Balthus exhibition in Martigny

[LCR]

In the fund-Pierre Dzhanadda in Martigny (Switzerland) opened a large retrospective of Balthus (1908-2001) on the occasion of the centenary of his birth.

Here's an abridged translation of an interview with a member of the French Academy, Jean Clair, former director of the Picasso Museum, one of the best experts on creativity Balthus, published in the newspaper "Le Figaro".

LF - Arto said that the smells from the works of B. plague. This is still true?

Yellow - Let's see how this exhibit will be accepted. It is possible that on the contrary, B. classic elegance in a new, yet virtually no written history of modern art, bringing together all the artists, predstayalyayuschih figurative art, so important to the twentieth century, from Pierre Bonnard to Lucian Freud.

LF - But the enchantment of B. young girls still smells of sulfur.

Yellow - Much of the history of fine art, and in particular, the muralist of the Italian Renaissance, which inspired AB, were used as models of very young girls. Once it was believed that before the age of 20 years and the woman lost the freshness of its beauty.

/.../

LF - Have you talked with BA on the interpretation of his paintings?

Yellow - Like all great artists, his paintings are a complex iconographic program. B. never said nothing about this program, however, when he was offered a hypothesis, and he agreed with her, then he gave it to understand. For example, a significant number of his paintings are illustrations to poems by Pierre-Jean Zhyuva.

LF - Art B. called art forebodings, reminiscences, disturbing strangeness ... Is this enough psychoanalytic treatment?

Yellow - Absolutely not! BA has always rejected it. He has always fully aware of what he did in his art, never yielded to the free association of ideas, and therefore denied the surreal.

LF - ie opredelniyu Zhyuva masterpiece - a perfect, deliberate skill?

Yellow - Exactly. This picture, such as "Passage du Commerce Saint-André", fully encrypted. Each piece finds its place in the geometrically modeled the general structure.

LF - But this picture at the same time completely oniricheskaya.

Yellow - That's it, that's what the artist and the effect sought. This incredible poetic discovery. In the depths of the arcade is hardware shop, which still existed when I was a student. During the Revolution in this workshop was the first forged knife guillotine. Him to experiment on the lamb - and it is not surprising that little dog, written by AB, recalls lamb. As in Artaud Theater, in the tales of the Brothers Grimm and Lewis Carroll, as in painting Quattrocento or Caravaggio, Poussin and Courbet, the work is full of BS this cruelty, liberating and soothing. Even his dreamy and languorous young girls completely devoid of tenderness.

LF - Did B. bilious man?

Yellow - No, I do not think. I met) with him in 1969, he was already aged. It was a little disappointed dandy. He was very fond of masquerade, a game. At his funeral, he invited the archbishop, a bishop, all of this holy brotherhood. The character he was rather ironic, the nature of a stateless person who does not really believe in social cohesion, but compliance with customs in the course.

The exhibition will be open until 23.11.2008
www.gianadda.ch