in the capital city of 1830, is acted by a big crowd of
people--shop=attendants, customers of every sort, small merchants and
grand ladies, lackeys and grenadiers, mailmen and policemen produced on
the stage as the naive action unfolds. All these masques and costumes
are absolutely authentic, but they seem fragile and delicate like a
dream. The fact is that the documents from which the <g>dossier</g> of the
decorator was constructed were anything but commonplace. Bakst did not
seek his information from the more direct sources supplied by the
engravings of that time: he went to the show cases of porcelain ware.
Too little are the charming products of Russian porcelain makers--the
Gardners and the Popovs--known. To be sure, they often merely
misrepresent, in their style, the models from Saxony or Sèvres, but they
do it with a naive flash of pure color that appeals to rustic artisans.
But side by side with such imitations these obscure Russian artists
modeled an entire little world of their own in tender clay--cossacks in
uniform, drunken serfs, nude women, coiffed “en cabriolet” and burying
their chilly hands in fur muffs. Whatever tastefully conventional there
was in these figures, Bakst transposed into the language of the theater.
Ever since that time this form of ballad (or “boutade”, as it was
called
[Illustration: XXIX
SUBMARINE MONSTERS (“SADKO” OPERA). (GOUACHE)]
[Illustration: XXX
STAGE DECORATIONS FOR THE BALLET “WOMEN OF GOOD HUMOUR” (SECOND
VERSION). GOUACHE]
[Illustration: XXXI
A BACCHANALIAN DANCE (JOSEPH) BY R. STRAUSS]
[Illustration: XXXII
Mr. NIJINSKY AS “BLUE GOD”. (GOUACHE)]
in the time of Cardinal Mazarin), the dancing for which had been
designed by Serge Legat, a splendidly endowed young man who committed
suicide in a fit of passion and despair over a love affair, has
maintained its place on the program. Examples of it are the “Carnival”,
“Phantom of the Rose” and “Secret of Suzanne”, that delightful
little=work in which one already sees Napoleon evolving from Bonaparte.
[Illustration: IN UPPER SAVOY. DRAWING]
But Bakst had by no means given up his painter’s easel for his
theatrical sketches. Numerous portraits of his bear out this fact, such
as that of the philosopher and lay theologian Vassili Rosanov, of his
friend Benois, of Levitan the remote emulator of Corot who discovered
the intimate and poignant beauty of the humble Russian landscape, of
Diaghileff and his old nurse. Painted with keen observation, with
facility of touch and in vivid colors that spread over broad surfaces,
these portraits coming from the school of Serov showed nothing of that
painful affectation, of that anguish of definitive, absolute expression
with which the Moscow master often endowed his canvases to the point of
tiresomeness. In the case of Bakst there is nothing of the exact analyst
who dissects and torments the soul of his model. With our artist
everything seems to be improvisation, happy inspiration; it is a style
for which the fine term “prime=sautier” (ready=wit), once coined by
Montaigne, is exactly appropriate.
His growing familiarity, however, with Greek art, which is in a high
degree plastic and linear, turned him in the direction of more
concentrated and more simplified processes. The painting of vases in the
merest outlines and on flat surfaces neatly silhouetted, imperceptibly
drew him into the path followed by Ingres. He therefore gave up his
paint brushes in favor of the lead pencil and the colored crayon. In his
portraits thus designed it is the line which circumscribes the person,
which sets it out in space, which expresses its character and suggests
its size. Thus the Russian painter is already en route towards that
strictly linear transposition of a body of three dimensions without the
aid of the model, or of any standard of values, or of any material
record; a style which some day Pablo Picasso employed as master and
Modigliani as spiritual dreamer.
But even all this could not satisfy that fever for activity, that fecund
restlessness which at all times determined the tremendous productivity
of Bakst. It was necessary, people were agreed, to offer, in opposition
to the Academy of Fine Arts, managed by pedantic dilettants who were
embittered by the triumph of the new art, a form of instruction at once
free and sane. The haughty air of the Academy’s official staff was not
justified either because of any venerable tradition nor because of the
most elementary <g>savoir faire</g>. The “wanderers”, having dislodged from the
Academy the pedants whom Bakst knew, placed themselves in their seats.
Their æsthetic carelessness was complete, their ignorance of Western art
absolute and provoking. At the same time young artists who rebelled at
this teaching were reduced to the necessity of acquiring the rudiments
of painting by themselves.
