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Anno XXXVI, N. 1 RIVISTA DI STUDI ITALIANI Gennaio-Aprile 2018 Tutti

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Anno XXXVI, N. 1 RIVISTA DI STUDI ITALIANI Gennaio-Aprile 2018 Tutti Anno XXXVI, n. 1 RIVISTA DI STUDI ITALIANI Gennaio - Aprile 2018 Tutti i diritti riservati. © 1983 Rivista di Studi Italiani ISSN 1916 - 5412 Rivista di Studi Italiani (Toronto, Canada: in versione cartacea fino al 2004, online dal 2005) CONTRIBUTI COLLECTOR, ART PATRON, AND CREATOR OF MUSEUMS: PEGGY GUGGENHEIM IN VENICE VICTORIA SURLIUGA Texas Tech University or at least five decades in the twentieth century, Peggy Guggenheim (1898 - 1979) built and consolidated her reputation as patron of various artistic movements, gathering masterpieces that ultimately converged in F 1 her Venice Collection in Palazzo Venier dei Leoni . She also contributed to the definition of artistic trends, capturing in her collection the spirit of surrealism, abstract expressionism, and the avant - garde. She had an impact on the career of artists such as Jackson Pollock and Max Ernst by making their presence desirable in the art scene and therefore highly collectable. In her roles as patron and collector, first she founded two art galleries, Guggenheim Jeune in London (1938) and Art of This Century in New York (1942), and later the Peggy Guggenheim Co llection in Venice (1951). While she pursued the artists who triggered her interest, her own aesthetics shaped the vision of the ultimate museum that she wanted to create. Her declaration “ I am not an art collector. I am a musem ” 2 contained an important s tatement that revealed her view of art as a cathartic operation that brought forth her personality. The entire Peggy Guggenheim Collection revolved around her. When she met an artist and saw the artworks, even if she was advised by André Breton, Marcel Duc hamp, and Herbert Read, it was 1 The Peggy Guggenheim Collection includes works by Alechinsky, Bacon, Braque, Calder, Chagall, Dalì, de Chirico, De Kooning, Dubuffet, Er nst, Magritte, Miró, Moore, Picasso, and Rothko, among others. The complete list can be found in Peggy Guggenheim Collection , Foreword by Thomas Krens, New York : Guggenheim Museum Publications, 2009, pp. 244 - 256. 2 Peggy Guggenheim declared, “I am a museum ” , in an interview dated November 1970 - April 1976 and included in Virginia Dortch, Peggy Guggenheim and her Friends , Milano : Automobilia, 1994, p. 15. 359 VICTORIA SURLIUGA ultimately her aesthetic judgment that motivated her selection. While she was following the tradition of her family, she was always on her own because her uncle Solomon R. Guggenheim never helped Peggy in developing her galle ries or the Venice Collection. I n this article, I will analyze Peggy Guggenheim’s legacy and experience starting from her own autobiography, published in three editions (1946, 1960 and 1979) 3 . In the first edition, Peggy Guggenheim created fa lse names to hide the identities of the acquaintances and friends she was interacting with. All names were eventually revealed in the 1960 edition, and remained uncensored in the 1979 version 4 . The 1979 supplements chronicle the events that followed her relocation to V enice, including the creation of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection. In her autobiographies, she adopted a journalistic style of reporting facts in a direct way, without much literary elaboration, and in the straightforward spoken tone of a pragmatic person. It was precisely because “she still wanted to give her own version of how she promoted the works of contemporary artists that s he wrote her own autobiography” 5 . I have taken interest in Peggy Guggenheim’s autobiography insomuch as it is instrumental in ana lyzing her role as patron, collector, art dealer, and active player in the history of modern art. The narrative of her life lays out the uncensored tale of a Jewish American heiress whose personal and unique taste redefined the role of artistic patronage and art collecting, while adding otherwise unknown American and European artists to the canon of modern Western art. Her experience as a collector echoes the theories on patronage outlined in a 1963 New York Times article in which Aline B. Saarinen eloque ntly explains that “each collector [whom she refers to only in the masculine gender] seems to be an artist manqué . His collection is his creative act; an extension of himself indeed, an expression of his ideal image of himself” 6 . W ith her collection in Venice, Peggy Guggenheim reversed the role: instead of hosting a collection in her house, she made her house into a museum (“I am a museum”, indeed). For many years, she did not live in a society or period in history that appreciated her taste. In fact, wh en she first asked for help from her 3 All quotes are from the 1979 edition of Peggy Guggenheim’s autobiography, Out of This Century, Confessions of an Art Addict , New York : Universe Books, 1979. 