Veridian E-Journal, Silpakorn University International (Humanities, Social Sciences and Arts) ISSN 1906 – 3431 Volume 11 Number 4 January-June 2018

Libertarian creeds and artists of the symbolist movements*

ลัทธิอิสรเสรีนิยมและศิลปินสัญลักษณ์นิยม

Sébastien Tayac (เซบาสเตียน ตา-ยาค)**

Abstract: The political, social and religious ideas of artists are usually put aside to present only their thoughts on the artistic field. To fill this void, the article focuses on unveiling the commitments and libertarian creeds of artists of the symbolist nebula at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century; namely, , the group of the Nabis and Joséphin Péladan.

Keywords: , libertarianism, Gauguin, Nabis, Péladan.

* The purpose of this article is to highlight the political, social and religious convictions, often hidden, of symbolist artists, with particular emphasis on their relationships with the different currents of anarchism. วัตถุประสงค์ของบทความนี้เพื่อเน้นย้้าความเชื่อมั่นทางการเมือง สังคม และศาสนา ที่มักถูกซ่อนเร้นในกลุ่มของศิลปินลัทธิสัญลักษณ์นิยม โดยเฉพาะอย่างยิ่งความสัมพันธ์ของพวกเขากับอนาธิปไตยในหลากหลายรูปแบบในปัจจุบัน ** Lecturer, Division, Visual Arts Department, Faculty of Fine Arts, Chiang Mai University. Email: [email protected] 453

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บทคัดย่อ: แนวคิดทางการเมือง สังคม และศาสนาของศิลปินมักถูกทิ้งไว้เพื่อน้าเสนอความคิดของพวกเขาใน ส่วนของศิลปะเท่านั้น เพื่อเติมเต็มช่องว่างดังกล่าวบทความนี้จึงมุ่งเน้นที่จะเปิดเผยความมุ่งมั่นของลัทธิอิสรเสรี นิยมของศิลปินลัทธิสัญลักษณ์นิยมเนบิวลา โดยเฉพาะ พอล โกแกง กลุ่มของ นาบิส และ โจเซแฟง เปลาดัง ช่วง ปลายศตวรรษที่สิบเก้าและช่วงต้นศตวรรษที่ยี่สิบ

ค ำส ำคัญ: ลัทธิสัญลักษณ์นิยม, ลัทธิเสรีนิยมประชาธิปไตย, โกแกง, นาบิส, เปลาดัง.

In the ruins of the French Second Empire (1852-1870), the French Third Republic (1870-1940) tried to implement national cohesion using patriotic and revenge ideals after the defeat in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871). In this period of bankruptcy of conservatism and generalized decadence, society was deeply bourgeois, led by a middle class that had just come to power and that was hostile to the demands of the proletariat, just as much as it displayed wariness of new developments in the arts. In this particular context, numerous links were established between the artistic and political fields, especially between symbolist and anarchist ideals. As an example of this relationship, in 1885, the Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin (1842-1921) published the book Paroles d’un révolté (Words of a Rebel), in which he addressed a message to artists. He wrote: You, poets, painters, sculptors, musicians, if you understand your true mission and the very interests of art itself, come with us. Place your pen, your pencil, your chisel, and your ideas at the service of the revolution […] Show the people how hideous is their actual life. (Quoted in Leighten, 2013: 6) Despite this context of cooperation between artists and revolutionaries, the symbolist painters were always perceived as being distant from the real world, “entrenched in the extreme limits of mystery, ending up producing alone and for their private use, exclusively” (Quoted in Pellois, 2012: 93, author’s translation). Contradicting this prejudice against symbolist artists, Jean-David Jumeau-Lafond has shown that they were: far from being recluses, living in the secret of the workshop and despising the contemporary world, far from dreaming of an idealized past only to advocate restoration, these painters and sculptors claimed the right to an idealist art, not only to transcend nature and fight against the supremacy of materialism, but also so that this elevated vision of human being could be collective and prelude to a new social era. (Jumeau-Lafond, 1999: 20, author’s translation)

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Nevertheless, even though studies on symbolists’ artworks and ideas about art are numerous, analyses of their political, social and religious thoughts are rare. Highlighting the political aspirations of the symbolists and not reducing them to their artistic visions appears relevant. Regardless, before delving into the ramifications that could exist between the doctrine of anarchism and artists of symbolist obedience, it is important to define these two notions. Anarchism and symbolism, as multifaceted movements, remain nebulae with poorly defined contours, which, like all such movements, are traversed by internal tensions. This postulate is fundamental to the understanding of this article. According to François Richard (1988: 9), the ideology of anarchism is defined by three branches. First, an anarchism of the left, stemming from the progressive thought of the eighteenth century, which played an important role in all the emancipation movements of the people (cf. Bakunin, Proudhon). Secondly, a “raw” anarchism, which does not refer to an ideology, but advocates absolute freedom and the rejection of any power whatsoever, and that is assimilated, rightly or wrongly, with excessive individualism (cf. Max Stirner). Finally, a right-wing anarchism, that has sources in the stream and libertine philosophy, which developed in literature, and elsewhere in aristocratic and libertarian themes (cf. Gobineau, Barbey d'Aurevilly, Bloy or Drumont). Symbolism appears in the current notions of as one of the last figurative movements before the abstraction phase and which, unlike , is associated with both the visual arts and literature. While the writings of Jean Moréas1 (1856-1910) or Albert Aurier2 (1865-1892) could be used to define symbolism, Rémy de Gourmont’s (1858-1915) definition, as it appeared in le livre des masques3 (The Book of Masks), seems more appropriate. For him, the word symbolism means: practically nothing, if we adhere to the narrow etymological sense. If we go beyond that definition, it may mean individualism in literature, liberty in art, abandonment of taught formulas, tendencies towards the new and the strange, or even towards the bizarre. (Gourmont, 1921: 10) Similar to Gustave Moreau (1826-1898), Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (1824-1898) or (1840-1916), Paul Gauguin is one of the precursors of symbolism. In the summer of 1888, Paul Sérusier sojourned in Pont-Aven (Brittany, in north western France). During an outdoor lesson with Gauguin, Paul Sérusier created a painting – later called le talisman - on

