French Modernisms: Perspectives on Art Before, During, and After Vichy

by Michèle C. Cone

Overview

French Modernisms: Perspectives on Art Before, During, and After Vichy examines the close link between art and politics in France from 1935 to 1970. In essays on the exhibition and criticism of modern art, Michèle Cone provides a broader context for the xenophobia that characterizes Vichy-era France. Cone argues that the decline of French art in the second half of the century was caused, not by the invasion of foreign artists, but by the Parisian art establishment itself, which continued to promote the Vichy-era values of national identity and national tradition.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521783507
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	03/19/2001
Pages:	236
Product dimensions:	7.01(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.55(d)

Table of Contents

Introduction: art, nationality and national tradition: the case of France from 1937 to 1968; 1. Collaboration foretold: French art of the present in Hitler's Berlin; 2. Decadence and renewal in the decorative arts under Vichy; 3. Vampires, viruses, and Lucien Rebatet: antisemitic art criticism during Vichy; 4. Tricolor painting in Vichy France; 5. Jean Paulhan and his artist friends; 6. The Picasso album: a 1943 landmark of artistic resistance; 7. Wartime guilt: French furniture of the 1940s; 8. The mature Richier, the young César: expressionist confluences in French postwar sculpture; 9. Pierre restany, the French fifties and the Americanization of the everyday; Epilogue; Hitler equals de Gaulle in a May '68 poster.

Editorial Reviews

"...an thoughtful, engaging study... Cone's nonsensationalist tone makes her observations seem all the more startling, as we see not only venality in action but also naivete, self-interest, and survival as motivators. [...] She ...shows how the country's self-protective instincts and phobia towards outside influences have led to provincialism and marginalization." ARTNews

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