In the days following the Franco-Prussian War and the Commune, the
Government conceived the project of decorating the Panthéon, which had
just been once more secularized, in order to convert it into a temple
wherein all the shining lights of the nation could be brought together
and honoured.
M. de Chennevières, who at that time was director of the Beaux Arts gave
the first place, in that illustrious line, to the noble and serene
Genevieve, patron saint of Paris, incarnate ideal of patriotism.
Accordingly it was a series of religious paintings that M. de
Chennevières required of Puvis de Chavannes, when he entrusted him with
a large share of the decoration.
This type of painting, although new to Puvis de Chavannes, failed to
intimidate him. He had too much patriotic fire, more than enough
Christian faith, and above all too thorough a mastery of his profession
not to approach this task with full confidence. It is enough to visit
the Panthéon just once in order to be convinced of this. A more
magnificent realization of Saint Genevieve could not be conceived of,
even in dreams. But are these paintings to be classed with religious
art? One would hesitate to assert it, if the pictures habitually
consecrated to religious themes are to be taken as a standard. But they
are something better than that, because the virgin protectress of Paris
is in these pictures profoundly human; she is brought very close to us,
and we see her despoiled of the aureole that would have removed her too
far from our vision and our hearts.
The whole world knows, at least through reproductions, the series of
paintings consecrated to the life of this saint. First of all, we have
Saint Genevieve as a child, singled out from a crowd by Saint Germain,
because she is marked with the divine seal. "I chose the hour," wrote
Puvis de Chavannes, "at which history claimed possession of this heroic
woman. These two are not an old man and a child, they are two great
souls face to face. The glance which they ardently exchange is, in its
moral significance, the culminating point of the composition."
Next in order comes the _Piety of Saint Genevieve_. The pious child is
at her prayers before a cross formed by two interlacing branches. This
is the prologue of a life filled with miracles, divine recompense
accorded only to supernatural virtue. The artist has admirably
reproduced the mystic fervour of that child whose future was
foreordained to be so beautiful.
Subsequently, in 1896, the Government entrusted Puvis de Chavannes with
the execution of two new panels, likewise dedicated to the life of Saint
Genevieve. The two themes chosen were the following:
"Ardent in her faith and in her charity, Genevieve, whom the greatest
perils could not swerve from her duty, brings sustenance to Paris,
besieged and threatened with famine."
"Genevieve, sustained by her pious solicitude, keeps watch over sleeping
Paris."
These noble paintings were the last productions of the great artist. A
sort of premonition told him that the end was near, in spite of his
robust health. "How I shall devote myself to the Panthéon," he wrote,
"when I am finished with the Hôtel de Ville! I intend it to be a sort of
last will and testament."
In these last paintings, Saint Genevieve is no longer a child. Having
attained womanhood, her saintliness is such that, from all sides, people
come to take shelter behind her veil, like children around their mother,
as soon as danger is announced.
For the purpose of portraying this hieratic and inspired figure, Puvis
de Chavannes found the ideal model close at hand, in the noble woman who
had associated her entire life with his. _Genevieve bringing sustenance
to Paris_ is the artist's wife who, already mortally ill, inflicted upon
herself the most cruel suffering, in order to pose in her husband's
studio. The disease which was killing her was known only to herself, and
she had the heroism to conceal it up to the supreme hour when, conquered
at last, she was stricken down. In painting the pensive and dolorous
attitude of _Genevieve watching over sleeping Paris_, the poor artist
never once suspected that he was tracing for the last time the portrait
of her who had been the consolation and the joy of his whole existence.
The unfortunate woman lacked the strength to play her rôle to the end;
she was forced to take to her bed. The artist, no less heroic than she,
feeling that his own life was slipping away with hers, yet wishing to
complete this last work,--his testament--transported his easel beside
the dying woman's bed, and there finished the sketches for his picture.
In the intervals of time between the paintings executed for the
Panthéon, Puvis de Chavannes produced certain other large compositions
in no wise inferior either in importance or in merit, notably, in 1883,
a large painting for the Palace of Arts, at Lyons.
The municipal government of that city, wishing to have the main
staircase of the palace decorated, entrusted the execution to the great
artist who was at the same time a compatriot. He felt a very special joy
in accepting this commission, for he had always retained a vivid memory
of the city of his birth.
He endowed it with three pictures of a very high order, one of which,
_The Sacred Wood, dear to the Arts and the Muses_, is considered by many
to be the artist's masterpiece.
Puvis de Chavannes breaks away from the mythological theme so often
treated that it has become hackneyed. It is not on Helicon that he
groups his Muses, but on the shore of a lake, in a setting of verdure
softly illuminated by the rays of the moon. At the foot of a portico,
Calliope is seen declaiming verses before her sisters. Some of the Muses
appear attentive; others converse together; one of them is reclining
lazily upon the grass. Euterpe and Thalia, heralded from the sky by song
and the accompanying lyre, approach to join the group.
[Illustration: PLATE VII.--LETTERS, SCIENCES AND ARTS (detail)
(In the Amphitheatre of the Sorbonne)
In this immense composition, in which the groups are balanced with
admirable harmony, there is an exalted and pervading beauty. It makes
itself felt in the prevailing mood of the subject as a whole, in the
expressions of the several characters, in the naturalness of their
attitudes and in the luminous clarity of the landscape.]
