“Montparnasse, when Paris lit up the world”, by Mathyeu Le Bal: a capital of the arts
Montparnasse, when Paris lit up the world
by Mathyeu Le Bal, preface by Jeanine Warnod
Albin Michel, 402 pages, €59
At the beginning of the XXe century, artists from all over the world converged in Montparnasse. Among them were Russian Jews – Chagall, Zadkine or Soutine –, immigrants from Eastern Europe like Brancusi, a small band of Japanese rallied to Foujita. Some had crossed the Atlantic like Diego Rivera, Man Ray, Calder, others had crossed the Alps, like Modigliani and Giacometti, without forgetting the “provincials”, such as the Normand Fernand Léger. And in this cosmopolitan melting pot were to be written some of the richest pages of modern art…
With a lot of verve, Mathyeu Le Bal, gallery owner in Montparnasse, revives this effervescence which culminates in the Roaring Twenties. By recalling that from the second half of the 19e century, academic painters like Bouguereau and Gérôme had already settled in Montparnasse, soon followed by Whistler, Renoir, Rodin and Camille Claudel…
A neighborhood that unites
The district still offered cheap rents, guinguettes and soon large cafés, numerous art schools where women painters were admitted – the Grande Chaumière, the Académie Julian, Colarossi or Vassilieff – and even a phalanstery, the Ruche , a refuge for many immigrant artists.
The story, amply illustrated and full of anecdotes, quotes from poets and writers who made the great hours of the Closerie des Lilas, takes us into this bohemian life. The author deciphers the famous places: the “Bal negro” where the West Indian community was originally found, the brasseries of the Dôme or the Coupole, but also “the rented”, the market for models trusted by Italian networks, and its counterpart “the market for turnips” created later on boulevard Raspail, to sell the crusts and works of young artists in search of recognition.
Women, muses, painters, gallery owners, booksellers or collectors enchant, as much as men, these great hectic hours. We enjoy discovering characters, like this curator Léon Zamaron, unexpected support of many foreign artists.
Too bad that the book weakens in its second part devoted to one hundred portraits of “Montparnos”, including many second knives, some represented by the gallery of Mathyeu Le Bal. Through this great procession of artists, Bretons, Czechs, Polish, Ukrainians and Australians, however, we take full measure of the past attraction of this Montparnasse, made into the navel of the world.