1 Moréas, Jean. « Le Symbolisme ». Le Figaro, le samedi 18 septembre 1886, Supplément littéraire, p. 1-2. 2 Aurier, G. Albert. « Le Symbolisme en Peinture : Paul Gauguin », Mercure de France, t. II, n° 15, mars 1891, p. 155-165. 3 The Book of Masks was published in 1896. 455

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the lid of a cigar box. When he returned to , Sérusier showed it to his classmates at the Académie Julian (firstly, Henri-Gabriel Ibels, , , , then, Ker-Xavier Roussel, Verkade and Vuillard). Le talisman became a revelation of what their art should become; these young artists created the group of Nabis, meaning “prophet” in Hebrew, around the personality of Paul Gauguin, their Messiah. They chose to refer to themselves using this term in order to state their common willingness to renew painting. With spiritual aims based in (doctrine of ancient Greece based on the myth of Orpheus) or in Theosophy (religious syncretism according to which all religions have a part of truth), the group of Nabis would later be joined by other artists such as Félix Vallotton (1892). Under the leadership of Paul Sérusier, these young artists formed a heterogeneous group in Paris from 1888 to 1900 which was in “competition” with the neo-impressionists for the legacy of the Impressionists. From 1892 to 1897, Joséphin Péladan (1858-1918) established in Paris an annual exhibition called the Salon de la Rose+Croix (sic) for painters, writers, and musicians. Occultist, historian of religions, art critic, novelist, essayist and playwright, Péladan shared both his Symbolist artistic ideals and his political views during these events. The Nabis were among the participants. All these symbolist artists were not only gentle dreamers, but also men with political and libertarian aspirations. In this way, the purpose of this article is to highlight the complex libertarian spirit of the symbolist artists in the last twenty years of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, focusing first on Paul Gauguin, then on the Nabis group, and finally on Joséphin Péladan and the Salon de la Rose+Croix.

1°) Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), or the eternal rebel Gauguin was the grandson of the socialist writer and activist Flora Tristan4 (1803- 1844). In Avant et après (Before and After), written in 1902-1903, Gauguin says that his, “grandmother was an odd old lady. […] Proudhon5 used to say that she had genius. Knowing nothing of the matter, I trust Proudhon” (Quoted in Prather & Stucker, 1987: 31). Even though Flora Tristan died four years before Gauguin was born, he, “idolized his grandmother, and kept copies of her books with him to the end of his life” (Bowness, 1971: 6). His father, Clovis Gauguin, anti-Bonapartiste and fervent republican, was a political columnist for the newspaper Le National. As a result of the mounting political tensions in France that followed the failure

4 The book Pérégrinations d’une Paria (Wanderings of an Outcast) published in 1838, made Flora Tristan’s literary reputation. 5 Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865) was a French libertarian socialist and journalist whose doctrines became the basis for later radical and anarchist theory (Retrieved on 3/12/2017 from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Pierre-Joseph-Proudhon. 456

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of the 1848 Revolution, in 1849, Clovis Gauguin headed for Peru with his wife Aline and their two children Marie and Paul, but died during the voyage. Gauguin lived with his mother and sister in Lima until 1855. Gauguin followed in the steps of his family's “tradition”, most likely due to the convictional battles he led throughout his life, from his wedding with his Danish wife Mette until his death in Marquesas Island.

