Poussin and Nature: Arcadian Visions
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
1000 Fifth Avenue
New York City
212-535-7710
February 12 - May 11, 2008
By CATHY NAN QUINLAN
A Distant View framed by Trees
Pen and brown ink, brown wash over black chalk, 10 7/8 x 14 1/2 in.
Musee des Beaux-Arts Marseille
Every enthusiastic response to Poussin, from Gian Lorenzo Bernini in the 1630’s to Holland Cotter in 2008, remarks upon how much Nicolas Poussin rewards the engaged viewer, but this is so astonishingly the case that one cannot help reiterating it. “Poussin and Nature: Arcadian Visions” succeeds in intensifying that engagement with a surprising twist: an exquisite drawing show in the center of the exhibition which invites you to consider whether an unattributed group of drawings, called the G-Group, is by Poussin.
The placement of this show within the show marks the strong division between the early phase of his work, when Poussin is sexy, relatively messy, mythological, with nymphs and satyrs reclining or disporting themselves in natural settings, and the later phase, when he is serene, spacious, ordered and with Christian or more secular themes dominating his work. After spending time with the nymphs, and then trying to figure out what constitutes a Poussin drawing, one emerges into the later phase of the paintings and finds oneself wondering, “Is this all the same painter?”
Where is the ray of sunshine that shimmers in between the trees and catches a shoulder, the rump of a sheep, an ear and a golden cup? Who is this new, more formal if not artificial (because what painter is not?), cooler guy who seems to be appealing to another definition of the “mature audience”?
It was popular among artists in the 1630’s to go out into the landscape around Rome and draw from nature: Poussin, along with his friend Claude Lorrain, his brother-in-law Gaspard Dughet, and others often went out together. They shared the same interests and subjects and also, one supposes, the same paper and ink. The G-Group is named after Dughet, a successful landscape painter, but not all the drawings are his and many have been attributed, at times, to Poussin. The signage on the wall offers a great deal of information on how to identify a Poussin by taking into account the artist’s known works—their internal motivation and their touch.
There are many learned arguments about whether in all cases to use the following criteria, but here are some of the points the curators made about how to use them to judge individual works.
A Poussin drawing covers the whole page, leaving no space undefined. An otherwise very likely candidate, “Landscape with Classical Buildings,” has a large open area on the lower right.
Poussin uses washes constructively, not supplementally. “Landscape with Five Trees” not only has undefined areas, but the shadows of the trees are supplemental washes.
Poussin never isolated a subject, used a ruler, or corrected. The drawing of a sculptural arch is therefore unlikely to be his.
Poussin drawings always depict deep space. A beautiful drawing of a birch tree, “Two Branches, One Broken,” does not depict deep space and also incorporates a motif in which he never showed any interest.
The birch tree and other G-Group drawings are described as not analytical enough—they’re too “picturesque” —and this is a distinction that deserves special attention. What could be considered the strongest group of real Poussins, both in execution and attribution, is undoubtedly drawn directly from nature and is intensely analytical. For example, in “Panoramic Landscape with a Villa at the Foot of a Mountain,” every line describes and distinguishes the space. This drawings, and the others like it, took no more than a few minutes and seem to be directed toward gathering topographical information for paintings.
For the person who understands and therefore loves these drawings, especially their economy, “picturesque” feels like the wrong word. During this period, whenever Poussin tried to make his drawings more picturesque—more descriptive of the leaves on the trees, for instance—he seemed to lose interest, unlike in the paintings, where he is very interested in the leaves on the trees.
However, several drawings in the G-Group make “picturesque” a compliment. For example, “Forest Glade,” with its intertwining tree and bush, doesn’t depict deep space but the depiction of shallow space is extraordinary. And most notably, “A Distant View Framed by Trees,” while perhaps lacking everything that a Poussin has, is lovely and atmospheric none the less.
Attributing and reattributing is a wonderful sport. This viewer feels grateful to the curators for providing the information and the artists who, by their multiple interests, made it possible. In fact it led this viewer to take the game further and discover another characteristic of the Poussin works in this show: The light, whether shimmering or bathing evenly, virtually always enters from the left. In only two of the drawings, both from life and in which the direction is a bit muddied, and in two paintings—“Landscape with a River God” and “The Arcadian Shepherds” —does the light come from the right. (In several of the G-Group drawings the light is from the right.) Even a defining characteristic might have odd exceptions to the rule. What is certain, though, is that a room full of paintings with the light all coming from the same direction makes for a beautiful room.
