Artists in the spotlight room - La Villa du temps retrouvé

Revolutions

This room highlights the historical convergence between the revolution brought about by Marcel Proust in the art of the novel and the aesthetic revolutions in the painting of the Belle Époque, which followed on from the Industrial Revolution. Proust read the “Manifesto of Futurism” in Le Figaro, intrigued by the praise of speed that he foreshadowed in his 1907 text, “Impressions en automobile”. He alludes to Futurism when he writes in “La Prisonnière” that a first-class carriage is considered by some to be more beautiful than St Mark’s in Venice; and he associated with the founders of Surrealism: Philippe Soupault, whom he met in Cabourg before the war, and André Breton, who proofread certain galley proofs of “In Search of Lost Time”. Passionate about literary and artistic experimentation, Proust wrote to Soupault expressing his admiration for "Les Champs magnétiques" (which he regarded as “magnetic songs”).

Pablo PICASSO (1881-1973)
Femme
Paris, automne-hiver 1913
Copper etching, first state
Dation Pablo Picasso, 1979.
Musée national Picasso-Paris

©GrandPalaisRmn, Sylvie Chan-Liat

Pablo PICASSO • Femme

Marcel Proust knew and met Pablo Picasso; Jean Cocteau was their mutual friend. Proust attended the premiere of "Parade" in 1917, a ballet set to music by Satie, for which Picasso designed the sets and costumes. In 1919, in his preface to Jacques-Émile Blanche's essay From "David to Degas", Proust praises ‘the admirable Picasso, who has precisely concentrated all of Cocteau's features into an image of such noble rigidity that, in comparison, even the most charming Carpaccio of Venice fades somewhat in my memory’. In 1922, Jacques Rivière, editor of the Nouvelle Revue Française, explained to Proust that he was convinced of '(his) connection with the Cubist movement and contemporary aesthetics'.

Pablo PICASSO (1881-1973)
La Table (première planche)
Cadaqués, août 1910
Copper etching, first state
Dation Pablo Picasso, 1979.
Musée national Picasso-Paris

©GrandPalaisRmn, Adrien Didierjean

Pablo PICASSO • La Table

Cubism is quoted as follows in "In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower": "Undoubtedly, it is easy to imagine, in an illusion akin to that which makes everything on the horizon appear uniform, that all the revolutions which have taken place hitherto in painting or music nevertheless adhered to certain rules, and that what lies immediately before us—Impressionism, the pursuit of dissonance, the exclusive use of the Chinese scale, Cubism, Futurism—differs outrageously from what preceded it.”. Furthermore, Luc Fraisse demonstrated in his thesis on “The Experimental Fragment” (1989) how certain Cubist traits can be found in Proust’s text.

Henri de SAINT-DELIS (1878-1949)
Église de la côte de Grâce
Undated, Oil on canvas
Deauville, Les Franciscaines

Henri de SAINT-DELIS • Église de la côte de Grâce

Born in Pas-de-Calais, Henri de Saint-Delis moved to Le Havre with his family in 1882. He spent most of his life in Normandy, mainly in Honfleur. “The most knowledgeable is De Saint-Delis,” said his classmate and friend from the École des Beaux-Arts in Le Havre, Émile Othon Friesz. Like their other classmate, Dufy, and Friesz, Saint-Delis took note of the artistic developments of his time, particularly Fauvism and its liberation of colour. But he remained aloof from any group, largely due to his exile in Switzerland. Leading a very solitary life—which explains the modest posthumous reputation of this great painter—Saint-Delis sought only to develop his own style.

Emile Othon FRIESZ (1879-1949)
Automne à Honfleur
1907, Oil on canvas
Grenoble, Musée de Grenoble

Emile Othon FRIESZ • Automne à Honfleur

The blazing autumn glade in Honfleur is emblematic of Friesz’s Fauvist period. Trained in Le Havre, it was when he travelled to Antwerp in 1906, in the company of Georges Braque, that his Fauvist style began to
take shape. Friesz subsequently spent much time in Honfleur, following in the footsteps of his friends from Le Havre, Henri de Saint-Delis and Raoul Dufy. His work reflects a pictorial Fauvism, drawing on the influence of Matisse and the pre-Cubist style of Braque. This Norman composition simplifies lines and volumes in favour of the vitality and luminosity of colour. Here, the artist unfolds an imaginary space with trees sketched in spontaneous brushstrokes, brought to life at its centre by an intense red-orange hue.

Kees VAN DONGEN (1877-1968)
La Bottine jaune
1909, Oil on canvas
Paris, Collection particulière

Kees VAN DONGEN • La Bottine jaune

Kees Van Dongen is best known for his portraits of women. Before the Great War, he revitalised the portrait genre as practised by Boldini and Blanche, infusing it with a ‘Fauvist’ touch. He gained recognition for his aesthetic innovation at the 1905 Salon d’Automne, alongside Matisse, Derain and Vlaminck. Fauvism championed the use of pure, vibrant colours, a freedom that allowed for the simplification of forms and rejected naturalism. Fauvist painters sought the truth of an emotion rather than descriptive reality. This portrait depicts Nini, one of his favourite models, a dancer at the Folies Bergère and both his mistress and his muse.