Gauguin and his Danish family A self-taught painter, Gauguin had ties with various movements of the late nineteenth century (Impressionists, school of Pont-Aven, Nabis). His commitment as a painter cost him a "social decline" which coincided with the separation from his Danish wife, Mette Sophie Gad (1850-1920), and his five children. The contact with the Gad family emphasized a real horror of the Danish bourgeoisie for Gauguin as well as the bourgeoisie in general, especially its morality and its cult of money. By moving away from his family home, Gauguin, constantly in financial difficulties, continued his travels in search of a place that could quench his thirst for painting. However, his life had begun differently and was not supposed to turn out this way. Returning to France in 1855 from Peru with his mother and sister, Gauguin received a Catholic education, and even though he wrote, “I will not say […] that this education counts for nothing in my intellectual development; I think, to the contrary, that it did me a lot of good” (Quoted in Dorra, 2007: 9), Gauguin remained very critical about the institution and functioning of Catholic religion. Gauguin, by his remarks, stands out from religion to rationalism since he writes, “I believe that it is there that I learned from an early age to hate hypocrisy, false virtue, tattling [...] and to distrust anything that was antagonistic to my instincts and my reason” (Quoted in Dorra, 2007: 9). After Gauguin’s mother died in 1867, Gustave Arosa became the legal guardian of Gauguin and his sister. On his return to Paris in 1871 after his military service, he found himself immersed in a Protestant environment with Gustave Arosa and the stockbroker Paul Bertin, from whom he was offered a job. These two men introduced Gauguin to his future wife Mette, whom he married according to protestant tradition. However, there is no evidence to suggest that Gauguin attached great importance to these ceremonies and perhaps he just followed, “the desire of his wife born in a Danish Protestant family very involved in the Lutheran Church of his country” (Printz, 2009: online, author’s translation). In any case, Gauguin, haunted at that time of his life by death, the hereafter and religion, wrote an unpublished manuscript that he started in Tahiti (1897-1898) and finished in Atuona (1902), L’esprit moderne et le catholicisme (The modern spirit and Catholicism). He develops Divers 457

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choses (Various things), on the theme of the corruption of the gospel by the church, similarly to philosopher and historian Ernest Renan (1823-1892), to whom he compares himself, but with an emphasis on evangelical aspiration. In addition to this religious environment, the collector Gustave Arosa had another influence on Gauguin: the introduction to the world of art. Arosa was the owner of “an excellent private collection of modern – many works by Delacroix, some Corots, Courbets, Jongkinds, Pissarros, as well as pieces of oriental and exotic pottery” (Bowness, 1971: 7). Further, “as Gustave’s family also counted the impressionist among its acquaintances and owned a number of his paintings” (Dorra, 2007: 10); Gauguin seemingly met him in 1874. Thereafter, Camille Pissarro became his mentor and introduced him to other Impressionists artists such as Degas and Cézanne. Gauguin quickly became close to Camille Pissarro because he had “a William Morris like faith in the latent artistic talents of everyone, and a remarkable nose for exceptional men of genius” (Bowness, 1971: 8). A reader of French libertarian socialist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865) and Russian revolutionary Peter Kropotkin, between 1889-1890 Pissarro did a series of 28 pen and ink drawings entitled Turpitudes sociales (“social turpitude,” or disgraces) that evoke scenes of suicide, starvation, urban poverty, drunkenness, street crime, and violent insurrection. If the influence of Pissarro on the art of Gauguin is already widely studied, we must also take into account the political dimension. After Pissarro, Gauguin strengthened his relationship with Degas, the most rebellious personality of the Impressionist group, who did not forgive Renoir, Sisley and Monet for compromising with the Official Salon of 1882, which he considered a real treason. When Gauguin abandoned Pissarro for Degas, the reason was his attraction to those who refused to return to rank. Thus, he was impressed as much by the figure of Degas as by his and his irreducible independence. In both men, we find the same traits of misanthropy, an identical hatred for progress and the all-powerful bourgeois of the nineteenth century, and the contemptuous and aristocratic scepticism that characterizes "right-wing anarchy". Gauguin’s hatred of the bourgeoisie and the dogma and rituals of the pushed him towards anarchism.

Gauguin and the Spanish anarchists After having spent three weeks in London, Gauguin stopped on his return to Dieppe for two or three days. In his correspondence with his wife of September 19, 1885, he mentions his journey to London with the cryptic phrase, "You know where". He says he was there for the ‘affairs of Spain’:

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As you must have seen in the Copenhagen newspapers, the affairs of Spain have just become complicated and help the small evolution that we were looking for. It is only a matter of time, I have not failed to renew the friendship contracted. It is for the future, a business almost assured. (Gauguin, 1946: 50)

Such a remark may appear quite opaque; however, we must juxtapose it with Gauguin’s correspondence with Pissarro to better understand his words. From 1883 to 1885, Gauguin was associated with a group fomenting a revolution in Spain. At the beginning of August 1883, Gauguin, who spoke perfect Spanish, went to Cerbère to assist Ruiz Zorilla (1833- 1895) to cross the Franco-Spanish border at the moment when the Badajoz garrison was raised and proclaimed the republic. The uprising was part of the desire to overthrow King Alfonso XII (1857-1885). When the insurrection of Extremadura failed, Gauguin brought Ruiz Zorilla back to France hidden in a cart of hay. Bordeaux became the place of forced residence for the officers who took part in the uprising. Police reports of the surveillance of the turbulent community indicate the presence of a former MP, Don Carlos Amusco, who was in correspondence with Zorilla. The latter would come to Bordeaux on October 27, 1884, and the following year, on November 28, 1885. He sometimes resided in London, Geneva or Paris. It was probably he that Gauguin visited in London. In 1886, the headquarters of the Spanish revolutionary committee was held in Bordeaux. Since the death of Alfonso XII in December 1885, and the difficult establishment of the regent Marie-Christine, the revolutionary spirits were warming up. In January 1886, the Carlist army mobilized and made an agreement with Bordeaux anarchists sending them money to buy arms and ammunitions. On January 20, police reports divulge a meeting in Bordeaux that Ruiz Zorilla would attend. Gauguin seemed to be present in Bordeaux on the same date. An interesting proof appears in a painting by Gauguin, first called Port of Antwerp; however, after careful study, the Wildenstein Institute has shown that it was, indeed, a view of the Port of Bordeaux. The view is taken from Quai de Queyries at La Bastide. The stone bridge and the spire of the Gothic Saint-Michel church are very logically included in the painting. Interestingly, we notice that Gauguin created his painting on a day of high tide because the water reaches the limit of the first piles of the stone bridge. The Annuaire de la Gironde of 1886 indicates that the tide of 21 January was one of the strongest of the year. From these personal links with the anarchist milieu, Gauguin retained a profound disdain for all oppressive power. However, as Henri Dorra (2007: 14) notes, “Pissarro did not have unmitigated faith in the purity of Gauguin's intentions or in his political perspicacity”. Pissarro himself wrote, "I’m beginning to think that my poor Gauguin does not always see straight [...] 459