Affairs were in such a condition that they absolutely needed to be
remedied. Bakst therefore associated himself with Mstislas Doboujinsky,
[Illustration: A HUNTRESS IN 1930]
a remarkable offspring of “Mir Iskousstva”, who excelled in the
designing of the ornament and of the vignette, and who later worked with
considerable success in the theater, in order to start a free school. I
recall having been able, in connection with an exposition organized by
the review “Apollo”, to estimate the results achieved during the first
year of the school’s work. One series of studies symbolized a nude man
on a background of red material. There was none of that “academic” way
of placing things in a vacuum or in a neutral atmosphere, nor of
sketches colored amid gray shadows. The bright red of the background
played upon the subject in green lights; the rhythm of the colored
surfaces superimposed itself upon the anatomic harmony of the body. All
these attempts were strictly anonymous as far as the public was
concerned; it was not the personal pride of the students that was to be
flattered; it was merely a question of establishing the validity of the
method. That did not hinder the fact, however, that some of those young
unknown painters today enjoy a reputation that borders upon renown.
We have now reached the year 1908. Bakst seems to have condensed his
effort. He has summoned back the ancient legendary tale and has restored
it to the theater. This myth he has also projected upon a famous canvas.
In his portraits his incisive line closely encompasses material and
internal realities. In his romantic dreams he has been able to live
again through what Stéphane Mallarmé has called “la grâce des choses
fanées”. Later he makes a division of his artistic property among his
enthusiastic students. How much there is in this to fill a beautiful
life! One might think that the circle of such men as Bakst is completed
in one harmonious curve. But it is nothing of the sort.
Bakst is one of those men whose road is laid out in spiral form. What
seems like a stop, is in fact nothing but a turn of the road. And at
each turn the circle widens. At Petrograd his task is completed. There
is nothing left there except to follow. But there remains Paris and the
universe.
In reality, I am at the end of my task, which is that of acquainting the
reader with a Bakst who has not yet been written up, of speaking of his
formative period and of the intimate and hidden sources of his
inspiration. Once my hero had entered upon public life, I ought already
to have left the domain of his private existence. It is with regret that
I take leave of the good little fellow who goes into ecstasy over his
grandfather’s canary birds; of the uncompromising youth who defies his
ignorant masters; of the young man who risks his future--and what a
[Illustration: XXXIII
THE RED SULTANA]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: XXXIV
THE PINK SULTANA. (GOUACHE)]
[Illustration: XXXV
THE YELLOW SULTANA. (GOUACHE)]
[Illustration: XXXVI
STAGE DECORATIONS FOR THE “BLUE GOD”]
[Illustration: A DRAWING]
future!--for the sake of the exquisite form of a smile and the profile
of a tapering hand; and finally of the artist whom I see in my country
becoming identified with all big projects, either undertaking them or
excelling in them.
But this study would perforce be incomplete if I did not decide to
accompany our friend on his exodus toward the West and to put together
the main facts of his recent activity which sends its rays over the
entire world--an activity of which, for the most part, I am a witness.
Therefore, en route to Paris!
[Illustration]
A SHOW IN AN ARMCHAIR
In 1906 or thereabouts, following immediately upon the first Russian
revolution that failed so grievously, the group of young artists and
poets marched side by side through the breach that had been opened in
the citadel of public opinion. The “modernists” of “Mir Iskousstva”, who
had been jeered by the common herd, came into their own. But a certain
uneasiness troubles this rising power; it feels itself incomplete,
limited in a fatal manner. It is not equipped to reestablish great
painting; it can only count upon illustrators, decorators, and poets of
the
[Illustration: DRAWING OF COLOUR FOR THE REVIEW “APOLLO”]
past. And, as is the case with authority everywhere when it feels itself
threatened, so too this group, not being able to assert itself, was
anxious to spread out.
Accordingly, they looked for new fields to conquer. Once again we see
Diaghileff leading the attack. He releases that great exodus of Russians
to the West--the brilliant and victorious march on Paris. The offensive
starts with a Russian exhibition at the “Salon d’Automne”, an exhibition
which under the guise of being retrospective is in reality a fighting
manœuvre. A collection of icons, of numerous portraits of the eighteenth
century symbolizes the return to a tradition which the young men of the
“Monde Artiste” proclaim to be their own. Similarly the arbitrary gaps
indicate their complete break with the unnatural art of the “wanderers”,
the latter having been nearly entirely eliminated.
