Round-About with the Arts

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Hilary Spurling on Henri Matisse

The PJ depends exclusively on reader support. Please help us continue by contributing directly via PayPal, or by contributing editorial content via PhiladelphiaJunto@ymail.com. Empowered by WritersClearinghouse | S.P.Q.R. 1976 Richard Carreño, Editor Copyright MMXIV. All Rights Reserved

Matisse Live from Tate Modern

Tale of Two Museums

Chez Paul at 22 ave Foch

L'Orangerie

 Musée de l'Orangerie and Barnes Foundation Share the Same Muse
By Richard Carreño Bio
[WritersClearinghouse News Service]

Paris

The stats have an eerie familiarity: Scores of paintings by Chaim Soutine, Pablo Picasso, Jean Renoir, Henri Mattisse, Henri Rousseau, Amedeo Modigliani and other Impressionists and post-Impressionists, and all assembled by a fiercely independent collector who pioneered new ground in introducing modern art to 20th century audiences. The Barnes Foundation collection in Philadelphia, maybe? In considering the numbers and artists, American museum-goers can be easily forgiven for free-associating with that Philadelphia institution, the world's largest repository such modern works. And, of course, they would be wrong. At least, in Paris.

Welcome to the Musée de l'Organerie, home of the Walter-Guillaume Collection, an array of 145 paintings that rivals the Barnes as a showcase of many of the same modern artists who once called upon Paris for inspiration and livelihood. For Philadelphians, especially those seeped in the lore of the Barnes collection and its visionary founder, the eccentric, taciturn Dr. Alfred C. Barnes, the Orangerie is a kind of foreign pilgrimage to a place that can rightfully be called the Barnes' French 'bookend,' even its precursor.

That the two museum collections are almost a matched set, in presenting a similar catalogue of artists and their works, is hardly coincidental, in that Barnes (1872-1951) and the Orangerie collection's founder, Paul Guillaume (1891-1934), equally admired and promoted the same favored artists. Similarities between the collectors, who were in equal parts friends, competitors, and business associates, don't stop there.

Editor's Sketchbook

'MODERN' ART TURNS 100

New York

What do Constantine Brancusi's Muse endormie, Marcel Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase (N0.2), François Picabia's Dances at the Spring, and Jacques Villion's Young Girl have in common? These works, then contemporary works, were all part of scores of now 'modern' paintings and sculptures that were displayed in the ground-breaking Armory Show, held in New York 100 years ago and now recreated at the New-York Historical Society Museum &; Library, 170 Central Park West at 77th Street.

 

There's another commonality: These and other sculptures and pictures, more than a dozen in all, are now housed in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the single best-represented repository of Armory Show submissions, all part of the museum's stellar Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection.

 

'The Armory Show at 100' is one of the best art exhibits I've ever had the privilege of attending. It's a time capsule of what modern art was to become. I was transported to 1913 and 69th Regiment Armory (1906), still functioning at 68 Lexington Avenue, between 25th and 26 streets. Imagine, if you will, being an attendee at that time, seeing, aye savouring, early first works by Picasso, Matisse, and Van Gogh. Add a Renoir or two, a picture by Goya, even an Augustus John, the under-appreciated English portraitist. In all, scores of artists are represented. Still, only a fraction of the total collection in the show itself. 

Letters to the Editor



Blowing Smoke
 Dr. Albert C. Barnes, founder of the Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia

Boo Hoo
Darsh Gone, Dr. Barnes
is Still Getting Dissed

(In response to 'Matisse's Revenge,' published in the BroadStreetReview.com and below).

Thanks for your letter. We'll post it soon.
Sincerely,
Dan Rottenberg
Editor

On Oct 17, 2011, at 8:40 PM....

