ARTS
Exhibitions
Visible export
Giles Auty
Lucian Freud (Musee National d'Art Moderne, Paris, till 24 January) Lucian Freud is an artist I have admired consistently. It seems almost in- conceivable to me that almost 14 years have crept by since I saw the retrospective of his works in 1974 at the Hayward Gallery. The present exhibition returns to that venue from the Pompidou on 4 Febru- ary, when it will be augmented by the addition of 17 new works. Before Paris, the show was at the Hirshhorn, Washington DC, where it was received with great but surprised acclaim. Because I would place Freud unreservedly among the half-dozen foremost British artists of this century, such a reaction intrigues me. I arranged, therefore, to intercept the exhibition in Two Irishmen in W.11', 1984-85, by Lucian Freud Paris to try not only to gauge Gallic response but also to speak to officers of our cultural outpost there — the British Coun- cil — about the complex factors affecting international reception of contemporary works. Although the artist has been very well known in our own country for approaching 40 years, these are his first major exhibitions outside Britain. This is certainly one factor behind the reluctance of American museums, other than the Hirshhom, to stage the present show.
Other British artists have proved far easier to market internationally, although at best of comparable or, more usually, of lesser status at home. Nor was the placing of the present exhibition a problem in America alone. Enthusiasm for the show at the Must e National d'Art Moderne in Paris — popularly the Pompidou — was far from unanimous, although a senior mem- ber of the curatorial staff, Gerard Regnier, could not have been more generous and discerning in his response. Gaining access to the exhibition's final venue — the Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin, city of the artist's birth — was also an uphill task for the organisers. It says much for the determina- tion of those involved at the British Coun- cil that this thoroughly worthwhile project ever became airborne.
Why, then, such an onerous struggle to present a highly respected British artist to the art-going publics of other Western countries, when far lesser talents slip into the international jetstream with apparent ease? What I fear has been happening is that Western nations have been indulging increasingly in what I can best describe as a `style race', each attempting to outdo the others in embracing and exporting the latest in modish but often vacuous artistic styles. Such soi-disant luminaries as Gilbert & George, Julian Schnabel, David Salle, George Baselitz, Sigmar Polke and a hatful of others have been propelled into global orbit largely by the efforts of their publi- cists, but also with the approval of an international cartel of like-minded museum directors.
In general this 'style race' has just about the same cultural profundity as recent arguments focusing on the respective skirt lengths of Summit leaders' wives. Yet what can the art-going public do in the face of high-level manipulation of international museum fashion? At best the public's role has become a peripheral and passive one, since the citizens of Western countries cannot influence the visual fare set before them in public sector museums and galler- ies. The directors of modern museums see their roles increasingly as Olympian and didactic; doctors of our artistic souls, they write out the unpalatable prescriptions for which the rest of us must pay. A prominent member of the French art press admitted to me that although many of his colleagues and academic associates might ignore Freud's exhibition — largely because it could prove difficult for his classification- mad countrymen to pigeonhole — the French public would almost certainly wel- come it with warmth.
Here we see the obverse of the museum coin; opportunities to see important and interesting work depend on the whims of an appointed few. We are at the mercy of our respective museum tyrannies, whose despots, in turn, are often at the mercy of narrow ideologies. Too many imagine they are on earth to preach the crusade of modernist (or post-modernist) orthodoxy. In such circles a true original such as Freud tends to be read as a heretic; he must be banished from sight lest he taint future disciples to the holy cause.
In their own estimation, the supporters of so-called progress in art occupy the moral high ground. The mouthing of mod- ernist platitudes is, in fact, the route by which most become and remain high priests of contemporary culture. To favour endless formal change — and hunt out recidivists — is central to the entrenched modernist credo. Radicalism and progress are watchwords of the faithful and those who would be upwardly mobile in the arts must sign the appropriate articles of faith. The Pompidou, now roughly a decade old, was conceived as a cathedral for the priests and acolytes of art's 'onward and upward' faithful — in short, those confident in or carried away by their own quasi-religious, `progressive' rhetoric.
The timing of Freud's entry into the international arena is an interesting one. As an artist of unquestionable integrity and 'I like to stress the property-developing side of it.' great, if sombre talent, he is just the sort of fly who may stick in the gullet of contem- porary history. It is little exaggeration to say that the presence of his art in the Pompidou challenges the validity and prac- ticality of Richard Rogers's building. In the ground-floor 'galleries', wherein the intru- sive presence of brightly coloured ducting overhead is nothing more than a flouncing of architectural petticoats, Freud's weigh- ty, considered and modest-sized paintings do battle with the inflexible proportions and dated ethos of a technological dino- saur. In the massive, high-ceilinged cham- bers designed to embrace the overblown productions and flimsy, compliant content of art's international jetstream, Freud's paintings, with their echoes of Ingres and earlier European masters, look utterly at variance with their surroundings. Lower ceilings and walls are necessary to suit the modest scale — but certainly not preten- sions — of Freud's powerful works, but the intransigence of the museum's much- vaunted design makes this impossible.
In the 40 years since Freud painted the first works in the current exhibition, a striking series of portraits of Kitty Gar- man, at least 15 artistic movements have supposedly 'swept' or 'changed' the world. During these posturings, the artist has merely thickened his paint and loosened his handling without loss of the probing, hawk-eyed intensity of observation that is his hallmark. Nor have there been notable changes in his subject matter. The human face and figure, naked or clothed, is the artist's staple motif, interspersed with the occasional plant piece or view beyond the narrow confines of his studio and its windows.
Modernists excuse Freud's formal tradi- tionalism on the grounds that he is at least modern in spirit, i.e. disaffected and alien- ated. Almost identical remarks were made, in his lifetime, about the art of the Amer- ican Realist Edward Hopper, who strongly refuted them. What few contemporary writers will accept — but I applaud — is the right of an artist, now or at any other time, to determine the means he or she requires in pursuance of personal vision. No matter how polished the individual's awareness of art history, presumed com- pulsions to work in any particular fashion, at any particular period, are always and utterly illusory. This, and the primary importance of excellent technique, de- veloped but not borrowed through aware- ness of great works of the past, are the lessons to be learned from Freud's exhibi- tions. I hope this rare example of persist- ence and artistic originality will not be lost on young artists, who have had few enough worthwhile guides in recent times.
In staging this series of international exhibitions, in the face of great opposition, officers of the British Council may have achieved something more than they real- ised. I suspect we may be witnessing a turning point in artistic history.
Previous page
