Louis Vauxcelles by Jules Chéret (1836-1932)

Louis Vauxcelles (born Louis Meyer; 1 January 187021 July 1943) was a French art critic. He is credited with coining the terms '' Fauvism'' (1905) and '' Cubism'' (1908). He used several pseudonyms in various publications: Pinturrichio, Vasari, Coriolès, and Critias.

Fauvism

Vauxcelles was born in Paris. He coined the phrase 'les fauves' (translated as 'wild beasts') in a 1905 review of the Salon d'Automne exhibition to describe in a mocking, critical manner a circle of painters associated with

Henri Matisse Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a drawing, draughtsman, printmaking, printmaker, and sculptur ...

. As their paintings were exposed in the same room as a Donatello sculpture of which he approved, he stated his criticism and disapproval of their works by describing the sculpture as "a Donatello amongst the wild beasts." Henri Matisse's '' Blue Nude (Souvenir de Biskra)'' appeared at the 1907 Indépendants, entitled ''Tableau no. III''. Vauxcelles writes on the topic of ''Nu bleu'':

I admit to not understanding. An ugly nude woman is stretched out upon grass of an opaque blue under the palm trees... This is an artistic effect tending toward the abstract that escapes me completely. (Vauxcelles, Gil Blas, 20 March 1907)Russell T. Clement, ''Les Fauves: A sourcebook'', Greenwood Press, 1994

Vauxcelles described the group of 'Fauves':

A movement I consider dangerous (despite the great sympathy I have for its perpetrators) is taking shape among a small clan of youngsters. A chapel has been established, two haughty priests officiating. MM Derain and Matisse; a few dozen innocent catechumens have received their baptism. Their dogma amounts to a wavering schematicism that proscribes modeling and volumes in the name of I-don't-know-what pictorial abstraction. This new religion hardly appeals to me. I don't believe in this Renaissance... M. Matisse, fauve-in-chief; M. Derain, fauve deputy; MM. Othon Friesz and Dufy, fauves in attendance... and M. Delaunay (a fourteen-year-old-pupil of M. Metzinger...), infantile fauvelet. (Vauxcelles, Gil Blas, 20 March 1907).

Cubism

In 1906

Jean Metzinger Jean Dominique Antony Metzinger (; 24 June 1883 – 3 November 1956) was a major 20th-century French painter, theorist, writer, critic and poet, who along with Albert Gleizes wrote the first theoretical work on Cubism. His earliest works, from 1 ...

formed a close friendship with

Robert Delaunay Robert Delaunay (12 April 1885 – 25 October 1941) was a French artist who, with his wife Sonia Delaunay and others, co-founded the Orphism art movement, noted for its use of strong colours and geometric shapes. His later works were more abstra ...

, with whom he would share an exhibition at

Berthe Weill Berthe Weill ( Paris 1865 – 1951) was a French art dealer who played a vital role in the creation of the market for twentieth-century art with the manifestation of the Parisian Avant-Garde. Although she is much less known than her well-establ ...

's gallery early in 1907. The two of them were singled out by Vauxcelles in 1907 as Divisionists who used large, mosaic-like 'cubes' to construct small but highly symbolic compositions.Robert L. Herbert, 1968, Neo-Impressionism, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New YorkDaniel Robbins, 1964, ''Albert Gleizes 1881 – 1953, A Retrospective Exhibition'', Published by The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York, in collaboration with Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris, Museum am Ostwall, Dortmund
/ref> In 1908, Vauxcelles again, in his review of Georges Braque's exhibition at Kahnweiler's gallery called Braque a daring man who despises form, "reducing everything, places and a figures and houses, to geometric schemas, to cubes".Alex Danchev, ''Georges Braques: A Life'', Arcade Publishing, 15 nov. 2005
/ref> Vauxcelles recounts how Matisse told him at the time, "Braque has just sent in o the 1908 Salon d'Automnea painting made of little cubes". The critic Charles Morice relayed Matisse's words and spoke of Braque's little cubes. The motif of the viaduct at l'Estaque had inspired Braque to produce three paintings marked by the simplification of form and deconstruction of perspective. On 25 March 1909, Vauxcelles qualifies the works of Braque exhibited at the

Salon des Indépendants Salon may refer to: Common meanings * Beauty salon, a venue for cosmetic treatments * French term for a drawing room, an architectural space in a home * Salon (gathering), a meeting for learning or enjoyment Arts and entertainment * Salon (Pa ...

as "bizarreries cubiques" (cubic oddities). Vauxcelles, this time in his review of the 26th Salon des Indépendants (1910), made a passing and imprecise reference to

Henri Le Fauconnier Henri Victor Gabriel Le Fauconnier (July 5, 1881 – December 25, 1946) was a French Cubist painter born in Hesdin. Le Fauconnier was seen as one of the leading figures among the Montparnasse Cubists. At the 1911 Salon des Indépendants Le Fauco ...