Bakst took part in this enterprise not alone as a painter. He decorated
the hall of the eighteenth century, which had been transformed into a
grove, with a trellis surmounted by vases. This conception of an
exposition hall forming an organic whole, making a coherent <g>ensemble</g>,
and therefore having a distinctive atmosphere--is not this, again, a
gift belonging to the Russians?
This first attack could do no more than break through the first lines of
the enemy. Painting, it was evident, was not sufficient as an object for
combat. So Diaghileff thought of music. His historical concerts of
Russian music caused the greatest excitement; Parisian opinion was
deeply stirred. Bakst’s role in this first and formidable success was
quite accidental. He drew some portraits for the program, notably that
of Balakirev, the composer of “Thamar”: bold lines and a synthetic
contour set out the head of the aged oriental sorcerer as though it were
sculptured.
It now became a question of following up this first victory. Diaghileff
turns once again to the theater, counting for his success upon its
numbers and upon the wide range that it afforded. All circumstances are
favorable for his project. His old group of co=workers surrounds him,
abler through strife and experience. A galaxy of stars of the
dance--Pavlova, Karsavina--await but the signal to make them gleam forth
on the western sky. At the same time a marvellous dancer is
discovered--Nijinsky. And, as a will is needed to give life to all these
latent forces, behold, Michael Fokine presents himself,--Fokine, a young
master of
[Illustration: XXXVII
STAGE DECORATIONS FOR ACT 3rd OF VERHÆREN’S “HELEN OF SPARTA”.
(GOUACHE)]
[Illustration: XXXVIII
STAGE DECORATIONS FOR THE “CLEOPATRA” BALLET. (GOUACHE)]
[Illustration: XXXIX
COSTUME FOR TCHEREPNINE’S “ADORATION”]
[Illustration: XL
COSTUME FOR STRAVINSKY’S “BIRD OF FIRE”]
[Illustration: A WANDERING MUSICIAN’S COSTUME. (“WOMEN OF GOOD
HUMOUR”)]
the ballet, a rebel at the hundred=year=old tradition in vogue in the
imperial theaters, who is ready to offer himself body and soul to the
cause of the painters who take possession of the theater as masters.
Into this renunciation of tradition he puts all the fervor of a neophyte
and an infinite measure of talent. What was there that one could not
dare to undertake with such a band of the élite?
What followed is well known: fifteen times the celebrated “Russian
Seasons” have already borne in upon Paris like shining waves breaking
into foam.
It is not for me here to trace in detail the fate of the “Seasons”,--the
transformations which they underwent, their successes as well as their
[Illustration: FACING THE MONT-BLANC. DRAWING]
failures, the latter oftentimes being more creditable than the
successes. Whatever else may have been their mission, certain it is that
they brought two men forth into fame and glory: Stravinsky the musician
and Leon Bakst the painter.
“Cleopatra” had caused extraordinary surprise. “Sheherazade” in 1910
surpassed everything. In recalling the annals of the modern theater, it
is scarcely possible to recollect any production that was given a
similar reception.
I had intended to sum up the successive stages of the fifteen years of
productive work accomplished. Yet here I find myself, as I face my
sources and my documents, overwhelmed with the almost magic
[Illustration: A VERANDAH. DRAWING]
abundance of the material, the description, yes, the mere ordered
enumeration of which would fill many a volume. These sources consist in
part of numerous productions which maintain their place in the theater
from season to season without losing their popularity because of the
ever present memories of others. But on the other hand we also have the
“dossiers” of these productions,--the sketches and models of the
decorations and costumes. These sketches are without a doubt the most
authentic references. But besides having value as documents they possess
an intrinsic value as works of art. These water-colors or emphasized
sketches are more than mere guide-lines for the scissors of the costume
maker or the brush of the stage decorator. These statuettes of
odalisques, of girls of the street, of a marquis each have an existence
of their own, each possesses an individual rhythm. The artist imparts
movement to them--the whole dynamic rhythm of the future ballet
pre-exists there potentially. Jotted down upon a white sheet of Waltmann
they energize and give life to this surface. More than that: they
suggest the character of the particular role.
