production of this interpreter of a colored and refined Far-East. It is also the catalogue for an exhibition and an important donation to the museum of Quai Branly. Maybe Jacoulet who is appreciated in the USA, will finally step out of his French purgatory.
• L’univers flottant de Paul Jacoulet, un artiste voyageur en Micronésie, directed by Christian Polak and Kiyoko Sawatari, publication Somogy/musée du quai Branly, 2013, 354 p., €49
IN BRIEF
BORDEAUX The 23rd Itinéraires des photographes voyageurs will be held from 2 to 28 April 2013.
PARIS - The contemporary art fair, ArtParis, will be held from 28 March to 1 April. The guest country will be Russia this year.
PARIS - The contemporary art gallery Jérôme de Noirmont, founded in 1994, has closed on 23 March 2013.