André Kertesz, Orages sur Paris

Andre Kertesz, Chez Mondrian

(click here for the Romanian Version)
I went to his studio and instinctively tried to capture in my photographs the spirit of his paintings. He simplified, simplified, simplified. The studio with its symmetry dictated the composition. He had a vase with a flower, but the flower was artificial. It was colored by him to match the studio.
[Andre Kertesz telling the story of this photo]

With their extrem abstractionism the works of Mondrian are very challenging. Can the photos made by Kertesz give us some hints, to progress a little bit in discovering Mondrian's artistic personality? At first view, they are very enigmatic, these photos, Chez Mondrian and at the Modrian's Glasses and Pipe. There are however some very subtle references, and I discovered on the web this essay that made relevant for me the references from the two photos, the thick glasses, the tulip ... one tulip in a vase, an artificial one, its leaves painted white... wearing his heavy glasses, Mondrian seemed more a scientist or priest than an artist:


In his Paris studio he had used flowers to make it more cheerful. One tulip in a vase, an artificial one, its leaves painted white...

The artificial tulip fitted in, of course, with the legend of the studio as laboratory or cell, the artist as scientist or anchorite... Everything was spotless white, like a laboratory. In a light smock, with his clean-shaven face, taciturn, wearing his heavy glasses, Mondrian seemed more a scientist or priest than an artist...

The loneliness of the artificial tulip with its painted leaves might seem to suggest that flora were admitted grudgingly, one plant being the next best thing to none. But it probably meant the opposite of that - was probably a sign, not of Mondrian's having become a different person, but of his having remained the same...

As Mondrian was probably incapable of irony, the tulip was unlikely to be a wry joke about his having had to produce flowerpieces between 1922 and 1925 when he no longer wanted to because there were no buyers for his abstracts...

[David Sylvester, About Modern Art]

Andre Kertesz, The Daisy Bar

Les rues étaient abandonnées et humides. Une bruine fine enfermait les lumières dans des halos. Quelques figures se déplaçaient près des maisons. Sur le coin de la rue Montmartre et des Grands Boulevards, un café était encore ouvert.
(Georges Simenon, Maigret et la Jeune Morte)

Le cadavre d'une jeune fille est découvert place Vintimille. Maigret s'occupe de l'affaire, provoquant le mécontentement évident de Lognon, l'inspecteur du deuxième quartier, bien connu par ses complexes d'infériorité et de persécution ; le Malgracieux devra une nouvelle fois s'atteler à des tâches secondaires. Maigret parvient à identifier la victime : il s'agit de Louise Laboine, d'origine niçoise. Dès 16 ans, la jeune fille a tenté sa chance à Paris ; dans le train qui l'emmenait vers la capitale, elle a fait la connaissance de Jeanine Armenieu, Lyonnaise décidée, elle aussi, à vivre sa vie. A Paris, tandis que Jeanine réussissait et parvenait à se faire ouvrir les portes de la haute société, Louise végétait et vivait le plus souvent aux crochets de son amie. Celle-ci a mis fin à cette situation en partant du meublé de la rue de Ponthieu où elles habitaient. Dès lors, Louise a commencé son naufrage : foncièrement honnête et de moralité irréprochable, elle a quitté l'appartement et a sombré dans la misère, lorsqu'elle a appris que son ancienne amie allait faire un mariage avantageux avec Marco Santoni, Italien fortuné. Elle a cherché à la revoir, a reçu d'elle un peu d'argent, ainsi qu'une lettre adressée à son nom, mais remise à Jeanine par la concierge de l'immeuble de la rue de Ponthieu qui ignorait le nouveau domicile de Louise. Cette lettre lui a été laissée par un Américain nommé Jimmy O'Malley. Ce dernier a été le complice du père de Louise, Julius Van Cram, escroc international que la jeune fille n'a jamais connu. Avant sa mort dans un pénitencier américain, Van Cram a demandé à O'Malley de dire à Louise comment elle pourrait entrer en possession de l'argent qu'il a accumulé dans sa vie d'escroc. O'Malley, qui n'a pu retrouver Louise, a déposé pour elle un message dans un bar louche de la rue de l'Etoile. C'est là qu'elle s'est rendue le soir du meurtre, mais le message avait été intercepté par Falconi, patron du bar, Bianchi et le Tatoué, individus peu scrupuleux qui ont profité de la situation. Pour se procurer l'« héritage » à la place de Louise, ces truands ont essayé de lui dérober ses pièces d'identité ; elle s'est défendue et a été tuée par accident.
(Tout Simenon)

The streets were deserted and wet. A fine drizzle enclosed the streetlamps in halos. A few figures were moving close to the houses. On the corner of Rue Montmartre and the Grands Boulevards, a café was still open.

The album had the English version of the text. I thought that a Maigret should be presented firstly in the original version - so I considered translating the text back to French. For wet I choose humide, rather than mouillé. Halos remained halos, and I believe this is also the word used by Simenon. For streetlamps I decided to use lumières - I am sure there is another word, more appropriate.

I found then on the web a summary of the novel - I copied it here, for the sake of all fans of Maigret.

And the photo of Kertesz, that Daisy Bar, is absolutely fabulous. I visited today again the Washington National Art Gallery - there was an exhibition of recent photographic acquisitions - among others, a Pont des Arts by Brassaï, and a couple of fantastic photographic portraits of Maiakovski, by Rodchenko. Here is a Parisian photo made by Charles Marville in the 1860's, Rue de la Bûcherie.

Marville was commissioned to record the streets, monuments, and parks of Paris both before and after the radical changes implemented by Napoleon III and Baron Haussmann (from the biography published by the Washington national Art Gallery).