Antiquity, as treated by Puvis de Chavannes, loses nothing of its
nobility, but quite the contrary. It even gains in real beauty, because
his Muses profit by being despoiled of those conventional attitudes, in
which an immutable tradition has trammelled them. The artist has
retained only such of their attitudes as cannot detract in any way from
the naturalness of their movements or their lines.
In the same Palace of Arts, Puvis de Chavannes painted two additional
allegorical panels representing _The Rhone and The Saône_, both of which
are admirably effective.
To about the same period belongs his well known painting, _The Poor
Fisherman_, at present in the Musée du Luxembourg.
In this work, which he painted as a relaxation from his more extensive
efforts, Puvis de Chavannes has tried to portray, as Millet so often
did, all the sordid and lamentable misery of the slaves of toil, who
bend their poor aching backs beneath the burden of physical distress and
mental degradation. This work is a fine and eloquent lesson in
humanity.
In 1889, the Hôtel de Ville, in Paris, proceeding with the still
unfinished decoration of its numerous halls and chambers, entrusted
Puvis de Chavannes with the task of decorating the main staircase and
the first salon in the suite of reception rooms.
On one wall of this salon, he painted _Winter_, on the other _Summer_.
These two compositions are of imposing dimensions and admirable in
execution.
_Winter_ shows us a snow-clad stretch of forest landscape. Woodsmen are
hauling the trunks of trees which others of their number have just
felled. Nothing could be more impressive than his rendering of the
desolation of winter; and the truth, the exactitude of the physical
effort these men are putting forth, with every muscle straining tensely
on the rope.
_Summer_ shows us a delightful and smiling landscape flooded with light;
bathing women plunge their nude forms beneath the water, while a mother,
seated on the grass, nurses her new born child. In this picture Puvis de
Chavannes, who was a landscape painter of the first order, has
surpassed himself; the work is a miracle of open air and grateful shade.
Unfortunately, the room in which these two magnificent pictures are
placed suffers from a deplorable want of light, and its scanty
dimensions make it impossible to stand back at a sufficient distance to
see them to advantage. The Hôtel de Ville should for its own credit
assign them a place more in keeping with their worth.
For the museum at Rouen, Puvis de Chavannes painted an allegory entitled
_Inter Artes et Naturam_, charming in fantasy and poetic feeling.
According to his habit, he has grouped together in synthetic form the
various things which constitute the wealth or serve to mark the
characteristics of the province of Normandy.
Labourers heaping up architectural fragments preserved from all the
various epochs proclaim the variety and antiquity of its monuments; its
special art is represented by a young girl painting a tulip on a
porcelain plate and by a lad carrying a tray of pottery; its principal
agricultural richness is revealed by the action of a woman, bending down
a branch of an apple-tree, in order that her child may reach the fruit.
And at the bottom of the picture flows the Seine, rolling its flood past
a long sequence of manufactories, and bearing in its course heavily
laden boats.
This picture is one of Puvis de Chavannes' most ingenious conceptions;
furthermore, it possesses great charm of detail.
In 1891, the trustees of the Boston Museum approached Puvis de Chavannes
with a request to decorate the main staircase of that edifice.
The negotiations were troublesome. In spite of his delight at having a
new work to produce, in spite of the legitimate pride he felt in this
homage paid to French art, Puvis de Chavannes hesitated to accept the
commission. For the first time he faced the necessity of painting a
canvas without having studied beforehand the physiognomy, the
environment, the illumination of the space he was to decorate, and his
artist's conscience suffered. Besides, certain misunderstandings had
arisen between American trustees and the painter; several times
relations were on the point of being broken off; and no definite
agreement was reached until after the lapse of four years.
Puvis de Chavannes began this work in 1895; he did not finish it until
1898. The surface to be covered was to be divided into nine large
panels, three facing the entrance, three to the right, three to the
left. The choice of subjects was left to him.
For the central panel Puvis de Chavannes chose a theme already treated
twice by him: _The inspiring Muses acclaim Genius, Messenger of Light_.
Against a background of sea and of blue sky, a Genius with the radiant
features of a child advances, holding a torch in each hand. At sight of
the Genius the muses run forward and range themselves on each side.
The ninth muse, still floating through the air, hastens to rejoin her
companions.
This whole charming group of women is deliciously painted and one is at
a loss which to admire the more; the originality of the artistic
conception, or the peculiarly rare delicacy of the painter's skill.
The eight subordinate panels represent _Bucolic Poetry_, _Dramatic
Poetry_, _Epic Poetry_, _History_, _Astronomy_, _Physics_, _Chemistry_
and _Philosophy_. All these paintings produce a decorative effect of the
highest order, and many critics consider, not without reason, that this
group of frescoes in the Boston Library constitutes the masterpiece of
Puvis de Chavannes.
However that may be, the authorities of the great American city are very
proud of this absolutely unique decorative ensemble, and whenever any
distinguished stranger passes through Boston he is conducted to admire
it. Is not this a beautiful homage to French art, of which Puvis de
Chavannes was one of the most glorious exponents?