L'éternel Décoratif: French Art in the 1950S

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L'Éternel Décoratif: French Art in the 1950s Author(s): Romy Golan Reviewed work(s): Source: Yale French Studies, No. 98, The French Fifties (2000), pp. 98-118 Published by: Yale University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2903230 . Accessed: 20/11/2011 16:29

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http://www.jstor.org ROMY GOLAN

L'EternelDecoratif: FrenchArt in the 1950s

In 1953,the magazine Art Digest published a symposiumon theques- tion"Is theFrench Avant-Garde Overrated? " The threeyoung Ameri- can paintersinterviewed, Ralston Crawford, Robert Motherwell, and JackTworkov, said they did not find the question relevant to their work, addingthat it smackedboth of nationalism and provincialism.Clem- ent Greenberg,on the otherhand, the sole criticon the panel,found himselfcompletely in his elementand was onlytoo happyto answera questionthat his own writingshad donemuch to provoke.Yes, he an- swered,France's cultural prestige did account in largepart for the critical andcommercial success of the latest exportation of French abstract painting.Largely dismissive of that success, he wenton to articulatea crucialdifference between the French and the American versions of Ab- stractExpressionism: "In Paris,they 'finish' and unify the abstract pic- turein a waythat makes it moreagreeable to standardtaste. They still go for'paint quality' in the acceptedsense. They 'enrich'the surface withfilms of oil orvarnish, or with buttery paint. The resultis softer, suaver.If Abstract Expressionism embodies a visionof its own, that vision is tamedin Paris."1Almost every adjective in Greenberg'sstate- mentpoints in thesame direction:the weakness of the French for belle peinture.Such commentsalso indicatethe extentto which the "triumphof American painting" in the 1950s was predicatedon the de- motionof French painting to thedecorative. The culturewars between Franceand Americain the 1940sand 1950shave providedboth edify- ingand engrossingmaterial for art historical writing. One aspectthat has been overlooked,however, except for a passingif pointed remark

1. "Symposium:Is theFrench Avant-Garde Overrated?," Art Digest (15 September 1953):12.

YFS 98, TheFrench Fifties, ed. SusanWeiner, C 2000 byYale University. 98 ROMY GOLAN 99 by Serge Guilbaut in his book How New YorkStole the Idea ofModern Art,is preciselythe question of the decorative,and, more specifically, the critical link between the desire forlarge-size pictures in the 1950s and the decorative.2 It is Clement Greenbergwho, in two articles published in 1948, described the situation most perceptively: Thereis a persistenturge, as persistentas it is largelyunconscious, to go beyondthe cabinet picture which is destinedto occupyonly a spot on thewall, to a kindof picture that, without actually becoming iden- tifiedwith the wall likea mural,would spread over it andacknowledge its physicalreality.... But it is a factthat abstract painting shows a greaterand greater reluctance for the small, frame-enclosed format. Ab- stractpainting being flat, needs a greaterextension of surface on which to developits ideals than does the old threedimensional easel painting. Thus while the painter'srelation to his arthas becomemore private thanever before because of a shrinkingappreciation on the public's part, thearchitectural and, presumably social location for which he destines his producthas become,in inverseratio, more public. This is thepara- dox,the contradiction, in themaster-current ofpainting.3 What Greenbergchose to overlook,however, even thoughhe was writing forthe Marxist Partisan Review, was the ideological dimension of this so-called "crisis of easel painting,"the title of Greenberg'sfirst article. To understand"the situation at the moment," the title ofGreen- berg's second article,one has to delve into the 1930s. For it is the thir- ties that had witnessed, both in Europe and in the United States, the revival of mural painting. And it is the 1930s which, politically trou- bled as theywere, cast theirlong shadow onto the 1950s. AfterWorld War II, the desirefor mural painting-or ratherfor a "mural effect"(for technicallyspeaking veryfew of these images were actually murals)- had persisted.Yet it had now become ideologically tainted. It became imperativeto dispel any distastefulhints of an art formwhose revival had been so oftenassociated in the 1930s with either Communist or

