Rivals and Conspirators
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Rivals and Conspirators Rivals and Conspirators: The Paris Salons and the Modern Art Centre By Fae Brauer Rivals and Conspirators: The Paris Salons and the Modern Art Centre, by Fae Brauer This book first published 2013 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2013 by Fae Brauer All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-5376-3, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-5376-7 FOR JUSTIN FLEMING TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................................................... ix Glossary of Terms ........................................................................................................................................................ xi Preface ......................................................................................................................................................................... xii Visiting One Friday at the French Artists’ Salon No. 1: State Fine Arts Undersecretary, Henri-Charles Dujardin-Beaumetz Careerists and Lobbyists Marginalizations and Ostracizations Conspicuous Absences Introduction ................................................................................................................................................................... 1 The Paris Salons and the Modern Art Centre “The Holy Place of its Time”: Paris and its Networks “The Field of Cultural Production”: An Institutional Art History Outline of Contents Chapter One ................................................................................................................................................................. 12 The Persistence of Tradition: The Old Salon in the New Republic Bouguereau’s “Grand Art” Moral Order Salons and Impressionist Exhibitions: “Grand Art” and Popular Culture “The Triumph of the Republic”: “The Glorification of the Arts” Turquet’s “Turkey”: Overhauling the Salon Chapter Two ................................................................................................................................................................ 67 The Persistence of Power: The New Salon in the New Republic Forging a Universal Suffrage Salon Opposing Gender Discrimination: Forming the Women’s Salon The Return of “Rigour” and “Severity”: National Exposition of Living Artists “Neither Jury, nor Awards”: The Independent Artists’ Salon Failure of the “Universal Suffrage” Salon: The Persistence of Hierarchy and Meritocracy Chapter Three ............................................................................................................................................................ 107 Patriotism and Dissonance: Forging the National Fine Art Salon Patriots and Traitors: The Bouguereau-Meissonier Schism “An exhibition is a patriotic work”: Boulangism and Meissonier’s “Ferocious Patriotism” “Nothing more than an elegant club”: Gentlemen’s “Cercles” and the National Society “All the world flocked to see the Salon of dissidents”: The Triumphant Opening Chapter Four .............................................................................................................................................................. 138 Identity Crises: Elitists and Refusés “A Salon as beautiful as the throne of Meissonier”: Redefining the French Artists’ Salon Forsaking the “Universal Suffrage” Salon: The Fall of Bouguereau, the Rise of Bonnat “A coterie more closed than the old Salon”: The Decorative Arts Salon and Anquetin’s coup “What a salad!”: The Third Salon Chapter Five .............................................................................................................................................................. 163 “Art By and For the People”: The Republic of Decorative Arts at the Salons Proust’s Salon: Showcasing “New Tendencies” and “New Sculpture” “Democracy in Oils” or “An Aristocratic Society”? The French Artists’ Identity Crisis “A temple dedicated to Art-God”: Salon de la Rose+Croix “L’Art dans tout”: Forging a Republic of Decorative Arts at the Salons viii Table of Contents Chapter Six ................................................................................................................................................................ 202 Chauvinists and Cosmopolitans: Art Nouveau, L’art dans tous and “L’unité de l’art” “Solidarity among all the arts”: The Panama Scandal, Dreyfus Affair and “the dynamite years” “L’unité de l’art”: L’Art dans tous and L’Art Nouveau Infiltrating the French Artists’ Salon: The Caillebotte Legacy, Decorative Art and the Double Salon Chapter Seven ............................................................................................................................................................ 230 The Spectacle of French Artists’ Supremacy: Staging the 1900 Universal Exposition Stabilizing the Republic: The Universal Exposition and the Dreyfus “Battle” Dividing the Spoils: Salon Equity at Universal Expositions “The Takeover”: Hegemony of the “Pontiffs” at the Decennial Counteracting the “Pontiffs”: Inverting the Stakes at the Centennial and Retrospective Expositions Rancour and Revolt: Overthrowing the “Pontiffs” Chapter Eight ............................................................................................................................................................. 282 New Rivals: The Salon d’Automne in the Radical Republic Overcoming “The Death-Sentence”: The Salon d’Automne in the Bloc des Gauches “The Field of Battle”: The Salon d’Automne and the “Bigwigs” “Wild Beasts”: Dujardin-Beaumetz, Fauvism and the Salon d’Automne “Invisible Hegemony”: The Subtefuge of Eclecticism and Transparency Chapter Nine .............................................................................................................................................................. 329 Rivals as Conspirators: The Salons at War “The French Decorative Art Crisis”: Morocco, Munich Designers and Cubists “Made in Germany”: Pacifist Infiltration and Alien Artists Hooligans and Transgressors: Lampué and Expulsion of the Salon d’Automne Orphism and Pornography: Salon d’Automne and the Senate Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................................. 386 Rivals and Conspirators: Revisiting One Friday at the French Artists’ Salon Bibliography .............................................................................................................................................................. 404 Index .......................................................................................................................................................................... 418 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS A project of this scale and complexity would have been impossible without the support of many people, institutions and organizations, not least those who continue to manage the art societies and salons in Paris. Professor Christopher Green at The Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, nurtured its early growth during my PhD under his excellent supervision. As this project matured into a book, he proved a wonderful sounding board for mulling over ideas emanating from the research. At The Courtauld Institute of Art, I was also fortunate to reap the benefit of the immense knowledge of the Salon and Salon des Artistes Français of the late John House and the deep knowledge of modernism, particularly Cubism, of the late John Golding. Marie-Claude Genet-Delacroix, Professeur at the Université de Reims, raised many insightful points about the operation of the State’s art institutions, particularly the Conseil Supérieur des Beaux-Arts. Others who readily did so were the late Filiz Burhan, Anthea Callen, Neil McWilliam and Virginia Spate. The pioneering research on the State’s relationship to art and on the Salons conducted by Pierre Vaisse, Professeur de l’histoire de l’art contemporain at the Université de Genève, provided a constant source of reference and of inspiration. The publications of James Kearns on the early salons and the book published by him and Vaisse, “Ce Salon à quoi tout se ramène”: Le Salon de peinture et de sculpture, 1791-1890 proved immensely helpful in relation to the early salon and its demise, as did the excellent conference convened in September 2013 by Kearns at the University of Exeter, The Paris Art Salon, 1791-1881. The research and publications by Gilles Plum on the Grand Palais were able to bring to light many architectural and institutional details about this State Palace on Paris Municipal terrain that would have otherwise remained obscured. All of Albert Boime’s publications were an incessant source of information and inspiration, particularly Art and the French Commune: Imagining Paris after War and Revolution, as were Debora Silverman’s, particularly her outstanding treatise, Art Nouveau in Fin-de-Siècle France: Politics, Psychology and Style, and Richard Thomson’s recent books, particularly Art of the Actual: Naturalism and Style in Early Third Republic France, 1880-1890 and The Troubled