DOI Heft:
No. 60 (February, 1902)
DOI Artikel:Proust, Antonin: The art of Fantin Latour
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.22772#0296
The Art of Fant in Latour
basis of romanticism, moreover, was a horror of
reality and an ardent desire to avoid it. Nothing
could be more untrue than the second part of this
proposition. The Romanticists of 1830 strove, as
many others, particularly Ingres, had striven since
1800, to recapture our natural language—to speak
French, in a word. That the mysterious, the
strange, the lugubrious, and the extravagant were
often unduly prominent is indisputable; every
protest is apt to overshoot the object at which it is
directed. But the reformers of 1830, and more
particularly the landscapists who were the precursors
of the Courbets, the Manets, and the Fantins,
“personalised” the art which David and his
imitators had robbed of all personality, by prefer-
ring direct observation to a regard for antique
traditions and dogmas.
In all sincerity I ask—do we not derive more
enjoyment from the smallest sketch of Ingres, or
from one of Fantin Latour’s admirable compositions
than from the Grseco-Roman “arrangements” of
David ? At the same time, I yield to no one in
my admiration of the painter of the Sabines, when
he keeps to his own subject, without borrowing
from elsewhere.
When he first exhibited—in 1859—I think the
members of the jury who had previously refused
his works must have felt some anxiety, not to say
disquietude, at the sight of the public crowding
round his superb picture.
From the day when Manet—who also had the
honour of being rejected in 1859—gave his loyal
support to the young artist, the professional daubers
took fright; for their position was assailed, not by
the public, but by the real artists, who had nothing
to do with the distribution of favours and orders.
No one is more insouciant,
and at the same time more
keen than Fantin Latour. It
has never occurred to him to
formulate a process already
known. He is fully master
of his art, and has the faculty
of dominating his material.
I know nothing more ad-
mirably descriptive than the
set of compositions in which
Fantin Latour has celebrated
the genius of Wagner and
of Berlioz. One sees therein
the inspiration which is the
result of studies made again
and again, corrected, re-
touched, and finally ended at
the moment when, with Nature
as his guide, he has discovered
the realisation of his dreams.
The earliest of these inspira-
tions—the scene from “ Tann-
hauser”—■ was exhibited in
the same year as the Ho?nmagc
a Delacroix. In both these
compositions the artist has
summed up life with mar-
vellous acuteness of observa-
tion. The double current
which has constantly borne
Fantin Latour at once towards
the ideal and the real made
itself felt even in his earliest
works. But as he advanced
in years his ideas became
PORTRAIT OF EDWARDS THE ENGRAVER AND HIS WIFE BY FANTIN LATOUR
234
basis of romanticism, moreover, was a horror of
reality and an ardent desire to avoid it. Nothing
could be more untrue than the second part of this
proposition. The Romanticists of 1830 strove, as
many others, particularly Ingres, had striven since
1800, to recapture our natural language—to speak
French, in a word. That the mysterious, the
strange, the lugubrious, and the extravagant were
often unduly prominent is indisputable; every
protest is apt to overshoot the object at which it is
directed. But the reformers of 1830, and more
particularly the landscapists who were the precursors
of the Courbets, the Manets, and the Fantins,
“personalised” the art which David and his
imitators had robbed of all personality, by prefer-
ring direct observation to a regard for antique
traditions and dogmas.
In all sincerity I ask—do we not derive more
enjoyment from the smallest sketch of Ingres, or
from one of Fantin Latour’s admirable compositions
than from the Grseco-Roman “arrangements” of
David ? At the same time, I yield to no one in
my admiration of the painter of the Sabines, when
he keeps to his own subject, without borrowing
from elsewhere.
When he first exhibited—in 1859—I think the
members of the jury who had previously refused
his works must have felt some anxiety, not to say
disquietude, at the sight of the public crowding
round his superb picture.
From the day when Manet—who also had the
honour of being rejected in 1859—gave his loyal
support to the young artist, the professional daubers
took fright; for their position was assailed, not by
the public, but by the real artists, who had nothing
to do with the distribution of favours and orders.
No one is more insouciant,
and at the same time more
keen than Fantin Latour. It
has never occurred to him to
formulate a process already
known. He is fully master
of his art, and has the faculty
of dominating his material.
I know nothing more ad-
mirably descriptive than the
set of compositions in which
Fantin Latour has celebrated
the genius of Wagner and
of Berlioz. One sees therein
the inspiration which is the
result of studies made again
and again, corrected, re-
touched, and finally ended at
the moment when, with Nature
as his guide, he has discovered
the realisation of his dreams.
The earliest of these inspira-
tions—the scene from “ Tann-
hauser”—■ was exhibited in
the same year as the Ho?nmagc
a Delacroix. In both these
compositions the artist has
summed up life with mar-
vellous acuteness of observa-
tion. The double current
which has constantly borne
Fantin Latour at once towards
the ideal and the real made
itself felt even in his earliest
works. But as he advanced
in years his ideas became
PORTRAIT OF EDWARDS THE ENGRAVER AND HIS WIFE BY FANTIN LATOUR
234