2. SergeGuilbaut, How New YorkStole theIdea ofModern Art: Abstract Expres- sionism,Freedom, and theCold War(Chicago: University of Chicago Press: 1983), 196. See also his "PostwarPainting Games: The Roughand the Slick,"in Reconstructing Modernism:Artin New York,Paris, and Montreal1945-1964, ed. SergeGuilbaut (Cam- bridge,Mass: MIT Press,1990): 30-79. 3. ClementGreenberg, "The Situationat theMoment, " in Greenberg,The Collected Essaysand Criticism:Arrogant Purpose 1945-1949, vol 2, ed. JohnO'Brian (Chicago: Universityof Chicago Press, 1986), 194-95; see also,in thesame volume, "The Crisisof theEasel Picture,"221-25. 100 YaleFrench Studies Fascist indoctrination.Figuration and storytellingin any stylethat vaguelysmacked of eitherneoclassicism or Socialist Realism were thus categoricallyforsaken for abstraction. During the 1930s,the re- quirementthat mural painting be integralto thewall andwedded to ar- chitecturehad been grounded not so muchin thefear of the decorative as in thedesire for a monumentalart that would embodytotalitarian regimes'aspirations to last fora millennium.This is whyit became crucialafter the war for mural-size images to be relatedbut ultimately distinctfrom architecture. Murals in the 1930s had been eminently propagandisticin theirpublic mode ofaddress. Hence it was now es- sentialfor mural-size works to retreatfrom the public sphere into the autonomousspace of the modern art museum or into the private sphere of the art collector'sapartment. But, as a resultof theirabstraction, theirdetachment from architecture, and theirretrenchment into a private or semi-privatespace, large works now ranthe risk of becoming "'mereornament," "little more than pleasing decoration." Some ad- justmentshad to be made.4The workshad to becomehybrids: some- wherein betweenthe mural and thelarge easel painting. Whilehe mayhave adopted, by the 1950s,a patronizingattitude to- wardFrench painting, Greenberg remained faithful to his earlyloves. He thusfound himself having to make a special case in orderto "sal- vage" Matisse.By the time of his 1951MOMA retrospective,Matisse had recentlyventured, with his mural-sizepaper and textilecutouts, intothe most unabashedly decorative phase of his career(Fig. 1): Thereis a habitof referring toMatisse as a decorator.The irony is that puredecoration is thearea in whichhe hasfailed oftenest. His paper cut-outs,his ventures into applied art, and most of what I haveseen of histapestry designs, and even murals seem to me thefeeblest of the thingshe hasdone. He is an easelpainter from first to last: this is ob- scured-ifit really is-only by the unprecedented success of his effort toassimilate decoration to the purposes of the easel picture without at the same timeweakening the integrityof the latter.... Matissewas flatteninghis motifs for the sake of a moreabstract, purer, and suppos- edlymore soothing effect. But the results amount to much more than decoration.5

4. Althoughnone of the essays deal withthe 1950s,see theexcellent Not at Home: The Suppressionof Domesticity in ModernArt and Architecture,ed. ChristopherRead (London:Thames and Hudson, 1996). 5. Greenberg,"Feeling Is All" (1952),in Greenberg,The CollectedEssays and Criti- cism:Affirmations and Refusals1950-1956, vol. 3, (1993),100-101. ...~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~...... - .. ...:....i.: .}is F } ;e.|eS.....>.. -l e~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.l l..... | | l l |

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n: __ . r _ -~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~SC-h} Fiue1 er Maise Pae cu-ou in the aris' Nie Rerite in Henr Maise Paper..CutOut(NeYok>bam,17"Acrobats,"93 aprmet 102 Yale FrenchStudies Eightyears later, in the exhibitioncatalog of Joan Miro's MOMA retrospective,curator James Thrall Soby likewise had to make a special plea forthe artist's two recent mural commissions in America:one for theGourmet Restaurant in Cincinnati'sTerrace Hilton Hotel (Fig.2), the otherfor the dininghall of HarknessCommons in the Graduate Centerat Harvard.About the former he wrote:"The mural'sgaiety and sweepare mostimpressive. Here beyondquestion is a masterdecora- torat work,and if the mural lacks theprofundity of Miro's finest easel pictures,it neverthelessfulfills brilliantly its festivepurpose." And aboutthe latter: "Doubtless the fact that the mural was plannedfor an educationalinstitution persuaded Miro to work with a sternercreative impetusthan he had forthe Cincinnati hotel's dining room wall. "6 In the eyesof American critics during the 1950s,it was barelyac- ceptablefor older French or Paris-based artists to dabblein decoration. Whenit came to theyoung artists of the New YorkSchool, however, theslightest hint at an interactionbetween big paintings and thedec- orativehad to be avoided.Thus Mark Rothko,who had acceptedin 1958a commissionto painta groupof five mural canvases for the Four Seasons Restaurantat the SeagramBuilding in New York,refused at thelast minute to deliverthe work when it was completeda yearlater. He eventuallygave thepaintings to theTate Galleryin London,with the strictstipulation that they always be exhibitedon theirown in a specialroom. And even as MOMA was aboutto sendits show The New AmericanPainting on a "GrandTour" to eightEuropean capitals, the criticE. C. Goosen was stillbusy securing the statusof Abstract Ex- pressionistpainting in an articleentitled "The BigCanvas, " writtenfor ArtInternational in 1958: Thesize of such pictures is notadjusted to the size of the kind of rooms wecurrently live in. Even museums are not in love with large pictures. Recently,however, such canvases have forced their way into rooms wherethey consume the entire wall space, and in turn affect the qual- ityof life in the room pressing an emotional experience upon those who usedto have to stand and peer.7 This kindof rhetorical exercise, stressing the prerequisite "difficulty" ofgood modern art, had becomeall themore necessary as disclaimer and antidote.Two richlyillustrated books publishedin New York-