Comments:
I don't understand why so many presumably well informed writers feel it
necessary to slime Albert Barnes and why editors (Dan?) print this trash. In
a comparison of Matisse collections, is it necessary to allege Barnes'
marital infidelity? Do we need to read ONCE AGAIN that Barnes was
"irascible" and etc and etc ad nauseam? The man was an astonishingly
courageous connoisseur who was widely villified by "experts" and yet
assembled the breathtaking collection we all treasure. Show him some
respect!

Donald Eckard
St. Davids, PA 19087

Dan Rottenberg, Editor
Broad Street Review
1315 Walnut St.
Suite 904
Philadelphia PA 19107
Phone: (215) 735-1455Fax: (215) 735-1455
drottenberg@broadstreetreview.com

Museum Mile: Philadelphia's Parkway Museums

Philadelphia's Parkway Muses 

By Jackie Atkins

[Writers Clearinghouse News Service] 

Museum Mile: Philadelphia's Parkway Museums

By Richard Carreno

WritersClearinghousePress

180 pp $19.99

ISBN: 978-1-105-14489-9 

AT a glance, it's simply a beautiful Philadelphia reproduction of the Champs-Elysée. But for Richard Carreño, it's 'Museum Mile,' the core of Philadelphia's museums and galleries on the city's famed Benjamin Franklin Parkway.

In Museum Mile: Philadelphia's Parkway Museums, Carreño looks deep into this street-scape for its architectural and artistic resources, embodied in the Parkway's venerable public arts and cultural spaces. In all, he canvasses more than a dozen of the city's arts institutions. Sometimes he strays in the name of local insights -– as far afield even as Jerusalem and Nice, France.

The book gets much closer to home with Carreño's sharp and reflective appraisal of changes at the Barnes Foundation museum. Significantly, Museum Mile coincides with the debut in 2012 of the 'new' Barnes, now the on the Parkway's newest cultural jewel.

Not much has escaped the author as he examines and deconstructs paintings with the fervor of an explorer and teacher. The artists whose compositions he describes come under as equal scrutiny as their works themselves. Similarly, administrative and curatorial staff members, and even some of Philadelphia's most prominent arts donors and financiers, never go unchallenged.

Carreño looks 'behind' the canvass. Before addressing the hidden techniques of the sporting art of Alfred J. Munnings, Carreño carefully scrutinizes this English country artist's background to explain the influence of Munnings' life experiences in his portrayals of uncommon horses and their equally uncommon riders.

Carreño introduces Michael Taylor, until recently modern art curator at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, as 'part scholar, part art historian, and part sleuth.' He describes his pioneering shows, and how Taylor singularly captures the importance, need, and workmanship of a museum curator.

Small tidbits make reading Museum Mile informative, substantive, and enlightening.

Not contented with just profiles of artists and the museums that showcase their work, Carreño spins tales of Philadelphia politics and intrigues as they relate the Museum Mile's art world. Neither the controversial founder of the Barnes Foundation, Dr. Albert C. Barnes, nor the film, The Art of the Steal, a screed against the Barnes' move from Merion in suburban Philadelphia to the Parkway, escape Carreño's critique.

Such seemingly mundane issues as the advisability of backpack captivity by the staff at the National Museum of American Jewish History and, more important, often draconian security measures at the Philadelphia Museum of Art get special attention from the author.

Even those familiar with Philadelphia's artistic treasures will come away, after reading the almost forty essays in Museum Mile, with previously unknown insights and, yes, some juicy morsels. From the grandness of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, to the historical roots of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, to the sheer wonder of the Barnes Foundation museum, Richard Carreño informs and edifies the reader in a knowledgeable work.

(Jackie Atkins, a short story and screenplay writer, lives in Cape May, New Jersey).

Letters to the Editor

My Pal, the Gangsta Scion Walter Annenberg

Oh Yeah, the Author?
That Would Be Me

In response to my article on the Musee Matisse and the Barnes Foundation museum, posted yesterday at the BroadStreetReview.com, BSR received today the following letter from Nick Tinari, a Philadelphia lawyer. The Junto's version of same story is below. -- The Editor.

