Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1911 (Heft 34-35))

THE NEW ART IN PARIS*

I THOUGHT I had formed a complete idea of the movement in French
Art, principally in so far as painting was concerned, through the exhibitions
that the Photo-Secession of New York held of the works of some of the
artists who belong to this movement. There, I studied their works as well as
the impressions they produced on the American public, and the judgments
that the art critics published in the New York press. But I was mistaken.
In spite of the efforts of Mr. Steichen, who selects in Paris the works of this
kind that are shown in New York, and in spite of the heroism of Mr. Stieglitz,
who gives them frank hospitality, both having undertaken this enterprise for
art’s sake, and to break the chains that tie the spirit of the artists to the rock
of the Academy, the exhibitions of the Photo-Secession give but a faint idea of
the intensity of this movement.
That is why, as soon as I arrived in Paris, I hastened to ratify my opinion,
profiting by the excellent opportunity offered me by the ‘ ‘Salon d’Automne,”
which had just opened, and in which I could see in ensemble, what I had only
seen in small fragments in the New York exhibitions. At the same time I had
the opportunity to see if the critics here were as intransigent, and if the French
public was as excited as the American over the insurrectionary movement of
the artists.
I must begin by telling my readers that the Society of the Salon d’Automne
is legally constituted, and its object is to further, from the general point of
view, the development of fine arts, in all the manifestations of painting,
sculpture, engraving, architecture, and applied arts, holding to that end an
annual exhibition which takes place in the autumn, from which it derives
its name.
This exposition takes place in the so-called Grand Palais of the Champs
Elysees, from the first of October to the eighth of November, and in it may
participate both French and foreign artists, with one restriction: that the
works sent have not been exhibited before in any of the Paris Salons.
So frank and noble is the hospitality offered to the artists foreign to the
association, that its regulations limit the works of its associates to two con-
tributions per section and place no restriction upon those of the non-associates,
the object being to allow to all the young unknown talents, and to all ar-
tistic efforts, an opportunity to manifest themselves freely.
I wanted first to get an idea of the ensemble, and afterwards to study
the details, which is a system just as good as any other. But I could not under-
stand anything. I looked, but did not see: it seemed to me as if I were in
the Tower of Babel of painting, in which all the languages of technique,
color, and subjects, were spoken in an incoherent and absurd manner, and I
began to surmise that this Salon was nothing but a charge d’atelier, peculiar
to the humorous artists. There were artists here from almost every part of
the world, like Matisse, French; Matthes, German; Steichen, American;
Bondy, Austrian; Borgeaud, Swiss; Borjeson, Swedish; Bottlik, Hungarian;
* Reprinted from “The Forum” February, 1911, with kind permission of Mitchell Kennerley.

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