6. JamesThrall Soby, loan Mir6(New York: The Museumof Modern Art, 1959): 122- 24. 7. E. C. Goosen,"The BigCanvas," Art International 2/8 (November 1958): 45-47. _____jj__j__ .___jj____ ...... - - ...... - - --

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Figure2. JoanMir6, Gourmet Room, Plaza Hotel,Cincinnati, 1947. 104 Yale FrenchStudies Artin ModernArchitecture, written by Eleanor Bitterman in 1952,and Artin EuropeanArchitecture, written by Paul Damaz in 19578-re- vealed that an unprecedentednumber of Americanand European artistshad become involvedwith mural-size paintings, ceramic mo- saics,tapestry hangings, and enamels during the 1950s.These werein- tendednot for the walls ofgovernment buildings such as townhalls and post offices,as had been the case in the 1930s,but forpurely recre- ational settings:restaurants, lounge bars, night clubs, hotel lobbies, and patios,both on land and on ocean liners(Fig. 3). These projectsin- volvedmostly second-tier artists. Still, art criticism had to stepin to stopthe tide and securethe separation of high and low. Frenchcritics, too, made sure to dissociate themselves from the decorative.They did it bothfor their own sakes and in responseto the newlycondescending tone of American writing on thingsFrench. Thus in 1949,Christian Zervos, the editor of Cahiers d'art, a magazinethat had devotedmany special issues to Matisse overthe years, expressed an evenharsher view of the artist's paper cutouts than Greenberg would two yearslater when he firstsaw themat the Musee National d'Art Moderne: Is it necessaryto saythat one should pay no attentionwhatsoever to thesepaper cutouts that constitute, with the decorative hangings, the bigdeal at the Matisse exhibition? As far as I amconcerned they are to- tallynegligible and nefarious neighbors to thepaintings.... The best theycould do would be tofunction as a textileor a wallpaperdesign.9 The painterAndre Masson tookthe same route when in 1952he wrote thefirst major article on Claude Monet'sNympheas since their instal- lationin twospecially designed oval rooms at theMusee de l'Orangerie almosttwenty years earlier. Masson had spentthe war yearsin the UnitedStates in close contactwith the future Abstract Expressionists. He knewexactly what it took to bringMonet's late work,which had justbeen rediscovered by the younger generation of American painters, back underthe Frenchmantle. What Monet had called his "Grandes Decorations"when they were painted in thelate 1920swere thus re- cast byMasson as largeeasel paintings: Onecould dream of a Monetturning toward the use of large canvases, clearand iridescent, the preserve ofVeronese and Tiepolo. Do notdream

8. Bothwere published by Reinhold Publishers, New York. 9. ChristianZervos, "A proposde l'expositionMatisse au Mus6e d'ArtModerne de Paris,"Cahiers d'Art 1 (1949):159-72, my translation. 2EW11"' W

