German Art at the Louvre

Saturday June 22 started cool and cloudy and stayed that way, with a few sprinkles of rain thrown in.  Only about 19C as the high.  We headed out after lunch to the Louvre to see the temporary exhibit: De l'Allemagne 1800-1939 (German Thought and Painting from Friedrich to Beckmann).  The exhibit was a tribute to the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Franco-German Cooperation Treaty in January 1963.

Louvre viewed through the pyramid

Poster for the exhibit

The entrance way to the exhibit had eight 12' high canvases done by Anselm Keifer (b. 1945), a German painter and sculptor, made especially for the show, and entitled De l'Allemagne.

Anselm Kiefer's paintings in entrance way

The exhibit deals with the German search for national identity and was divided into three themes: Apollo and Dionysius (relationship with the past); Landscape Painting as a national issue (relationship with nature); and Ecce Homo (place of Human Beings after WWI).  The first group of paintings from the 19th and early 20th centuries showed two strains in German art - Apollonian (rational and classical), known as quiet grandeur and noble simplicity, and Dionysian (dark, illogical), known as impulsive beauty.  The early romanic painters known as the Nazarenes looked to Greek temples, Italian painters' colours and Durer for drafting, as their models.  The context for these paintings was the era post Napoleonic wars and the fall of the Holy Roman Empire.  

The second group of paintings focused on landscapes, which were elevated in German painting to an almost mystical level and were very nationalistic.  French and Italian landscapes, by contrast, were not seen to be at the highest level of painting.  There was a room was a number of beautiful landscape paintings by the romantic painter Casper David Friedrich (1774-1840).

The third group of paintings focused on the portrayal of human beings after the destruction of World War I.  Otto Dix's portrayal of war in a series of paintings done in 1924 entitled La Guerre are very strong.  Max Beckmann and George Grosz also portrayed the upheaval of the 1920s and early 1930s.  The exhibit also showed that romantic paintings both became the mainstay of conservative painters in the 1920s, but also an escape for more progressive painters.  Excerpts from Leni Riefenstahl's Olympia and Fritz Lang's Metropolis were also shown.  A number of the artists exhibited in the Ecce Homo section had their works displayed in the Nazi's Degenerate Art exhibit held in 1937.  

The Louvre exhibit has generated a considerable amount of controversy in the press, some critics saying that the show was organized in such a way that it made the rise of National Socialism seem almost inevitable.  Others have criticized the non-inclusion of certain artists in the show.  However, all agree that the art works shown are excellent and that the show should not be missed.

Tischbein Goethe in the Roman Campagna 1786

Ernest Ferdinand Oehme (1797-1855)  The Cathedral in Winter 1821

Casper David Friedrich (1774-1840)    The Tree of Crows 1822

Carl Gustav Carus 91789-1869)  Haute Montagne 1824

Casper David Friedrich Morning in the Mist 1808

Otto Dix (1891-1969) La Guerre 1924

Otto Dix  La Guerre 1924

Lovis Corinth (1858-1926)  Ecce Homo 1925

Christian Schad Portrait du Comte St. Genois d'Anneaucourt 1927

George Grosz (1893-1959) The Lovesick Man 1918

Max Beckmann (1884-1950) Bird's Hell 1938

After the thought-provoking exhibit at the Louvre, we went to pick up a pair of shoes for Alain at Heschung on Rue Marche Saint Honore.  We then wandered up the street to Place du Marche Saint Honore, a street we hadn't been on before (in the 1st).  I bought a pair of cute runners ( I ended up getting the striped pair) at a newish concept store called N15.  The runners are a Croatian brand with a new Italian design.  The store has a number of interesting labels.  However, some of the clothes were a bit too dressy for my liking.

Trying on one of each-- ended up with the striped pair

Putting my own shoes back on-- Alain took the pic and didn't realize he was facing the mirror

We stopped for a coffee at a buzzy bar- Razewski- and then headed back towards the Marais.  It was getting late and the stores were closing.  We stopped at Pain du Sucre on Rue Rambuteau, one of our favourite patisseries from 2011, and each had one of their wonderful marshmallows.  Alain had salted caramel and I had a sesame noir.

Alain with a salted carmel marshmallow

We continued to the Marais and walked down Rue des Rosiers, one of the streets in the old Jewish area, which still has a number of Jewish food shops, but also a number of clothing stores.  There was a plaque at the old Goldenberg deli (now a clothes store), where a number of people had been killed in a terrorist bombing in 1982.

There was also a very moving plaque detailing a number of Jews who were deported from 6 Rue des Rosiers during 1942-44 with the complicity of the Vichy government.

We walked across the Seine and back to our apartment for another late dinner. I finished the blog on Sunday morning and it's raining once again.