DOI issue:
No. 47 (February, 1897)
DOI article:Mourey, Gabriel: A dream painter: M. L. Lévy-Dhurmer
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18388#0017
A Dream Painter
•most appropriate, and most original models were remarked that those artists who have gone the
produced at that period, and all sprang from his furthest and the highest in work of this kind, are
imagination. He devised new methods of utilising those who have given the most clear and definite
his materials, and greatly enlarged their scope, shape to the fancies of their mind. For the sensa-
obtaining the most unlooked-for effects of great tion of mystery therein is none the less intense, but
richness and symmetry. quite the reverse.
In his spare time he devoted his energies to pure These gifts—quite the rarest among the artists of
art, paying no heed to the transitory fashions of the to-day—are possessed by M. Levy-Dhurmer. So
hour, disdaining the aesthetic snobisme which has much may be asserted, without fear of contradic-
caused, and is causing, such ravages in art work tion, whether one like his art or dislike it.
generally. In his holiday times he would go far This art of dream-painting has its foundations in
away, to Florence or to Venice or elsewhere on life itself, in the study of nature, in direct observa-
Italy's consecrated ground, where Beauty shines in tion, transposed by the artist, but remaining, never-
its eternal glory. Hence spring the real sources of theless, and forming that strangely irresistible charm
M. Levy-Dhurmer's art, and I don't think any one which emanates from all Levy-Dhurmer's work,
will quarrel with him on this account. Twas in There is nothing artificial in it: everything is true
Italy he learnt that feeling of expression which is in the first place, before seeming like a dream ; and
one of his predominating characteristics, and there the delicious unreality of those women's faces which
'twas also he acquired his love of the imaginative the artist so greatly affects, their very seduction,
and the ideal. Moreover, his masters—the Masters lie, paradoxical as it may seem, in their strict
of the fourteenth and fif-
teenth centuries, who in the
plastic arts gave expression
to all that is heroic and
grand and beautiful in the
heart of humanity — taught
him the secret of impeccable
shape, and taught him, too,
a respect for nature and for
life. To them he owes also
that perfect precision which
1 so greatly admire in his
work, that absolute certainty
of touch which enables him
to express just what he
wishes, neither more nor less.
In this Italian school, also,
he became impressed with
the great truth, that the artist
must realise at every instant
that he can afford to neglect
nothing, that everything has
a deep meaning, and that the
artist's duty is to reveal this
to us, according to his tem-
perament, in all sincerity and
with all the force that is in
him.
Mere vague and indefinite
forms indeed will not suffice
to convey the impression of
a dream or a vision, for they
simply confuse and trouble il etait une fois une princesse"
the mind. And it is to be from a fainting by l. levy-dhurmer
7
•most appropriate, and most original models were remarked that those artists who have gone the
produced at that period, and all sprang from his furthest and the highest in work of this kind, are
imagination. He devised new methods of utilising those who have given the most clear and definite
his materials, and greatly enlarged their scope, shape to the fancies of their mind. For the sensa-
obtaining the most unlooked-for effects of great tion of mystery therein is none the less intense, but
richness and symmetry. quite the reverse.
In his spare time he devoted his energies to pure These gifts—quite the rarest among the artists of
art, paying no heed to the transitory fashions of the to-day—are possessed by M. Levy-Dhurmer. So
hour, disdaining the aesthetic snobisme which has much may be asserted, without fear of contradic-
caused, and is causing, such ravages in art work tion, whether one like his art or dislike it.
generally. In his holiday times he would go far This art of dream-painting has its foundations in
away, to Florence or to Venice or elsewhere on life itself, in the study of nature, in direct observa-
Italy's consecrated ground, where Beauty shines in tion, transposed by the artist, but remaining, never-
its eternal glory. Hence spring the real sources of theless, and forming that strangely irresistible charm
M. Levy-Dhurmer's art, and I don't think any one which emanates from all Levy-Dhurmer's work,
will quarrel with him on this account. Twas in There is nothing artificial in it: everything is true
Italy he learnt that feeling of expression which is in the first place, before seeming like a dream ; and
one of his predominating characteristics, and there the delicious unreality of those women's faces which
'twas also he acquired his love of the imaginative the artist so greatly affects, their very seduction,
and the ideal. Moreover, his masters—the Masters lie, paradoxical as it may seem, in their strict
of the fourteenth and fif-
teenth centuries, who in the
plastic arts gave expression
to all that is heroic and
grand and beautiful in the
heart of humanity — taught
him the secret of impeccable
shape, and taught him, too,
a respect for nature and for
life. To them he owes also
that perfect precision which
1 so greatly admire in his
work, that absolute certainty
of touch which enables him
to express just what he
wishes, neither more nor less.
In this Italian school, also,
he became impressed with
the great truth, that the artist
must realise at every instant
that he can afford to neglect
nothing, that everything has
a deep meaning, and that the
artist's duty is to reveal this
to us, according to his tem-
perament, in all sincerity and
with all the force that is in
him.
Mere vague and indefinite
forms indeed will not suffice
to convey the impression of
a dream or a vision, for they
simply confuse and trouble il etait une fois une princesse"
the mind. And it is to be from a fainting by l. levy-dhurmer
7