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He is always on the side on the cunning one [...] He is more naïve than I thought" (Quoted in Dorra, 2007: 14). In 1896, Gauguin’s quarrel with Seurat and Signac put an end to his contact with both artists and, apparently, with Pissarro as well. In 1888, Pissarro wrote to his son Lucien about Gauguin, “I reproach him for not having applied his synthesis in the service of our modern philosophy, which is absolutely social, anti-authoritarian and anti-mystical” (Quoted in Dorra, 2007: 21). This libertarian ideal would follow him in all his travels.

Gauguin or the colonial misanthrope Even in Tahiti or in the Marquesas Islands, Gauguin continued to meet the social order he hated. In his obituary about “Paul Gauguin” in the journal The Mercure de France, Charles Morice writes that, “his struggle against Western civilization, which he saw, over there, assuming the innocent and brutal shape of the surveyor or the gendarme [French policeman]” (Quoted in Prather & Stucker, 1987: 353). This ardent libertarian spirit could not bear that these men use their blue or black uniforms to abuse the power of impunity and the authority entrusted to them. Because of his solidarity and mutual aid towards the native population, Gauguin, claiming to have savage blood from the Incas, became a fervent anti- colonialist. In his articles for the journal Les guêpes (The Wasps), Gauguin was a polemical journalist, occasionally signing his letters with the pseudonym “Tit-oil”, which translates as “onanism” in Tahitian. In 1899, Gauguin continued to use his vitality to create a satirical newspaper that he wrote, illustrated, printed and published himself, Le sourire (The Smile), where he exalted his hatred of the settlers and their society. He considered himself the only white man on the spot capable of defending the Marquesan. In 1901, when Gauguin decided to settle in the Marquesas Islands, he first encountered the bishop who did not look favourably on his installation and refused him the sale of a piece of land. Gauguin had several times rendered services to the natives by delivering them from the gendarmes. He had also denounced the complacency and complicity of the gendarmes in the face of the contraband. The smugglers sold contraband-junks to men in exchange for vanilla or money and to the women for "caresses." After this denunciation, Gauguin was sentenced for defamation to three months imprisonment and a 500 Francs fine. His fiery temperament was not discouraged and he wrote to Charles Morice in a letter only a few days before his death, “I’m down, but not yet defeated. Is the Indian who smiles while being tortured defeated?” (Quoted in Prather & Stucker, 1987: 353); thus, he appealed this verdict with the profound certainty of his acquittal and the condemnation of the gendarmes, but he was taken by death on May 8, 1903 before he could complete his plan. As Charles Kunstler says, "Gauguin the independent, Gauguin the 460

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rebel, the cursed was buried with the Catholic pump by the bishop of the marquises in the small cemetery of the Mission" (Kunstler, 1947). The words of the bishop are even harder in the report he sent to Paris after Gauguin’s death, where he wrote, “the only noteworthy event here has been the sudden death of a contemptible individual named Gauguin, a reputed artist but an enemy of God and everything that is decent” (Quoted in Brodskaya, 2011: 5). Until the last twenty years, Gauguin’s life was mainly presented as such in all publications. However, since the early 2000s, researchers have been trying to show that Gauguin's anti- colonialist positions are not so clear. French historian Michel Pierre’s article in the Hors-série issue of Beaux-Arts magazine about the exhibition titled “Gauguin the alchemist” at the Grand Palais from October 11, 2017 to January 22, 2018, further enhances this mitigated perception of the artist. As Michel Pierre (2017: 38) explains, Gauguin was friends with “many settlers, even not really recommendable, starting with the mayor of Papeete, François Cardella, leader of the Catholic political party and director of the review Les guêpes, organs des intérêts français (The wasps, organs of French interest)”. Several times, Gauguin showed his solidarity with the settlers "in struggle against the administration, against the officials that he loathes and denounces […] Gauguin [also] challenges the state and its staff, vilipends governors and magistrates” (Pierre, 2017: 39). Gauguin's personality is more complex than has been shown in the past. If Gauguin helped both locals and settlers, he mainly fought against the state, its religion, and its representatives in this new world. If his art has been and continues to be studied, it is unfortunate that few publications take into account his political convictions.