Andre Kertesz, Mondrian's Glasses and Pipe

Through its simple means, pure abstract art can attain the objectivity of ornament, the purity of geometric construction, the spontaneity of the child. But to be art, the subjective must be manifested through the objective, the apparently mathematical must be free, spontaneity must be consciously expressed.
Piet Mondrian, 1929

I was today at the Phillips Collection to see again the two compositions by Piet Mondrian they have there. Geometrical abstractionism? Minimalism? His compositions consist of rectangular forms of red, yellow, blue, or black, separated by thick, black, rectilinear lines. What is there, beyond this extreme simplicity?

I believe, said Mondrian, it is possible that, through horizontal and vertical lines constructed with awareness, but not with calculation, led by high intuition, and brought to harmony and rhythm, these basic forms of beauty, supplemented if necessary by other direct lines or curves, can become a work of art, as strong as it is true.

Mondrian's art is intimately related to his spiritual preoccupations - he was extremely interested in theosophy. Helena Blavatsky (her work had a profound influence over Mondrian) believed that it was possible to attain a knowledge of nature more profound than that provided by empirical means. How?

If we look for the reality, then we should free ourselves from the tyranny of objects - and while the literature language is one of words, the language of music is one of sounds - so, the language of paintings should be one of shapes and colors - to see through them the reality beyond the objects - is that the lesson taught by Mondrian?

The two compositions by Mondrian are to be found usually in the same room with a couple of works by Paul Klee, and a splendid Blue Room, by Picasso.

Only today the arrangement was changed. The Blue Room of Picasso was in another place - and the works of Klee were also moved - there was a Paul Klee exhibition, with works gathered from different American museums and collections.

Today I found Mondrian in the company of Stuart Davis (Still Life with Saw). Two other works of Stuart Davis (Blue Cafe and Corner Cafe) were in another place, near a room devoted entirely to Soutine.

Phillips - the collection of masterpieces in downtown DC - Giacometti, de Kooning, Pollock, Gottlieb, Noland, Modigliani, Matisse, Cezanne (Mont Sainte Victoire, reminding me by some curios association the Mount Fuji of Hokusai), Braque, Rouault (with a portrait of Verlaine), Degas, Vuillard, Bonnard, Redon, Van Gogh ...Siskind, Kline ... a Repentant Saint peter by El Greco, and a replica by Goya ...

And I like John Sloan with his Staten Island ferry-boat.

And the Rothko room ... they had in mind the Mark Rothko - Barnett Newman Chapel from Houston, Texas, that I saw only in albums.

At the entrance of the Collection, a bronze by Arp, a Helmeted Head, with strong influence of Brancusi.

As for Paul Klee, let's talk about him in another post ...

(Phillips Collection)

Andre Kertesz, The Fork

Were I to take only one image of Andre Kertesz with me, this would be.


Minimalism at its best



El a intins spre mine o frunza ca o mana cu degete.
Eu am intins spre el o mana ca o frunza cu dinti.
(Nichita Stanescu, Necuvintele)

Andre Kertesz, Elizabeth and I

So there it stood, squeezed between the city and the sea, narrow and humble, with its eight long marble-topped tables standing on heavy iron legs beneath the mirrors that ran the length of two walls. The leather of the banquettes was split with use and age, and here and there the coils of springs and snuffing had broken through. But still this place seemed extraordinarily luxurious to us.

Kay Boyle and Robert McAlmon, Being Geniuses together

Few independent coffee houses remained in Washington - no more than a couple. All the others belong now to the big chains. I passed today near one of those independent cafes, and it was closed for ever - out of business: the Sirius, near the metro station of Van Ness - UDC.

I was on my way towards the Politics & Prose bookstore, on the Connecticut Avenue. There are only three independent bookstores in DC - all the others belong to Barnes & Noble, Borders, or other chains. Politics & Prose is the largest independent bookstore in the city (and it hosts one of the few independent coffee houses, too: a very bohemian place).

I was looking for the book of Andrei Cherny, The Next Deal - but even they were not having it. I found instead a Polish author, a journalist - I took his book and opened it - and I was not able to stop reading. The title, The Soccer War, is misleading - actually it describes the journalist's experiences in Africa of the sixties, in Congo, in Ghana, etc. - and it's a fabulous book, believe me. It is reportage, diary, memories, imagination, all combined. The period was extremely complex for African countries - and nobody would be able to understand all that happened there, the causes, the mechanisms and so on. There is no political agenda in the book; the author is first of all very honest to his readers. He tells us only what he sees, nothing more. This guy, Kapuscinki is kind of Hemingway and Marquez gathered together under the same skin.

Andre Kertesz, Flowers to Elizabeth

From all images witnessing the love of Andre Kertesz for his wife, Elizabeth, I had to make a choice, one of them in front of all others. And I made this choice.

Because Love is kind, and envieth not, and vaunteth not itself, and is not puffed up (1 Corinthians)


(Sufi)

Andre Kertesz, Paris, 1927

A seething madhouse of drunks, semi-drunks, quarter-drunks, and sober maniacs ... It was a useless, silly life and I have missed every day since.

Harold Stearns, The Street I know



Well, in the album where I found this text the image was not this one. It was a Robert Doisneau, Jeux de Societe au Cafe, only it was impossible to find it on the web. I found much more fine photos made by Andre Kertesz. I will try to find a place for some of them in the Parisian album. Only now I leave you guys with another Doisneau, celebrating le Paris Gavroche (or, you could say le Paris des Pigeons).