Monday, May 13, 2019

Art Book Review: From Drawing to Painting

Pierre Rosenberg is an extremely accomplished scholar and art historian.  When it comes to the five artists - Nicolas Poussin, Jean-Antoine Watteau, Jacques-Louis DavidJean-Honoré Fragonard, and Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres - who are the subject of From Drawing to Painting, few others are as competent to discuss their merits and faults.  As co-author of the catalogues raisonné of all five artists, whom Rosenberg considers "among the greatest of French draftsmen," he possesses an exhaustive knowledge of their lives and works.

The book itself is an adaptation of a series of A.W. Mellon Lectures given at Washington's National Gallery of Art in1996.  As such, the tone is informal and thankfully much less dry than one would expect of so erudite a scholar.  Moreover, both the book's excellent design and the inclusion of some 230 reproductions illustrating the author's arguments make the work fully accessible to laymen, even those possessing only a rudiementary knowledge of French art.

Rather than devoting a single chapter to each artist, the author has wisely chosen in each of the six chapters to address a specific problem by discussing the work of all five artists in relation to it. Thus, while the first chapter serves as an introduction to all five, the second, entitled "The Drawings: Their Histories, Techniques, and Themes," compares the five's drawings to one another, noting the similarities and differences in styles among them.  In this respect, it should be noted that the later artists were influenced, sometimes heavily, by their predecessors.  At times they even made copies of one another's works.  David, for example, was not only the teacher of Ingres but even found Fragonard employment at the Louvre when that artist found himself in dire straits.

Many of the issues addressed in the various chapters have applicability beyond the works of the five artists, and indeed of French art in general.  One particularly fascinating essay, "On the Attribution and Dating of the Drawings," has relevance to anyone interested in the process by which works of uncertain provenance are assigned to particular artists.  Forgeries, though rampant, are not the only problems faced by an author attempting a catalogue raisonné or a gallery owner preparing an exhibit.  In one instance, Rosenberg goes into a great deal of detail in explaing why in compiling the catalogue raisonné of Poussin's oeuvre, he and his co-author disallowed a large number of drawings formerly attributed to that artist, most notably a series of highly admired works that once formed part of the Crozat estate.

While the book is in general remarkably successful in educating its audience - I for one greatly enjoyed reading it - there remain a few quibbles.  For one thing, the title is somewhat misleading in its reference to painting.  Although several paintings by the five artists are discussed, it is almost always in relation to drawings that served as prepatory studies for the final works.  Throughout the book, emphasis is placed almost exclusively on the artists' drawings.  This is in itself not so great a drawback as long as the unwary reader does not anticipate any in-depth analysis of the painted works. 

The second problem has to do with the choice of artists.  After having only last year seen the two major exhibits of Delacroix's works at the Met Museum, I find it unforgiveable that so great an artist should have been entirely omitted from consideration here.  His absence seriously skews the study of the remaining five.  The famous rivalry between Delacroix and Ingres, for example, was representative of the conflict between Romanticism and neo-Classicism for ascendancy in nineteenth century French art.  Rosenberg himself is aware of the problem.  In the introduction he writes:
"Delacroix, I confess, does not inspire me.  I acknowledge his genius but it holds no attraction for me, and I do not understand him well (can we understand what we do not really appreciate?)."
An art historian, of course, is as entitled to his likes and dislikes as any layman.  Such a blatant disregard for one of the greatest French artists, however, cannot help but call into question the author's objectivity.

A final concern is the quality of the reproductions,  Though as noted above there are copious illustrations in every chapter, they are unfortunately all in monochrome.  Any consideration of the artists' use of color is thereby rendered moot.  This is hardly a minor point. 

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