2°) The “Nebulous Nabis” (1888-1900)6 The anticlericalism of the last 25 years of the nineteenth century led to the adoption of the French law on the “Separation of the Churches and the State” in 1905, the backbone of the French principle of laïcité. However, before the promulgation of this law, France had to go through different periods of social upheaval similar to the turmoil between 1892 and 1894 that Jean Maitron (1992: 206) calls “the era of the bombings”, when anarchist attacks provoked numerous state raids in anarchist circles that led to trials. Even before this period, the members of the Nabis started to show disparities in their political ideas, as some of them sympathized most sustainably with the libertarian movement. Thus, a sub-group of Nabis "anarchists" was formed: Roussel, Vuillard, Bonnard, Ibels, and Vallotton were the prevailing

6 Inspired by the 1993 exhibition of nabi graphic work “La Nébuleuse Nabie” [The Nebulous Nabi] entitle by François Fossier. 461

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members. This part of their works and of their personalities is known but often ignored in the main monographs and books that are highlighted here. In 1891, considering ‘propaganda through action” ineffective, Kropotkin specifies in La révolte (The revolt) that “an edifice based on centuries of history cannot be destroyed with a few pounds of explosive” (Quoted in Mayeur & Rebirious, 1984: 144). The beliefs of these Nabis are part of this vision of violent rejection. Accomplices in the artistic field, they were also politically implicated under cover of a deep friendship. Ker Xavier Roussel (1867- 1944) met Edouard Vuillard (1868-1940) in 1879 at the Lycée Condorcet, which was one of the best schools in Paris. Very strong ties united the two men and, logically, it was with, “Vuillard’s family that Roussel found refuge when his parents separated [1879], and he subsequently married Vuillard’s sister [1893]” (Kostenevitch, 2005: 167). Roussel dissuaded Vuillard from embracing a military career and persuaded him instead to enter the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1888, and later the Académie Julian. Bonnard made friends with Vuillard and Roussel, and the friendship lasted, in each case, until their death. After having adopted anarchist ideas widely from the literary circles of Paris at that time, Roussel approached the neo-impressionists who shared the same convictions as Henri-Edmond Cross (1856-1910), (1858-1941) and (1863-1935). Roussel knew and appreciated those artists who exhibited with him at the art gallery of Le Barcq de Boutteville. The arrest of in 1894 and the verdict of his trial, his sentence was two years in prison and a fine of 100 Francs, generated a petition of protest. Five painters (Paul Gauguin, Henry de Groux, H. G. Ibels, Maximilien Luce and Paul Signac) signed the petition published in the newspaper L’Echo de Paris. It is not surprising to find the signature of H. G. Ibels amongst them. Indeed, he was with his brother, André Ibels, who was involved with the anarchist networks and, in particular, with the journalist and writer Mécislas Goldberg. Pierre Aubéry (1978: 15), who worked with Mécislas Goldberg, emphasizes that H. G. Ibels, "was an illustrator and a writer well known in libertarian circles" (Aubéry, 1978: 15). In 1895, the libertarian press awoke, just as the anarchist movement changed tactics, recognizing the mistake of terrorism. Les Temps Nouveaux of Jean Grave, La Sociale of Emile Pouget and le Libertaire of Sébastien Faure were all launched that same year. As with La Révolte, the previous newspaper of Jean Grave, Les Temps Nouveaux was among the most serious newspapers whose sole purpose was the dissemination of libertarian ideas. Later, and in order to save the newspaper Les Temps Nouveaux, which was regularly in deficit, Jean Grave had the idea to organize paying conferences, during which tombolas were drawn. Vuillard, Vallotton, H. G. Ibels and Bonnard also donated artworks for

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these tombolas7. During the same period, Bonnard and Vuillard also created illustrations for L’Escarmouche, edited by the anarchist Georges Darien, author of the libertarian novel, Le Voleur. Despite his collaborations with the libertarian press, and in the words of Elie Faure (Quoted in Fermigier, 1984: 7) which point out the “delightful anarchism" of Bonnard, André Fermigier (1984: 22) notes that “Bonnard never seems to manifest the slightest religious or political convictions”. However, this neutrality or apolitical vision should be taken with caution. Indeed, Bonnard illustrated: The highly irreverent Almanachs du Pere Ubu (1899, 1901), or Jarry's Soleil de printemps, wherein one may read such disrespectful propositions as: "The spring sun shines even for the bourgeois; even for the curate. The curate's blackness sets off the colour of the sun." And, on the next page, Bonnard depicts the "Repopulator" in the guise of a satyr of particularly enterprising shape and deportment. (Fermigier, 1984: 23) In the catalogue of the exhibition Nabis 1880-1900, Anne Marie Sauvage recalls the words of aging Ibels explaining his emotions every time he saw Maurice Denis’ 1900 painting, Homage to Cézanne, which depicts a number of key figures of the Nabis. Ibels said “why am I not among them? It’s my fault, my great fault! Because of their wise and calm environment, I preferred the turbulence of political struggles” (Quoted in Sauvage, 1993: 177, author’s translation). His absence in this painting, where we find other Nabis (Vuillard, Sérusier, Ranson, Roussel, Bonnard and Denis), once again illustrates his social and political commitments, which could annoy Maurice Denis. Another Nabis also not in this painting was Félix Vallotton. Even though he was not French, Félix Vallotton was also involved with the group of Nabis. His affiliation with the anarchists predated his joining the group. Indeed, born in Switzerland to a bourgeois Calvinist family, Félix Vallotton arrived in Paris in 1882. He became a close friend of Charles Maurin, and faithful supporter of the anarchist newspaper the Temps Nouveaux. In the words of Thadée Natanson, "both painters hated the police; Maurin called them "bobbies" and even "dogs". Anarchist theories, which Lautrec had learned from Charles Maurin’s virulence, often provided Maurin and Vallotton with topics of conversation” (Thadée Natanson, 1948: 167, author’s translation). Thadée speaks more about the ideas of Vallotton who, "lived in a time and in an environment where they spoke willingly of anarchy. His misanthropy, or more so his experience of men, was not noticed. However, he would dare to refer to Bakunin or Stirner, whom he had read closely, or Emile Henry in whom he was very interested" (Thadée Natanson, 1948: 309, author’s translation). The early 1890s also seem to

