" He had a very distinguished
talent, but he was too distinctly clever--clever to the point of
sophistication. In this respect he was distinctly a man of the
nineteenth century. His great work, "Romains de la Decadence," created
as fine an effect at the Centenary Exhibition of the Paris World's Fair
in 1889 as it does in the Louvre, whence it was then transferred, but it
was distinctly a decorative effect--the effect of a fine panel in the
general mass of color and design; it made a fine centre. It remains his
greatest performance, the performance upon which chiefly his fame will
depend, though as painting it lacks the quality and breadth of "Le
Fauconnier," perhaps the most interesting of his works to painters
themselves, and of the "Day-Dreams" of the New York Metropolitan Museum
of Art. Its permanent interest perhaps will be the historical one, due
to the definiteness with which it assigns Couture his position in the
evolution of French painting. It shows, as everything of Couture shows,
the absence of any pictorial feeling so profound and personal as to make
an impression strong enough to endure indefinitely.
Pages:
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110