Leading scholar of Impressionism, Richard Brettell, has selected three paintings from the Getty Museum’s collection, each addressing a radically new and different form of beauty in French modern painting. At the conclusion of the third talk, Edward Goldman, host of KCRW’s Art Talk, joins Brettell to discuss the lectures.
The first lecture, on Sunday, February 28, focuses on Édouard Manet’s Le Printemps, a newly acquired work in the Museum’s collection. In the painting, a chic young woman in a day dress with floral accents (aspiring Parisian actress Jeanne Demarsy) is depicted as the embodiment of Spring. When composing the painting, Manet had in view both the latest fashion trends and old artistic traditions. More than just an ephemeral fashion plate, Manet’s archetypal Spring was conceived as a picture for the ages, summarizing his modern epoch through the figure of a beautiful Parisienne.
The second lecture, on Tuesday, March 1, takes as its subject Arii Matamoe by Paul Gauguin. The artist painted this startling image of a decapitated human head during his first stay in Polynesia in the early 1890s. The notion of a human head ritually displayed in an ornate interior suggests the formality of a ruler lying in state, supported by the presence of sorrowful figures in the background. In his collage-illustrated book Noa Noa, Gauguin included a copy of this painting and a comment that he thought of Pomare’s death as a metaphor for the loss of native culture due to European colonization.
The final lecture, on Thursday, March 3, examines Paul Cézanne’s Young Italian Woman at a Table. Resting her head in her hand, this young woman looks out with an enigmatic expression. Since the Renaissance, artists have used this pose to portray melancholy. The pose, combined with the woman’s unreadable face, gives a human poignancy and psychological tension to the figure. Questions about the space around the woman created by Cezanne’s unusual composition add tension to the human drama.
The Getty Museum Distinguished Lecture series is free; a separate reservation is required for each lecture. All lectures take place at the the Getty Center.
About Richard Brettell
Richard Brettell is the Margaret M. McDermott Distinguished Chair of Art and Aesthetic Studies and the Edith O’Donnell Distinguished University Chair at the University of Texas in Dallas. He is among the world’s foremost authorities on Impressionism and French painting from 1830–1930. His museum exhibition work includes Monet in Normandy (for the de Young Museum in San Francisco) and The Impressionist in the City: Pissarro’s Series (for the Dallas Museum of Art). He has given scholarly lectures at numerous museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery of Art, and has written over 25 books, including Impression: Painting Quickly in France, 1860-1890.
The 2016 Getty Museum Distinguished Lectures Series
Édouard Manet, Le Printemps (Jeanne Demarsy)
Date: Sunday, February 28
Time: 2:00pm
Paul Gauguin, Arii Matamoe (The Royal End)
Date: Tuesday, March 1
Time: 7:00pm
Paul Cézanne, Young Italian Woman at a Table
Date: Thursday, March 3 Time: 7:00pm