7 Vallotton and Vuillard made donations for the tombola of 1899, Bonnard of 1900 and 1901, and Ibels in 1912. The exhaustive list of artist’s contribution to Les Temps Nouveaux was published in the appendices of the publication of Aline Dardel (1987: 43-46). 463

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have been the period of Vallotton’s most explicit political engagement, despite his self- consciousness and fashionably cultivated stance of non-partisan recorder. He did a number of illustrations specifically for anarchist journals, some commissioned, others submitted Le Père peinard and Les Temps nouveaux as well as La Revue anarchiste, founded by Ibels’s brother, André, in 1891 (Newman, 1991: 21). Many of Vallotton’s most provocative graphic works, among them The Anarchist, The Charge and The Demonstration, were created during the period of real anarchist frenzy which began in Paris with the riots of the 1st May of 1891 and ended with the fatal stabbing of , president of the Third Republic, on 24th June 1894. Even if some Nabis were not anarchists, like Maurice Denis, this fact did not prevent them from participating in the criticism and the satire of society. In his book Naissance des intellectuels: 1880-1900 (Birth of intellectuals: 1880-1900), Charle Christophe considers that "the artist, even if he adopts identical aesthetic positions to that of the writers, is less free socially or financially because of the constraints of the academic system or the requirements of its customers" (Charle, 1990: 25). The Nabis did not confirm Christophe Charle's theory, probably because they mainly came from a well-off background. Even though they were not all anarchists, a majority of them such as Paul Ranson or George Lacombe were fervently anticlerical.8 The house of Paul Ranson, 25 Boulevard , nicknamed the temple, was the place where this conviction was expressed. A puppetry was permanently installed on the premises and improvised pieces were played. Ranson9 created the character of the Abbé Prout (Abbot Prout) (imitation of the sound that a fart makes), with a big fleshy mouth, jowls and a double chin as a representation of a bon vivant in cassock. His aim was to stigmatize the unbridled occupations of the aristocracy, the bourgeoisie, and that of the clergy, which was personified in the figure of the abbot. In 1902, seven of these plays were published in the book L’Abbé Prout. Georges Lacombe, who had been brought up by the Jesuits, also had a deep aversion to religion and describes baptism as follows: "I do not know anything more pitifully grotesque and absolutely insufficient for people who no longer live at the back of

8 Anticlericalism, in Roman Catholicism, opposition to the clergy for its real or alleged influence in political and social affairs, for its doctrinarism, for its privileges or property, or for any other reason. Although the term has been used in Europe since the 12th and 13th centuries, it is associated in more recent history with the French Revolution and its aftermath. Retrieved on 09/12/2017 from https://global.britannica.com/topic/anticlericalism. 9 For more information about Ranson and the puppetry, see: « L’Abbé Prout de Paul Ranson : satire et théâtre de marionnettes chez », in La Satire. Conditions, pratiques et dispositifs, du romantisme au post-modernisme, XIXe-XXe siècles, Actes de la journée d’études du CIRHAC tenue le 10 juin 2006 à l’INHA à Paris, organisée par Catherine Wermester et Bertrand Tillier, publié en ligne sur le site Web de l’HiCSA, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, 2009 and Ranson-Bitker, Brigitte. (2009). « Paul Elie Ranson : un nabi « fou de guignol » in Paul Elie Ranson, 1861-1909. Du Symbolisme à l’, Paris : Somogy. pp. 27-43. 464

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caves, struggling with bears [as adversaries] for the philosophical debate" (Quoted in Elleridge, 1993: 195, author’s translation). This anticlericalism did not forbid them from counting Christian members among their group such as Maurice Denis (1870-1943) or (1868- 1946). The group of Nabis was a very heterogeneous group whose members had different political, social and religious opinions, of which we can say that the friendship and the artistic research welded.