On Oct 5, 2011,
So rife with inaccuracies and unattributed statements as to be a complete fiction.

First sentence: a first year art student would know that Matisse was not an Impressionist.

Next, the Merion gallery is not a "villa", it was purpose built as a gallery for a school (not a museum) from day one. The author must want to impress readers with his knowledge of touristy sounding words like "villa" and his worldliness at having visited some, but he is completely ignorant of the history of the Barnes Foundation and of architecture in general.

Next, the author cites no source for the statement that Barnes disliked the mural and for the conclusion that the two men parted association. The evidence is to the contrary, since there are Matisse works in the Barnes Foundation that postdate the mural.

I could go on, but I think this is evidence enough that the author is working in the realm of fantasy. Maybe it makes a nice story, but it's not a true story. A true story would be how know-nothings like the author are now running the Foundation and how, thanks to them and the ancient animosity against the foundation of gangster scion Walter Annenberg, the mural will end up in a place the painter and his patron never intended it to be.

nick tinari
jenkintown

The BSR's Editor's Response:

Thanks for your letter. We'll post it soon.

That reference in the blurb to Matisse as an Impressionist was my error; I've corrected it.

Sincerely,
Dan Rottenberg
Editor

Barnes Connection

Tributes to Matisse at his gravesite in  Nice, France.
 Photo: Richard Carreno/Writers Clearinghouse

Matisse's Revenge

By Richard Carreño
[Writers Clearinghouse News Service]
Nice, France
Think the Barnes Foundation. For a devotee of Henri Matisse (1868-1954), that shrine to Impressionism in Philadelphia comes readily to mind when visiting the artist's eponymously-named museum here. In many ways, the Musee Matisse, founded in 1963 with donations by Matisse's family and with works earmarked by the artist himself, could well be considered a book-end to Dr. Alfred C. Barnes' more inclusive pantheon of Modern Art greats.

On one hand is the Philadelphia-based museum, the world's finest one-stop bully-pulpit of Impressionism, an amalgam of dozens of its stalwarts, an elite cadre from Cezanne (69 pictures), Modigliani (16), period Picasso (46), to Matisse himself (59), an erstwhile associate of the insatiable American collector. On the other is the artist's equally single-minded effort here showcasing the early-20th century genre, filtered through Matisse's own unrivaled lens of sharply-focused color, light, and line. The result: A rich, solipsistic journey through the artist's life-span.

Both museums, finally, are houses of worship. (Though in keeping with more conventional religious practice, entrance to the Matisse chapel here is free, funded by the French state, the city of Nice, and by private donations).

Some comparisons are superficially interesting. Both galleries are located in provincial capitals. The Matisse Museum is located in Nice's Cimiez neighborhood, an affluent residential area in the hills overlooking this otherwise Cote d'Azur resort city. Until recently, since its relocation to Philadelphia's downtown, the Barnes was even more remote, fixed in its original home in suburban Lower Merion, Pennsylvania.

In addition, both museums are located in villas, more like private homes of grandees than public spaces for artistic treasures. At least, the Matisse still is, housed in the Villa des Arenes, a 17th century home of local plutocrats. Its setting is bucolic, set among Roman ruins and a 17th century Franciscan monastery. Until the Barnes Foundation's move to Philadelphia (the new property on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway will debut in early 2012), its museum collection filled a Paul Cret-designed, purpose-built villa in leafy Lower Merion. Dr. Barnes' living quarters were attached.

Significant, too, the museums are conceptually crafted as singular private domains. The Barnes, of course, driven by the vexing, but brilliant vision of its namesake, the fabulously wealthy patent medicine inventor. Matisse himself, his widow, Amelie Matisse-Parayre, and their children were instrumental in creating their family memorial here. The museum includes, on two floors, scores of works in oils, engravings, and decoupages. (Thankfully, it excludes all the crazy-quilt presentation gimmicks that Barnes favoured).