Albert Gleizes Albert Gleizes (; 8 December 1881 – 23 June 1953) was a French artist, theoretician, philosopher, a self-proclaimed founder of Cubism and an influence on the School of Paris. Albert Gleizes and Jean Metzinger wrote the first major treatise on ...

and Fernand Léger, as "ignorant geometers, reducing the human body, the site, to pallid cubes."Daniel Robbins, Jean Metzinger: At the Center of Cubism, 1985, Jean Metzinger in Retrospect, The University of Iowa Museum of Art (J. Paul Getty Trust, University of Washington Press) p. 13

"In neither case" notes Daniel Robbins, "did the use of the word "cube" lead to the immediate identification of the artists with a new pictorial attitude, with a movement. The word was no more than an isolated descriptive epithet that, in both cases, was prompted by a visible passion for structure so assertive that the critics were wrenched, momentarily, from their habitual concentration on motifs and subjects, in which context their comments on drawing, color, tonality, and, only occasionally, conception, resided." (Robbins, 1985)

The term "Cubism" emerged for the first time at the inauguration of the 1911

; imposed by journalists who wished to create sensational news. The term was used derogatorily to describe the diverse geometric concerns reflected in the paintings of five artists in continual communication with one another: Metzinger, Gleizes, Delaunay, Le Fauconnier and Léger (but not Picasso or Braque, both absent from this massive exhibition). Vauxcelles acknowledged the importance of Cézanne to the Cubists in his article titled ''From Cézanne to Cubism'' (published in ''Eclair'', 1920). For Vauxcelles the influence had a two-fold character, both 'architectural' and 'intellectual'. He stressed the statement made by

Émile Bernard Émile Henri Bernard (28 April 1868 – 16 April 1941) was a French Post-Impressionist painter and writer, who had artistic friendships with Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin and Eugène Boch, and at a later time, Paul Cézanne. Most of his nota ...

that Cézanne's optics were "not in the eye, but in his brain". In 1911 he coined the less well-known term ''

Tubism Tubism is a term coined by the art critic Louis Vauxcelles in 1911 A notable ongoing event was the Comparison of the Amundsen and Scott Expeditions, race for the South Pole. Events January * January 1 – A decade after fe ...

'' in describing the style of Fernand Léger.

Legacy

In 1906 Louis Vauxcelles was named Chevalier of the

Legion of Honour The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...

, and in 1925 he was promoted to Officer of the Legion of Honour. Towards the end of his life, in 1932, Vauxcelles published a monographic essay about

Marek Szwarc Marek Szwarc (9 May 1892 – 28 December 1958) was a painter and sculptor associated with the School of Paris (École de Paris), as well as with the Yiddish cultural avant-garde movement in Poland ''Yung-yidish''. Early years Marek Szwarc was bor ...

, dedicated to the Jewish character of Szwarc's oeuvre.

"His art, which plunges its roots into the past of the ghettos and in which the moving accent like the ancient songs in the synagogue of Wilna, is a return to popular imagery. And, in as much as this may seem paradoxical, these stern manners, this severe style, of a "common" naïveté, are profoundly in accord with what art of the most modernist sort supplies in our regard; by virtue of its poetic concepts, by its firm and generous execution, by the sense of its cadenced dispositions, by the sharp graphics written in view of the material and which commands this very material, it is apparent that Marek Szwarc is in harmony with the most audacious innovators of our times, who seek him out and see him as a maître."

He died in Paris, aged 73.

Notes and references

*Néret, Gilles (1993). ''F. Léger''. New York: BDD Illustrated Books.

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Vauxcelles, Louis 1870 births 1943 deaths French art critics French male non-fiction writers Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur Officiers of the Légion d'honneur Recipients of the Legion of Honour