Caillebotte Exhibit At The Kimbell Museum, Ft Worth, TX -- January 16, 2016

My notes of the Gustave Caillebotte exhibit; during my second visit.

The Painter's Eye exhibit, Kimbell Museum, late 1915 / early 1916: wall notes. 

His eye: photographic
His works: rare

Folks were aghast that the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, would pay $17 million for Gustave Caillebotte's Man At His Bath. From wiki:

Caillebotte created this work in 1884. He sent the painting to be exhibited at the Les XX show of 1888 in Brussels. The painting was controversial enough that it was removed from public view and placed in a small and inaccessible room. The painting was held by Caillebotte's heirs until it passed to another family, and then to a private collection in Switzerland in 1967.

His works are scattered around the world, mostly held by private individuals; no museum owns any sizable collection. Man At His Bath was huge, not a small still life.

Lots of work to get all these paintings for an exhibit; the paintings are located everywhere around the globe, including Louvre Abu Dhabi; most in private collections.

Caillebotte painted at the beginning of the Impressionist Period -- 1870's, 1880's -- died 1894.

Tried to capture "how the eye worked."

Paul Hugot: personal friend; life-size painting -- may have owned more paintings by Hugot than anyone else outside Hugot's family.

Caillebotte: "photographic look"; common; eclectic; hobbies; friends; his life -- rich gentleman of leisure who wanted to preserve his fortunate "good life."

What's missing from the exhibit: no religious theme; completely secular; not even a church; did not see Notre Dame; no Parisian landmarks.

Eclectic:

• street scenes
• card-playing scene; original -- dogs playing poker; presidents playing poker
• portraits -- classic, posed
• portraits -- as seen in real life
• hobbies -- boating
• street scenes -- fruit, fish, vegetable market
• see picture of men looking at something 
• rarely -- we see a picture of what they were looking at (#513, #512)
• rural/urban
• modernity: Hausmann; steel bridges; trains

Eclectic:

• Manet: portraits, large black spaces
• Monet: landscape; impressionism; avant-garde; perhaps but not eclectic; did not evolve;
• Rembrandt: I get tired of looking at Rembrandts; I don't get tire of looking at Caillebotte.

Photographic eye:

men scraping floor -- all "three" men -- the same model!! -- it's like three frames from a movie camera; or a camera mounted on a tripod and photo shot every four hours

Caillebotte may have been singularly responsible for "saving" Impressionism -- the pieces themselves; he was a patron; supported the artists who were poor; bought their paintings. See this website for more justification for that statement.

Caillebotte's collection became the "bulk" of Musee d'Orsay.

Best example of impressionism:

• Dahlias
• Garden at Petit Gennevilliers
• 1893
• one year before he died
• most impressionistic

Paintings of looking out windows: "In the most radical compositions Caillebotte eliminated all evidence of the window, save for the plunging perspective ..." Again, the photographic eye.

"Paris emerges as the main subject."

#501: French National Collection of Impressionism

• basis of the Musee d'Orsay
• rich parents die -- he is in his 30's
• he and his brother Martial -- wealthy; bachelor pad in downtown Paris
• self-portrait -- relaxed, done quickly - as if taken by a camera; framed in a mirror
• trained as a lawyer; never completed

#502: half-nude scrapers 

• subject, again --> half-nude males
• style --> again, the photographic eye

Unnumbered: opposite #517

• cow / pasture: photographic
• mundane, why??
• who would buy it??
• who would hang it??

Argument: why Boston MFA did not pay too much for Man At His Bath

• must be put in context of what people now pay for art
• risk of Saudi princes buying the artwork; lost forever
• Caillebotte did not paint much
• no one museum had large collection; no museum had a collection large enough it could sell from to raise money
• once in a lifetime opportunity when this painting became available; MFA probably had to act fast; at risk of losing this opportunity
• few people have seen -- or recognized a Cailleboote; will bring new patrons in; something NEW; people getting tired of same old artists
• people will feel they have seen these paintings before; but won't be able to place them; will now know the story
• Caillebotte painted during the beginning of the Impressionistic Period -- the bridge from the OLD to the NEW; transitions are always important

At this point, ANY CAILLEBOTTE was important; if Boston MFA did not have a Caillebotte, it needed one. If Boston MFA had a Caillebotte, it would have had only one or two; not enough to call it a collection.

So, any Caillebotte - either is was serendipity this one came on the market when it did OR Boston MFA was specifically looking for a particular Caillebotte, or a particular type.

Now, why this particular one? Once decision was made to pay whatever it took to get a Caillebotte, why this one?

• large; not simply a small still life
• a peak into his alternate life-style; when this painting was bought by the Boston MFA, LGBT was a big bit deal; but even before, in Boston, the LGBT was always a huge community
• it seems all great artists interested in nudes; the human body is the holy grail; 
• human nudes done all the time; generally a female; this relatively unique, a male, but even more unique, the setting; how could a male nude be done differently: How did he choose his subject? Who was his subject?
• of all the Caillebott's at the exhibit -- was there any Caillebotte that was "better"? Not equal to, but better. 

From wiki on the controversy and argument for the purchase:

In preparation for its Degas and the Nude exhibition in 2011, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA) decided to purchase the painting, which it already had held on loan since earlier that year.

The painting was bought for approximately $17 million. The chairman of the Museum's European art department realized that they would be extremely unlikely to obtain donor funding for the purchase, because the painting depicted a male nude – difficult subject matter for attracting donors.

To raise the funds, the MFA "deaccessioned" (sold) eight other paintings in its collection.[9] The move was controversial, as the eight pieces had been given to the museum as gifts from benefactors. Those paintings were also by artists more recognized to the general public than the lesser-known Caillebotte: they included work by Monet, Renoir and Gauguin.

Others defended the move by the MFA: Boston Globe editor Dante Ramos claimed that acquiring the Caillebotte is "the kind of bold, adventurous move that a world-class museum ought to be making," while noting that there may not have been many benefactors willing to donate "a painting showing some random guy's naked butt."

The painting became the museum's first Impressionist nude, and joined the one other work by Caillebotte, the still life Fruits sur un étalage.