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Figure3. MichaelRachlis, wall tapestry,Andrea Doria Ocean Liner,ca. 1955.Repninted mn Paul Damaz, Artmn EuropeanArchitecture (New York:Reinhold, 1956). 106 Yale FrenchStudies anymore; consider his supremework, the Nymphgas. Despite their monumentaldimensions, they do not have the characteristics ofgrand Venetianor Flemish decoration. His disposition of spirit appears to me tobe thatof the great easel painter who decides to yield to his vision a fieldvast enough-imposing enough-so that it embraces the world.... Oneof the peaks of French genius. 10 The majorexhibition and book Un art autre:oui ii s'agit de nou- veaux devidagesdu reel,written in 1952 by then-influentialcurator and criticMichel Tapie de Celeyran,was entirelypremised on situat- ingpeinture informelle-the French equivalent to AmericanAbstract Expressionism-notsimply against, but outsideof any concernwith thenotion of tradition and bellepeinture. 11 Yetis was in an articleon thetruly mural-size painting produced in Franceduring the 1950s,the workof Georges Mathieu (Fig. 4), that Tapie's refutation of the niceties ofbelle peinture reached an almostdesperate pitch. The article,"Math- ieu Paintsa Picture,"with photographs by the cinematographer Robert Descharmes,belongs to a seriesof four photo-essays launched by Art Newsin 1951showing both American and European painters (the other essaysdealt with Jackson Pollock, Jean Fautrier, and the Italian Alberto Burri,respectively) working in a varietyof unorthodox manners in their studios.'2Yet while Fautrierand Burriwere shown at workin a quiet and absorbedmood in theirstudio, it becomesperfectly clear, as soon as oneglances at theMathieu photographs and even more as onebegins to readthe text, that that article was conceivedas a defiantresponse to two previousessays in the magazine:Robert Goodnough's "Pollock Paintsa Picture," thefirst in thephoto-essay series, and Harold Rosen- berg'snow famous "The AmericanAction Paintings, " published in Art News in 1952.The photographsby Descharnes showed Mathieu wear- inga fancifulcostume of black silk, white bonnet, and crossed leggings, midwaybetween that of a JapaneseSamurai and a FrenchCarolingian knight,squirting paint on canvasesmeasuring over two metershigh and six metersacross (Fig. 5). The artistis engagedin a studioperfor- mance situated,like his outfit,midway between the sublimeand the

10. AndreMasson, "Monet le fondateur,"Verve 7 (1952):68, my translation. See my essay"Oceanic Sensations: Monet's 'Grandes Decorations' and Mural Painting in France from1927 to 1952,"in Monetin the20th Century (Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1998): 86-97. 11. The bookaccompanied a showat thegallery Studio Paul Facchetti,and was pub- lishedby Gabriel Giraud & Fils. 12. MichelTapi6 de Ceyleran,photographs by Robert Descharnes, "Mathieu Paints a Picture,"Art News 53/10(February 1955): 50-53. - ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~K S :iir -~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Es

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Figure4. GeorgesMathieu, "The Battleof Bouvines," 1954, oil on canvas,2.5 x 6 meters.Private Collection.

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Figure5. RobertDescharmes, "Georges Mathieu at workin his studio,"Art News 53, 1955. ROMY GOLAN 109 ridiculous,in an attemptto upstage,both in canvas-sizeand in painting-as-spectacle,Hans Namuth'smemorable photographs of Pollock forGoodnough's article. Tapie's textreturned again and again,in a heavy-handedNietzschean voice, to the factthat Mathieu's gestures were "dictatedby the urgefor vehemence and violence." This was meantto outweighRosenberg's idea ofthe painting as an eventand the canvasas an arenain whichto act.Yet while Rosenberg had donea per- fectjob at keepingAmerican action painting safe, at least fora short while,from both theatricalityand the decorative("apocalyptic wall painting"),Mathieu lapsed into both. It is notin largeeasel painting,however, but in themedium of ta- pestrythat one findsthe most interesting and, it turnsout, by far the mostambitious response to the desirefor mural-size work in France duringthe 1950s. Tapestry stood as a warm,consoling vestige of savoir vivreand of grand historicalpatrimoine at a timewhen the French were experiencinga massivecrisis of confidence in thenew worldorder of the Cold War.Its two leadingproponents were Jean Cassou, thefirst chiefcurator of Paris'snew Musee National d'ArtModerne, and the painterturned tapestry-maker, Jean Lurcat. The museum'sfirst exhi- bitionin 1946,after the inauguralunveiling of its permanentcollec- tionof painting and sculpture,was dedicated,significantly enough, to La tapisseriefrancaise du moyen-agea nos jours.It was followedby otherlarge exhibitions such as Quatreannees de tapisseriefrancaise of1949, La tapisseriefrancaise et les peintres-cartonniersin 1957, and Tapisseries,peintures, gouaches de JeanLurcat in 1958,all curatedby Cassou. Meanwhile,the Musee des ArtsDecoratifs organized Tapis- seriesfrancaises 1949-1952 in 1952,and Tapisseries58 in 1958which, like theexhibition Douze tapisseriesinedites executees dans les Ate- liersTabard a Aubussonat theGallerie Denise Renein 1952,featured tapestriesbased almost exclusively on thedesigns of abstract artists. 13 In hisbook Situation de Partmoderne of 1951, published by Les edi- tionsde Minuit,Cassou presentedtapestry as one ofthe most impor- tantmanifestations of contemporary art. Yet such accoladeswere al- readyabsent in the 1950sfrom an importantmagazine like Cimaise, whichwas devotedto thecause ofpeinture informelle. Nor has it fig- uredin morerecent Anglo-American and Frenchart histories. It went totallyunmentioned in thecolloquium and book Reconstructing Mod-