Think of the sensual passion of the Oriental dancers in pink or green or
of the fragrance of the rustic idyll that breathes from the exquisite
pages drawn for Daphne! Think of the Gothic and mournful sensuality of
Sebastian! Indeed, what an inspiring “show in an armchair” it is to turn
over these pages, which are a microcosm of a world come into reality
upon the stage!
To this show I would invite the reader; as for myself, I would but turn
the pages.
* * * * *
“Sheherazade” was Bakst’s real debut at Paris. “Cleopatra” had been a
revival. It represented an attempt to utilize the small ballet inspired
by a story of Théophile Gauthier’s and supported by a mediocre score
composed by Arensky. On top of this score were grafted fragments from
Rimsky-Korsakov, Moussorgsky, Glinka, and Glazounoff in order to
transform it into an historic whole. Bakst undertook the thankless task
of re-creating the unity of this heterogeneous collection. He created a
monumental and sinister background, saturating the Egyptian granite with
color. He wrought into an harmonious whole the motley crowd of brown
slaves with white loin-cloths, the Greek young men raising the panther
skin of Dionysos, the captive Jewesses with somber hooded cloaks
punctuated by the white in which their single and troubled figure is
draped.
[Illustration: XLI
THE “BOUTIQUE FANTASQUE” BALLET THE CHILD WITH DOLLS]
[Illustration: XLII
THE “BUTTERFLIES” BALLET. A VALET IN 1850]
[Illustration: XLIII
A HUNTRESS. DECORATIVE PANEL]
[Illustration: XLIV
THE “BOUTIQUE FANTASQUE” BALLET. A DOLL]
[Illustration: SILENUS. “NARCISSUS BALLET”]
The action which begins as an idyll and which is lulled by the soft
music of the violin is suddenly upset by the strident notes of the
flutes. Preceded by musicians who carry instruments of antique and
unusual design and by solemn guards, a number of slaves carry a long
closed box upon a litter. One side of the palanquin slides down and a
mummy is revealed, tall and motionless, whom the slaves stand upright
upon its feet encased in cothurns of sculpted wood. The slaves, running
around her, free her of the bandages in which she is wrapped, and when
the last fetters have thus dropped, the queen steps down from the
cothurns, unnaturally tall, her hair colored with blue powder. She walks
toward the regal couch and in doing so, a nude limb is revealed, longer
and bolder than those of the fairies in the pictures of English
pre-Raphaelite artists. This female being, this queen is Ida Rubinstein.
It is not the first time in the life of Bakst that we see this haughty
and pallid profile of the implacable empress appear. Several years
previously Bakst had adapted the stage setting of Sophocles’ “Antigone”
[Illustration: A BROOK IN THE MOUNTAINS. DRAWING]
to this young débutante, who then appeared under an assumed name. I
clearly remember this unique production. And I see again the proud
maiden as she is wrapped in the numerous and complicated folds of her
black mourning robe. In working out this conception Bakst had drawn his
inspiration from a tombstone or else had deciphered the clever pattern
from the sides of a Greek vase.
Later this young woman with her disconcerting and mysterious beauty,
this mystical virgin, voluptuous yet frigidly cold, with a will
[Illustration: RABBITS. A SKETCH]
of iron underneath a fragile frame, and possessed of a haughty and cold
intelligence, who dressed in eccentric clothes, became one of the Muses
of our artist. Hers was the gift of driving his imagination to
exasperation. Even after many years had elapsed she still held for him
the allpowerful attraction of the strange, of the unreal, of the
supernatural. His Muse--perhaps that is not the right term: rather, his
Friendly Demon.
Having once touched upon the chapter of the Muses, another female image
rises in my mind’s eye--that of Mme. Marie Kousnetzoff, the opera star.
She is not the white and lunar Lilith; she is the Eve of the terrestrial
paradise. This Russian brunette, with a Levantine face, a blooming
flower in human flesh, with full, muscular form, seemed to have been
created for the very purpose of wearing the turbans and the revealing
veils designed by Bakst. Those who have seen her in the “Legend of
Joseph”, garbed as a Venetian of the Renaissance, and wearing the
thick-soled shoes suggested to Bakst by the celebrated costume designer
Cesare Vecellio, brother of Titian, will forever retain this wonderful
picture of the Biblical story of lust. Thus Mme. Kousnetzoff was the
very incarnation of the oriental mirage that many a time haunted Bakst.
Was she his Muse? No--his female Double!
