Classical exhibitions The Venice Biennale has become such an important moment in the global art calendar that countless events now congregate around it. They tend to be of a more classical nature than those at the national pavilions and the...
Paris: Gauguin dictated the standards for a good painting. Sérusier, Filiger, Bonnard and the others followed.
Paul Gauguin “How do you see this tree? Is it really green? Use green then, the most beautiful green on your palette. And that shadow, rather blue? Don’t be afraid to paint it as blue as possible”. During the summer of 1888 in Brittany at Pont Aven, Paul...
Modern and contemporary art auctions in New York: why so many records?
Death Who wants to part with their masterpieces? No one. That’s why the biggest art market records, generally obtained for absolutely outstanding works, are the fruit of forced and unhappy circumstances: death and divorce. This is primarily the way in which the...
New York sales: where the art market collides the art history
Specialized in nudity Young boys and girls disrobe to dance a graceful saraband in a composition over six metres long. In 1884, the then famous French painter William Bouguereau (1825-1905), who specialized in nudity under mythological pretexts, created what he...
Musée d’Orsay: The black model, this unknown figure in the history of art
People refuse to see me “I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me. (…) When they approach me they see only my surroundings, themselves or figments of their imagination, indeed, everything and anything except me.” Invisible man In 1953...
Fondation Vuitton: Courtauld amassed pieces by Cézanne, Seurat and Manet in seven years. Zoom in on five exceptional artworks.
The good Impressionnism The word “Impressionism” may be ringing in the ears of the twenty-first-century man like a deterrent. Some people no longer want the endless greenish landscapes of late Pissarros,even though the artist was the great theorist of the movement,...
Modern art sales in London: how the prices for Picabia, Cézanne, Magritte and Duchamp are justified
Impressionnist and modern On 26 and 27 February in London, Sotheby’s and Christie’s will be presenting during the evening sales 126 impressionist and modern artworks with a total estimate of 290 million euros. These are the first significant sales of 2019 in this...
Foujita in Paris: women, cats and war. The greatest of Japan’s modern painters, merits rediscovery
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGMgYcPkLvs Much has been said about the influence of the Japanese on modern art, from Degas to Van Gogh, to the extent that this phenomenon even has a name: Japanism. Much less has been said about the influence of modern...
Cubism: The Centre Pompidou makes a real effort to explain this great artistic revolution with the help of an impressive array of masterpieces
Paul Cézanne father of all “Everything in nature is modelled on the sphere, the cone and the cylinder. One has to learn to paint from these simple shapes”. It’s 1904 and the artist writing these words, the Aix-born Paul Cézanne (1839-1906), has been doing a lot...
Villa Medici in Rome: the pornography of Eisenstein and Fellini, the minimalism of Mandela and the realm of the dead according to Victor Hugo. About the hobbies of geniuses
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTJYVDMXfow The French language is facetious. In order to provide an emphatic and worthy name for amateur artists, for those who practise a hobby, it has found a unique description that’s even entered international usage:...
Anni Albers at the Tate in London: a pioneering genius of modernity presented at last without her husband
Mr and Mrs… There are certain artists like that, especially when it comes to women, who are always presented as a couple. Take Sonia Delaunay, who is systematically associated with Robert, her guru. Take Sophie Taeuber-Arp, the other half of sculptor Jean Arp… We’re...
Modern and contemporary art sales in New York: the big excitement is over. Analysis in 8 artists
The prices of art at auction are constantly being pushed up. Although the large auction houses remain anxious to publish the satisfying results so as to globally keep up morale in the field, they also have a desire to conquer certain parts of the market, nowhere more...