13. Cassou was consistentin his taste.He praisedMatisse's late paperand textile cutoutsin his cataloguesof two exhibitions: in 1949(reviewed by Zervos), and in 1956. 110 Yale FrenchStudies ernism:Art in New York,Paris, and Montreal1945-1962 editedby Serge Guilbaut in 1990, in spite of the fact that the book jacket, gracedby a Cecil Beatonfashion photograph in whicha classicPollock drippainting acted as backdropto a modelin a 1951fashion spread for Vogue,promised brave ventures into the realm of the decorative. 14 Ta- pestrywas hardlymentioned in thecatalog of the exhibitions L'art en Europe.Les anneesdecisives 1945-1953 (curatedby Bernard Ceysson at theMusee d'ArtModerne de Saint-Etiennein 1987),and Les annees 50 (at theMusee Nationald'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou in 1988),or evenin therecent homage by theCentre Georges Pompi- dou to itsfirst director, Jean Cassou 1897-1986. Un museeimagine (in 1995).15 The reasonfor this omission is clear:tapestry has remainedan embarrassmentto themaster narrative of modernism, not just because it repeatedlybrushes up againstthe problem of the decorative but because it is, intrinsically,a hybrid.The descriptiongiven by Georges Boudaille,one ofthe editors of Cimaise, in his reviewof the exhibition Tapisseries58 at theMusee desArts Decoratifs, in what appears to have been thatmagazine's only reference to tapestrythroughout the fifties, makesthis point clear: Tapestryshould not justfurnish like anysideboard, nor disappear intothe wall like wallpaper. Tapestry should not just be decorative.It shouldn'tcall attention to itself like a paintingor send an overly direct messagebetween the author and the spectator. The role of tapestry sit- uatesitself more than ever, it seems to me, midway between painting anddecoration. 16 It is thishybrid position-midway between painting and decoration-that made tapestrya uniquelycritical medium in the French fifties.Jean Lurcat repeatedly spoke about the differencebetween ta- pestryand easel painting.The decadenceof tapestry, we aretold, began at theend ofthe great French middle ages, during the Renaissance, as soon as it beganto tryto imitatepainting. It reacheda nadirwith the triumphof easel paintingin thenineteenth century. Avoiding the nu- ancedcoloristic effects of the Manufactures des Gobelins and Beauvais,

14. "Remember,one should never judge a bookby its cover!" Serge Guilbaut quipped, half-jokingly. 15. Thatis, before the split of the collections between the Mus6e d'ArtModerne de la Ville de Parisand theMus6e Nationald'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou in 1977. 16. GeorgesBoudaille, "Les expositionsa Paris:Tapisseries 58," Cimaise 6 (July- Sept1958): 42. ROMY GOLAN 11

Figure6. Mario Prassmo...s.,.. Au.. o tPesub c.15.Rerne nJa Cassou,La tapisserieTel...I,..1957).fran~~~~aise et lea peintrescartonniers (Paris: 112 YaleFrench Studies _4;eori w_S r w s_ _ r _s ll _ I_ ___Es? e N _ _ _ | n . _rl _ __-_ _ | __r sU;!irxls!t>R] _trxs 1b_ _ __,;;siFf a=QiY i!!_ 8< Mi, -a r ]Sl *_l .._ X__ jV c5 4 S_ '':o.