But enough of these parenthetical remarks! Why was it that “Sheherazade”
established itself and retained its place? Why was it that it could keep
its prestige undiminished, even after it had called forth innumerable
imitations in a territory extending all the way from the Opera to the
meanest of suburban music halls?
The reason for it is the fact that this Persian ballet, which adapts the
prologue of the “Thousand and One Nights” to a subtle and decorative
score composed by Rimsky-Korsakoff, the eminent colorist, is the
affirmation and, what is still more important, the realization of a
great principle--the optic unity of a production. The sides of a large
green tent enriched with gold and black encase and encircle the ladies’
apartment which is peopled with a crowd dressed in orange, pink and
green clothes, who surround the single royal jewel, the Sultana Zobeide,
a blue sapphire in a setting of rubies and emeralds. Thus the costumes
either blend with the scenery in an infinity of fine shades and
gradations of value that have been carefully studied out, or they
contrast with the scenery in accordance with the visible logic of
complementary colors.
Is the result, then, a ballet? It is a living scenery with
interchangeable elements.
Was I going to speak of optic unity? Do I mean by it that unity stops at
the surface? Certainly not! This ardent and cruel magnificence of color,
this effluvium of sensuality which emanates from the setting produces an
action in which the very excess of passionate ecstacy can only be
satiated by the spilling of blood. This harmonious giddiness, this
measured paroxysm seems to recall the title which Maurice Barrès gave to
a famous book: “Concerning Blood, Sensuality, and Death.”
“Sheherazade” remains as the model work in Bakst’s oriental sphere of
endeavor; neither he himself nor his competitors surpassed it. But
[Illustration: XLV
A PAGE. (“ALADIN” BALLET)]
[Illustration: XLVI
A PAGE IN LOUIS XIV’s STYLE. (“ALADIN” BALLET)]
[Illustration: XLVII
THE EMPRESS ELISABETH PETROVNA HUNTING. (GOUACHE)]
[Illustration: XLVIII
DELPHI. (GOUACHE)]
[Illustration: POPULAR BATHING AT LIDO]
round about this luminous center other visions of hashish radiate forth:
“Thamar”--a Cleopatra in Georgian style, a symphony in blue major; “The
Blue God”, a Hindu fairy=tale; “Peri”, more recently, “Alladin”, and,
only the other day, “The Adoration.” Astonishment takes hold of one as
one tells the large pearls on this necklace that is worthy of the
funeral=pile of Sardanapalus. Turn over the pages of the ballets that I
have cited and look for the sketches; if you are in possession of the
magic word of Ali=Baba, force open the sesame of the Museum of
Decorative Arts in which are jealously guarded the most beautiful of
these sketches; and you will find how justified was the saying of the
late Joséfin Péladan, “Bakst, the Delacroix of the Costume.”
Consider the wisely arranged orgy of “Sheherazade”, (for Bakst has this
supreme gift that great masters possess, of being concerned about the
smallest button on a legging at the same time that they are getting a
whole army to march) and in this whole eruption of vigorous colors you
will not observe the slightest suggestion of white. There is,
nevertheless, in the work of Bakst a whole corner, enveloped in
sunshine, in which the white--shining and serene, virginal and
fresh--dominates resolutely.
The sensual within him is duplicated by the romantic. We saw this come
to the fore for the first time in the “Fairy of the Dolls”; Schumann’s
“Carneval” revealed the “white Bakst” to the Parisians. They never grew
tired of these adorable puppets, sentimental and crafty, who glide over
the floor to the musical text of Schumann like the dolls on the cover of
a music box. Harlequin and Pierrot, Chiarina or Colombine--they are not
merely endless masks costumed in the styles of 1830, with furbelows and
coiffures in ringlets; they are the incarnations of that playful and
exquisite Viennese spirit; they are the descendants of Mozart and of
Haydn. And the cut of their hazy cambrics, their whole bearing is in
“Biedermayer” style--that quaint and charming style of bourgeois
romanticism in the Germany of old. In order not to crush these fragile
and delicate beings with the four walls of reality, as they flitted like
butterflies about the stage. Bakst removed all stationary decoration: a
background of drapery, a couch set off against this background--that was
all. Nothing encumbers the view nor impedes the imagination of the
spectator as he is enticed by the graceful or ironical episodes of the
play to picture to himself a ball room or a boudoir or a park.