4 Lisa Rull , “A Biographical Pursuit of Peggy Guggenheim”, in British Association for American Studies , 1, 2001, http://www.baas.ac.uk/issue - 1 - spring - 2001 - article1/. Accessed on August 8, 2014. 5 Herbert Mitgang, “Art Addiction”, in New York Times Book Review , August 26, 1979, p. 35. 6 Adriano Alibe Saarinen, “The Collector and The Collected”, in New York Times , December 15, 1963, p. 242. 360 COLLECTOR, ART PATRON, AND CREATOR OF MUSEUMS: PEGGY GUGGENHEIM IN VENICE uncle Solomon R. Guggenheim, with the purchase of a Kandinsky, he was appalled that she would ask him to buy a painting from her, but also by the kind of art that she was promoting. Ultimately, the most relevant point w as Peggy Guggenheim’s “willingness to put her money where her faith was”. Eventually, an “enormous change in perception” took place ar ound the art she was promoting, and Weideger points out that “t he works many thought rubbish when she bought them are rega rded as masterpieces today” 7 . Peggy Guggenheim was also able to solve the dichotomy between the cultural and commercial aspects of collecting. She enjoyed meeting the artists, getting to know them, and then including them in her collection. This entire ope ration of acquiring artworks was conducted with persistence and “If Peggy […] had made up her mind that she had to have a certain work by an artist, it was almost impossible to dissuade her” 8 . It was the combination of philanthropic motive, cultural communication, and patronage that constituted the three driving forces of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection. In his F oreword to the catalog of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Thomas Krens, Director of The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, has emphasized the philosophy behind the Collection: “This notion of the museum collection as an encyclopedia of masterpieces, representing in its scope and depth the historical passage of a cultural period, has drive n the collecting practices of m ost contemporary institutions” 9 . Peggy Guggenheim had to create specific spaces to gather her artworks and define them as collections only when the spaces themselves had shaped, in turn, a certain cultural meaning around the artworks. She worked in that direction since the early days of Guggenheim Jeune, when she outlined her future intentions of associating both herself and her present/future collections with her family name and legacy. In the French introduction to the exhibit of part of her collection at the Musée de l’Orangerie ( Tuileries ) , Peggy Guggenheim expressed her relief at the idea of having her Collection taken care of in the future, in reference to her 1969 trip to New York, when she finalized the transfer 7 Paula Weideger , “Getting to know the serious Peggy Gugge nheim”, in New York Times , November 15, 1998. 8 Maurizio Vanni (Ed.), Revealing Papers, the Hidden Treasures of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection , Cinisello Balsamo, Silvana Editoriale, 2011, p. 25. 9 Elena Calas - Nicolas Calas ( e ds.), The Peggy Guggenheim Collection of Modern Art , Torino : Edizioni d’Arte Fratelli Pozzo, 1967. Collection edited by Ezio Gribaudo. 361 VICTORIA SURLIUGA of her collection to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation 10 . All together, this process reaffirmed her identity, turning her persona into the equivalent of a public museum. She was not hostile to monetary gain. As her niece Karol e Vail wrote, “in the true Guggenheim fashion, she liked the idea of becoming a patron of the arts – and perhaps also making a profit” 11 . However, the story of her life and interests do not support the idea that she was in it for the money. Peggy Gugge nheim knew the relevance of her Collection. As it is reported, she said, “I have supported the greatest geniuses of my time” 12 . Yet it is also rumored that she starte d collecting art out of boredom 13 . Being a member of the Guggenheim family, she was brought up with an appreciation and desire for acquiring art, and her experience as collector and patron was ingrained in her as the outcome of her adult life. It was her vision that pushed her to promote new artists and new trends beginning with her first London avant - garde gallery on Cork Street, Guggenheim Jeune, which opened in January 1938 with a series of drawings by Jean Cocteau. In addition to her well - known statement about being a museum herself, it is worth quoting Philip Rylands when he observes, “Peggy Guggenheim used to say [to Bernard Berenson] that it was her duty to protect the art of her own time. She dedicated half of her life to this mission, as well as to the creation of the museum in Venice that still carries her name” 14 . As a matter of fact, Peg gy Guggenheim was always interested in constantly expanding the scope of her Collection since the early days of the Art of This Century gallery in New York. As she wrote in her foreword to the 1942 catalog: “I do hope that the next edition will be more com plete and that I shall be able to acquire several other important works that represent phases of the evolution of this art” 15 .
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