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Figure 7. JeanLurcat, "The Ladyand theDragon," 1947. Aubusson tapestry, 4.55 x 12.10meters. Notre Dame de TouteGrace, Assy. Reprinted in Jean Cassou,La tapisserie franSaise et le peintres cartonniers(Paris: Tel, 1957). ROMY GOLAN 113 whosepalette had escalatedby the eighteenth century to themadness of sevenhundred different shades, Lurcat restricted himself to forty, and eventuallyto twenty.Woven framing devices simulating wooden gildedframes were likewise to be eliminated.And so was anytrace of three-dimensionaltrompe-l'oeil effect so as to retrieve,with a truthto materialsconcordant with the credo of high modernism, the intrinsic two-dimensionalproperties of the woven medium.17 Yet it is precisely in itsmost modern abstract guise-when basedon designsby Jean Arp, AugusteHerbin, Alberto Magnelli, Fernand Leger, Le Corbusier,Ma- tisse,and Vasarely, or on cartoonslike theone byMario Prassinos im- itatingthe vignette calligraphic gesture of Hans Hartungor Mathieu (Fig.6), or even on Lurcat'sown compositions(Fig. 7)-that tapestry came to functionas a parergon. In his longdiscussion of Immanuel Kant's treatment of ornament in The Critiqueof Judgment, Jacques Derrida describes the parergon in the followingfashion.18 The parergonis that thingthat may ap- pearat firstto be unimportant,accessory, and superfluous,marginal as decorationor ornament,but thatis in factintegral to thework or ergon-in our case Parisianpainting of the 1950s. The parergonis no meresupplement, Derrida argues, but a "dangeroussupplement." For it "givesto see," it "causes to be seen," somethingabout the ergon itself,namely a lack. Byrevealing a lack in theobject it supplements,its supplementarityis subversive. The supplementedobject turns out to be knowableonly throughits supplement.Also, in contrastto the "complement,"the supplement,by makingup (supplying)for ulti- matelystands for, adds onlyin orderto replace.Applying this logic of supplementarityto theFrench fifties one maysay thatwhat tapestry as parergonallowed to be seenis whatthe champions of contemporary Frenchpainting, Michel Tapie, Michel Ragon,Charles Estienne, even JeanCassou, wereall too unwillingto contemplate.And thatis that theergon-Parisian abstraction chaude (gesturalabstraction) and ab- stractionfroide (geometric abstraction)-was about to become mar- ginalto AbstractExpressionism during the 1950s:nothing more than bellepeinture. The riseto prominenceof modern tapestry in Francein 17. JeanLurcat, Tapisserie francaise Paris: Bordas, 1947). See also ClaudeFaux, Lur- cat a hautevoix (Paris: Ren6 Julliard, 1962), and "Jean Lurcat et la renaissancede la tapis- seriea Aubusson,"Special issue of Colloque 92 (Aubusson:Mus6e D6partemental de la Tapisserie,1992). 18. JacquesDerrida, "Parergon," in The Truthin Painting,trans. Geoff Bennington andIan McLeod(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987): 15-147; see also Jacques Soulillou,Le decoratif(Paris: Klincksieck, 1990). 114 Yale FrenchStudies theaftermath of World War II revealedhow Frenchpainting was about to standin relationto thepainting of the New YorkSchool as tapestry stoodin relationto painting.It is bybeing put so oftenon display,not justin theMusee des ArtsDecoratifs, where one expectedto see it,but in thevery shrine of modern French art-Paris's Musee Nationald'Art Moderne-thattapestry was mostdangerously allowed to deployitself as parergon. Cassou was unawareof the damage he didto contemporaryFrench painting.As a faithful"fellow traveler" of the Left,from the years of the PopularFront, through his fightin the maquis of the Resistance duringthe years of Vichy, and his membership in theCommunist Party until1949, he was lookingfor a popularart form. Cassou saw in tapes- tryan expedientchannel for modernism to themasses. As he putit in 1958in his book La tapisseriefrancaise et les peintrescartonniers: Viathis functional and familiar medium, modern art infiltrates, with- outshocking people, everyday life. By the same token the modern artist reintegrateshimself into the social. He putshis genius in the service of thecollective. He recovershis role of laborer, worker, and producer.'9 The emphasison thewords "travailleur," "ouvrier" and "producteur" was aimed at dissociatingmodern tapestry from three things: from thetriumph of bourgeois individualism associated with easel painting; fromthe domestic, decorative realm of the feminine; and from the nos- talgic,feudalist dreams of a medievalsociety of artisan guilds associ- atedwith the craft of weaving during the years of Petain's regime. Cas- sou and Lurcatsuccessfully managed to link tapestryto the French mythof Resistantialisme. Thus, as the storygoes, while the tapestry manufacturersof the Gobelins and Beauvais were churning out official commissionsfor the Vichygovernment, at Aubussonin the Creuse, production,which went on unabatedduring the 1940s,was firstthe fruitof independentwork in the so called FreeZone, thenwent un- dergroundonce theGermans took over the whole country in 1942. Key to the revivalof tapestryfor Lurcat was thatit retrieve,in a modernguise, the mural function it had servedin theFrench Middle Ages.Tapestry would thus become once again a woolenwall ("unemu- raille de laine") in its own right.To make his pointclear, Lurcat re- peatedlycompared his ownApocalypse: Lady and theDragon, which was installedin 1951 in theapse ofthe new churchof Notre Dame de