3°) Joséphin Péladan (1858 – 1918): a controversial mage. In the 1880s, anti-militarist publications - Le Calvaire (The Calvary) (1886) of Octave Mirbeau (1886), Sous-offs (Non-commissioned officer) of Lucien Descaves (1889) and Biribi of Georges Darien (1890) - were multiplying, which deliberately took the opposite side of revenge killing against Germany. In 1886, the reformed but reservist young men - which was the case with Joséphin Péladan, who had been exempted from military service for being short-sighted - had been invited to spend twenty-eight days in the army. The writer did not present himself. As a punishment, he was therefore ordered to come and spend two days in prison. In la Décadence latine (Decadence latine), Péladan tells this story with his usual lyrical style. Here is an excerpt: In front of the knife of my country, my neck backed away, I had thought, at first, to throw my manuscripts and my magic in a trunk and to go to England, land of freedom, where the citizen is not the thing of the army; my homeland is the idea I evoke and the language I write; but I thought of my father, of my mother, full of years and mourning; that is why I am still French! (Péladan, 1886: 342, author’s translation)

For Péladan, this experience was an affront because for him it was a crime to surrender an intellectual to the army and he appealed to the artists of the past to justify his position. For him, "military service seems an unequivocal form of serfdom [...] When we think that Dante should have swept the barracks and Leonard rub down the horse of ramollot, one realizes that Balzac, the man of the state of individualism, had seen clearly and we must be reconquered against the number” (Quoted in Guillerm, 1981: 200). This conviction is also found in 2 of the 28 rules of the exhibition catalogue of the Salons de la Rose+Croix of 1892. By excluding "patriotic and military painting, such as Meissonier, Neuville and Detaille” in rule IV, and by not accepting "patriotic and historical sculpture" in rule VII, Péladan reaffirmed his anti-militarist ideas. Already, he had proclaimed his aversion to an , an art of the state. In the chapter devoted to civic painting in his book Le Vice Suprême (The Supreme Vice) (1884), he wrote the following condemnation: "No state painting, by grace, 465

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especially when it has no state" (Quoted in Da Silva, 1991: 28, author’s translation). With one sentence, Péladan showed his aversion against academicism and reaffirmation of his royalist convictions. Supporter of the monarchist regime against the republic, Péladan was also a convinced Catholic whose acts oscillated unmistakably between the position of the “profaner” and the “prophet”. Thus, he aligned himself with the positions of the church when he criticized Ernest Renan's Life of Jesus (1863), which propels a sceptical reconstruction of the life of Jesus. This book remained, for him as for the holy fathers of the church, an unacceptable attack. Having said that, he had also distinguished himself by criticizing violently, in the newspaper Le Figaro of November 20 and December 12, 1890, the too accommodating policy of Pope Leo XIII (papacy, 1878-1903) towards the French Third Republic. In these two articles, Péladan had practically threatened to excommunicate cardinal Rampolla, Secretary of State of the Vatican, and cardinal Lavigerie, who supported the attitude of Pope Leo XIII in France. On the occasion of a congress in Malines in 1891, the Catholic Church denounced Baudelaire, Barbey d'Aurevilly, Villiers of Isle-Adam, Verlaine and Joséphin Péladan as authors who dishonoured their faith (Da Silva, 1991: 26). Despite Péladan’s conflictual relations with the Holy See, its main enemy was the Republic. Furthermore, Péladan rejects, “the words of its motto [which] contain three unnatural propositions: liberty is the negation of duty; equality is the negation of justice; fraternity is the negation of selfishness, and the state has no right to ask for it” (Quoted in Besnard-Coursodon, 1983: 121, author’s translation) and the universal suffrage that “gives only to him [the workers] the right to send bourgeois to the Chamber, and to serve cannon fodder” (Quoted in Besnard-Coursodon, 1983: 123, author’s translation). This sentence also illustrates an important point regarding the personality of Péladan, his real concern for the people, the working class, which needs appropriate education. French poet and art critic Camille Clair (1872-1945) recounts one evening when Péladan was invited to talk in a small village in the Parisian suburbs, where efforts were being made to create a youth educational centre. During this evening, Péladan talked about: the Art of the Cathedral’, organising projections of the portals of Rheims, Chartres, Amiens, using the most special terms of architecture, rising at the most strenuous considerations of the genius of the ‘maître d’oeuvre’, highlighting faith and Christian symbolism, in short a magnificent conference for the School of Chartres or the School of the Louvre […] projected onto 200 “drudges” from the fields and factories whom bewildered, yawning and grumbling, eventually booed and left slamming doors. Only about twenty or so Bourgeois remained, not less bewildered, but more polite. (Mauclair, 1922: 84-85, author’s translation)

