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Center:Red Interior, Still Life on
a Blue Table, Matisse, 1947
Right: Ballerina in Green, Degas, 1880
[Click on images to see larger versions]
James Kalb over at the quiet and thoughtful Turnabout asks "Do pretty flowers mean that the French are totally immoral?"
His whole post is a rumination on aesthetics for aesthetics' sake - or merely prettiness for prettiness' sake.
Then he'd have to wonder about Degas' ballerina series and think of Matisses' textiled interiors. These are two artists who have stood out, to me, for their focus on looking at something pleasurable. Sure enough, Degas' ballerinas could convey the hard, physical, work of these tiny girls, who may suffer for their art (or just to earn a sou), and many of Matisses' interiors do seem to have a story behind them.
But, when I first started looking at them, all I thought was how pretty they were. In fact, I disdained Matisse, because he ultimately seemed to want to paint just wallpapers - flat images with an all over effect.
It was later that I realized all the influences Degas had to go through to get his style behind these ballerinas, including Japanese painting. And how Matisse traveled to North Africa to study precisely the decorative aspects of their art (or craft) which led him to more spiritual explorations.
The same with the flowers that stood out for Mr. Kalb. Has he not noticed the perspective - the foggy distance behind the carefully arranged "gate" of leaves which is reminiscent of Leonardo's dark background landscapes? And how the flowers alarmingly loom into the foreground, almost plunging into our space leaving the painting? And the strange bird-like foliage on the right and left which look a little like the foreboding imaginary jungles of Henri Rousseau?
I've long learned that there are no pretty paintings (at least by the classical painters). They are all trying to investigate some ideology, spirituality, imaginative landscape, exotic styles, art concepts, and the list goes on. Painting is the most deceptive of all arts. It looks decorative, but it is intensely philosophical. Which means that it is not immoral at all, i.e. it is not there purely for pleasure.
Perhaps French perfume could fall under that category.