19. JeanCassou, La tapisseriefranpaise et les peintrescartonniers (Paris: Editions Tel, 1957),23. ROMY GOLAN 115 Toute Grace in Assy (Fig.7), and laterhis tapestrycycle Le chantdu monde,to theApocalypse d'Angers, a hugeensemble of seven tapes- triesover 144 meters long and 5.5 metershigh woven in thefourteenth centuryfor the Duke ofAnjou by Nicolas Bataille.20In a desperatebid forthe heroic,Lurcat's "woven monuments,"as he called them,be- camelarger and larger as the1950s wore on. Yetthey managed to elude thedouble-bind of the 1930s. They were neither murals-as-Monument witha capitalM, norwere they tacked-on decorations. They were what Le Corbusier,himself on thelookout for a new muralconcept for the 1950s,coined as Muralnomad.It was in theexhibition leaflet for Douze tapisseriesinedites executees dans les AteliersTabard a' Aubussonin 1952 at theGalerie Denise Rene thatLe Corbusierfirst aired his con- cept:"Modern tapestry is not an archaicnotion. It is no longerout of fashion.Today's tapestry is and will be the muralof the nomad.The paintedmural one rollsand carries under one's arm.We areall nomads livingin rentedapartments and in futureunites dhabitation. " Bybeing described as a warmskin or skein (epiderme) under the ca- ressof the hand, mural tapestry came to functionas a tactilecorrective in the argumentsof those who favoreda New Humanismin modern architectureover the increasingoptical coldness of theInternational Style.For Le Corbusier,the Muralnomad went hand-in-hand with the use ofsculptural forms and rough concrete ("beton brut") in his build- ingsduring the 1950s. Whileart (i.e. painting)magazines like Cahiersd'art, Cimaise, or Vervechose to ignoretapestry, the lay press was readyto wax lyricalat the timeof Lurcat's retrospective at the Musee d'ArtModerne in the summerof 1958.The Communistdaily L'humanite& eager to distance itselffrom Socialist Realist paintingafter the mixed success of Pi- casso's Massacrein Korea at the Salon de Mai of 1951 and Louis Ara- gon's devastatingdismissal of Andre Fougeron's mural-size Civilisa- tionatlantique at theSalon d'Automneof 1953, ran an ecstaticreview ofthe show. The article,entitled "L'Epopee magistrate de JeanLurcat, " calledLurcat one ofthe greatest artists of his time.Intent to revivethe gloryyears of the FrenchCommunist Party, when the partytook it upon itselfat thetime of the Liberation to standfor Resistant France as "le partides fusilles," the reviewer gave a prominentplace to a quote froma poemby Robert Desnos wovenby Lurcat into a tapestryin 1954.