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Despite his good intentions, Péladan remained throughout his life misunderstood. In the catalogue of the Salon Rose+Croix, Péladan specified in rule XV that for him, "the foreign word has no meaning. His salon has the highest international character" (Quoted in Da Silva, 1991: 114, author’s translation). As a symbol of this “internationalist artistic symbolism” during the salons, Belgians (Fernand Khnopff and Jean Delville), Dutch-Indonesian (Jan Toorop), Swiss (Vallotton) and German (Carlos Schwabe) artists exhibited together. In addition to its eccentricity, Péladan also cultivated contradictions. Even though Péladan “rises against nationalism, against colonialism, in favour of internationalism” (Quoted in Besnard- Coursodon, 1983: 126, author’s translation), he insisted in rule XXVII of the Salon that “according to the magical law no woman's work will ever be exposed" (Quoted in Da Silva, 1991: 116, author’s translation). This rule was not a coincidence because Péladan maintained ambiguous relationships with women. Castrating, misleading and perverse women, Péladan perfectly illustrated by this rule the prevalence of misogyny at the end of century. But, as always for Péladan, this rule was relaxed in practice and “at least five female artists showed works at the Salon despite a key rule prohibiting their exhibition […] Maggie Boehmer-Clark, Delphine Arnould de Cool, Hélène Cornette, Judith Gauthier, and Antoinette de Guerre” (Slavkin, 2014: 219). Ultra-Catholic, antinationalist, internationalist, misogynist, monarchist and anti- republican, it seems particularly difficult to perceive the coherence of the thought of Péladan. Likewise, Roger Thierry highlights: Exaltation of artistic and political individualism leads to a serious confusion and misunderstanding between libertarian individualism, anti-state and properly anarchist libertarianism on the one hand, and an aristocratic, anti-democratic and anti-modern, indeed reactionary, individualism on the other. One attacks institution and authority, while the other attacks the people, universal suffrage and equality understood as egalitarianism (Roger, 2016: 67, author’s translation).

In this sense, Péladan was one of those men of the nineteenth century who navigated into the libertarian nebula, looking for an ideal tinged with values of the past blended with those of the time in which he lived. Involved in the symbolist nebula, Gauguin, the Nabis, and Péladan were all committed to the hustle and bustle of their time. Their quest for the absolute, whether in distant lands or in idealized worlds, did not deter them from the reality of a society in the throes of profound changes. Symbolists were intellectuals concerned by what was happening

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around them, and not only about their own feelings. Another key factor to remember is that they denounced the oppressive power of the state, the religion, the bourgeoisie and the capitalism that together enslaved the working class. Moreover, they were imbued with the various libertarian values and thoughts of the late nineteenth century. Social, political or religious, the commitments of symbolist artists with libertarian causes contrasts with the vision that the gives of them, showing once again the complex relationship between the artistic and political avant-garde. All things considered, this article should not be perceived as the final result of research, but rather as a proposal for future studies based mainly on the social, political and religious thoughts of artists.

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Jumeau-Lafond, Jean-David. (1999). Les peintres de l’âme, le symbolisme idéaliste en France. Gand: Pandora. Kostenevitch, Albert. (2005). Bonnard and the nabis. New York: Parkstone Press. Kunstler, Charles. (1947). Gauguin. Paris: Floury. Laurant, Jean Pierre. (1990). Les Péladan. Paris: l’âge de l’homme. Leighten, Patricia. (2013). The Liberation of Painting: and Anarchism in Avant- Guerre. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Maitron, Jean. (1992). Le mouvement anarchiste en France. 1. Des origines à 1914. Paris: Gallimard. Mauclair, Camille. (1922). Servitude et grandeur littéraires. Paris: Ollendorff. Mayeur, Jean-Marie Mayeur & Rebirioux, Madeleine. (1984). The Third Republic from Its Origins to the Great War, 1871-1914. New York: Cambridge University Press. Nabis, 1888-1900 : Pierre Bonnard, Maurice Denis, Henri-Gabriel Ibels, Georges Lacombe, Aristide aillol, Paul-Elie anson, zsef ippl- nai, Kerr-Xavier Roussel, Paul érusier, élix Vallotton, Jan Verkade, Edouard Vuillard: [exposition] Zurich, Kunsthaus, 28 mai - 15 août 1993 : Paris, Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, 21 septembre 1993 - 3 janvier 1994. Munich: Prestel-Verlag. Natanson, Thadée. (1948). Peints à leur tour. Paris: Albin Michel. Newman, Sasha. (1991). M. Félix Vallotton. Yale University Art Gallery: Abbeville Press. Péladan, Joséphin. (1886). La décadence latine, Ethopée, Curieuse ! Paris: Librairie de la Presse. Pellois, Anne. (2012). « Le théâtre symboliste : de la critique sociale à l’utopie civique et théâtrale ». Etudes Littéraires. 43 (3), pp. 93-108. Pierre, Michel. « Un peintre au temps des colonies. Dans la peau du journaliste polémiste et engagé ». Beaux-Arts. Hors-Série. Octobre 2017, pp. 38-39. Prather, Marla. & Stuckey, Charles. (1987). Gauguin: A Retrospective. New York: Park Lane. Printz, Othon. (2017, December 4). « Gauguin, sa « Bible Protestante » et ses célèbres Eves. Retrieved from http://othonprintz.blog.lemonde.fr/files/2009/06/gauguin-et-sa- bible.1245988930.pdf Richard, François. (1988), L’anarchisme de droite dans la littérature contemporaine. Paris: P.U.F.

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Roger, Thierry. (2016). “Art and Anarchy in the time of Symbolism: Mallarmé and His Literary Group.” S: Journal of the Circle for Lacanian Ideology Critique. Vol. 9. pp. 58-81. Slavkin, Mary. (2014). "Dynamics and Divisions at the Salons of The Rose-Croix: Statistics, Aesthetic Theories, Practices, and Subjects". CUNY Academic Works. http://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/385

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