That said, an even greater twinning -- an almost co-sanguine bloodline -- between the two institutions can be argued, given Matisse's professional and personal relationship with the irascible Barnes (1872-1951) and the artist's intimate knowledge of the Barnes venue in Lower Merion. Enter son Pierre Matisse.

In 1930, Pierre was operating an art gallery in New York. En route to Tahiti (in search of sunlight for his palette and inspiration for his metier), father Henri stopped by. Matisse was on another mission, as well, as a judge at the prestigious Carnegie International Exhibition in Pittsburgh. That second journey providently involved a side-trip to the Barnes Foundation, where he was welcomed with open arms by Dr. Barnes in full flower and at his vitriolic best. (Barnes attempted to sabotage a lunch date that Matisse had with a Philadelphia grande dame on the same day of of their meeting. Barnes hated all grande dames. Actually, he hated anything grande).

Despite the meeting being truncated (Matisse, in the end, was hauled off to the swank luncheon), the artist and collector hit it off. Barnes spoke fluent French. No intermediaries were necessary. Their liaison was also fortuitous, in that Barnes on the spot commissioned his new associate (the megalomaniacal Barnes would probably think of him simply as a minion) to contribute a mural to the museum's inner court.The result, of course, was the iconic La Danse. (Early studies are on display here).

The languid La Danse, an archetype of Matisse's interpretation of line and figure, actually comes in two completed versions. The first is at the Musee d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris. That's the one that couldn't fit the dedicated wall space in Cret's villa. Instead of tinkering with this work, Matisse just created another. Well, not just. The effort was time-consuming and arduous. In keeping with his character, Barnes had no sympathy for the artist, though Matisse readily admitted that the error in measuring was his alone.

There was more. Though he allowed the masterwork to be installed, Barnes cattily made it known that he actually didn't like it.

This rejection of Matisse, soon after, was at best odd. (OK, not for Barnes). Only a few years later, in 1933, Barnes and his putative mistress, Violette De Mazia, wrote what may still stand as the most definitive (and seemingly sympathetic) treatise of the artist and his oeuvre. Despite the authors apparent good will to the painter, The Art of Henri-Matisse, published by the Barnes Foundation Press, often serves more as a paperweight of almost 500 pages than a readable analysis. (On doctor's orders, bite-sized samples are recommended). La Danse is never mentioned in the book. Ouch!

Barnes' dissing of Matisse was probably for the best as it allowed the artist to escape the toxicity that Barnes had created in correct art circles in Philadelphia and New York. (Barnes had no shame. In the 1940s, he hired then fired eminent philosopher Bertrand Russell as a foundation instructor. Russell sued the litigious Barnes for breach of contract, and won).

Nice, not surprisingly, was a more agreeable venue. Matisse moved here in 1916, and, for the most part, was a resident ever since. He came in search of light, a warming glow that still washes over the azur-colored ocean of the Baie d'Anges and the Promenade des Anglais.

In a sense, Nice is more than simply a museum mecca. It's more like a Matisse mosaic, a patch-quilt of his former residences, all of which are still standing: From the Hotel Beau Rivage on the Avenue des Etats Unis, overlooking the Mediterranean; to the 1 Place Charles-Felix, where Matisse installed new windows in his top-floor studio. The artist never lived at Villa des Arenes. From 1938, he lived nearby at the still-elegant Le Regina, a former hotel that had been converted into apartments. (They still are).

In 1954, Matisse, 85 years old, died, and was buried in a secluded spot in the Cimiez cemetery not far from his museum. His widow, Amelie, joined in him in the sepulcher 1958.

The horizontal stone slab is modest, citing only the Matisses names and birth and death dates. On top, are numerous commemorative do-dads, pine cones, stones, and memorial messages. I left mine.

Appropriately enough, Barnes has no memorial -- other, of course, than his museum. The only official recognition of his death was the flag draping of a suburban Philadelphia fire house. His body was cremated.

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