20. See Lurcatand JacquesLevron, L'Apocalypse dAngers (Angers: J. Boutin "Au Masque d'Or,"1955). 116 Yale FrenchStudies Desnos,who had perished on 8 June1945 in theconcentration camp of Terezin,had written in hispoem entitled Hommage au mortsde la Re- sistanceet de la deportation(Hommage to thedead ofthe Resistance and thedeportation): Jevous salue vous qui dormez Apresle durtravail clandestin Imprimeurs,d6boulonneurs derails Distributeursdetracts, contrebandiers Jevous salue vous tous qui resistez. I saluteyou who sleep Afterthe hard clandestine work Printers,railway saboteurs Tractdistributors, smugglers I saluteall ofyou who resist.21 The reviewerended by praising Lurcat for reminding us, in his mostre- cent endeavors,of the ever-loomingmenace of atomicwarfare. The firsttapestries in theshow were Lurcat's latest works, La grandemen- ace, Le grand charnier,L'homme d'Hiroshima, La fin de tout and L'hommeen gloiredans la paix, all ofwhich belonged to a cycleenti- tledLe chantdu monde.When completed, this tapestry cycle, made outof separate pieces meant to be strung125 meters across (500 square meters)was obviouslydesigned to competewith Lurcat'sbeloved ApocalypsedAngers. In his weeklycolumn in Le monde,the well- knownRenaissance art historian Andre Chastel avoided the apocalyptic Cold Warrhetoric favored during those years by L'humanite.22 Yet overlookingthe staggeringsize of the workson display,he endedup soundingalmost as enthusiasticas the counterpartin L'humanite: "Whowould have predicted twenty-five years ago that Lurcat would be honoredby a majorretrospective in themost official sanctuary of modernart? "23 Once again,it took an Americancritic, Annette Michelson, review- ingthe show in her"Paris column" for The New YorkHerald Tribune, to commenton thelack of proportion between "this minor renaissance ofFrench tapestry" as she termedit, and "the almostgrotesque enor- 21. JulietteDarle, "L'Epop6e magistrate de JeanLurcat," L'humanit6 (28 July1958). Nonpaginatedexcerpt (Paris: Archives du Mus6e National d'ArtModerne, Centre GeorgesPompidou). 22. On thepopular reverberations ofthat rhetoric see FrangoisFonvielle-Alquier, La grandepeur de 1'apres-guerre1946-53 (Paris:Robert Laffont, 1973). 23. Andr6Chastel, "L'oeuvre de JeanLurcat," Le monde(1 August1958). Ilk

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Figure8. JeanLurcat, "The Conquestof Space," ca. 1957.Aubusson tapestry, 7.14 x 7.23 meters.KLM Airlines, Paris.Reprinted in JeanLurcat and Denis Clavel,Les tapisseriesdu Chantdu Mondede jean Lurcat(Annecy: Gardet,1963). 118 Yale FrenchStudies mityin scale and artisticambition" that went into it. Pointingto Lur- cat's "condescensionto a conventionthat suggests chic illustration ratherthan popular imagery," Michelson began by debunkingtapes- try'srecently earned leftwing credentials: Thescale, the inventive power of the iconography, the craftsmanship arealmost stupefying; they bully one into submission, and one's con- sequentcautious resistance must be at leastpartly understood as a functionof their staggering enormity. Cosmic aspiration of this kind cropsup nowand again in CartesianFrance. Among Lurcat's weak- nessesis a tendencytoward a disastrous inflation. This is, of course, the pricethat a notquite first rate sensibility will pay for a heaven-vault- ingambition.24 Sweepingaside fictionsof architecturalfunctionality called forthby such conceptsas theMuralnomad, she squarelyrepositioned tapestry withinthe registerof the decorative."The functionof tapestryhas shrunkto thatof a staticand exclusivelyvisual object.These hang- ingswill neverbe used like thefabrics of Nicolas Batailleor Baudoin de Bailleulas battlestandards or to shelterchilly clerics from drafts" (Michelson). The spectacleof these many tapestries hung on thecurved walls of theMusee d'ArtModerne (a neoclassicalbuilding designed in 1937 as partof the huge New Trocaderocomplex) is certainlydisconcerting to imagine.Even moredisconcerting is the factthat Lurcat's tapestries, with theirarchetypal figures, mythical beasts, and astrologicalem- blems caughtin cosmic explosionsof acid colorson black grounds, lookeduncannily like Pollock'swebs (Fig.8). Forit is ironicthat Cas- sou had scheduledLurcat's show in his museumon thevery eve ofthe New YorkMOMA's New AmericanPainting. The showlanded at the Musee Nationald'Art Moderne in January1959 like a truebombshell, withJackson Pollock's name written all overit.

24. AnnetteMichelson, "The Tapestriesof Jean Lurcat," The New YorkHerald Tri- bune(13 July 1958). Clipping found in theLurcat file of the Archives de Musee National d'ArtModerne.