ready given in his first paintings.
The structure itself is never ex–
panded or changed. In the paint–
ing of the reclining nude, one
feels that the refinement and his
exploration of the style have been
pushed to the farthest frontier. In
the subtle whites and pinks of the
face of the sleeping girl, the in–
tense delicacy of her heavy lan–
guor, the complexity of her pose,
there is a suggestion of new free–
dom. One step further, and the
basic structure of his technique
would have developed. That step,
taken by others, was never taken
by him. For this reason, although
he completely satisfies within the
scope of his work, the scope is
patently limited. We are tantalized.
We are given a passionate glimpse.
It is touch and go. The boldness
makes us faint, rather than em–
boldened. The poignancy suggests
"It
is too much to bear." There is,
in the painting of the nude, an
excess of ecstasy, an excitement
that chills. In his paintings of
children and friends, there is also
passionate infatuation. H e is loyal
to infatuation.
This is a twentieth-century ex–
perience. No nude has ever before
been represented as the nude by
Modigliani. The directness of his
perception encompasses an under–
standing of individuality that is con–
temporary. Much modern paint–
ing,
even works of such masters as
Matisse and Picasso, have the qual–
ity of a glimpse, of a fleeting im–
pression, lineaments, as if the view-
127
er would be hurrying by, and the
painter had only a moment to
catch the attention and to leave an
indelible impression. Modern art
is full of images that are recorded
in the middle of being "traded
in," like last year's automobile.
The very genes of visual subject
matter seem to be changing. The
poise of a human head today, as
subject matter for a painting, has
in its position the possibility and
likelihood of a free, unexpected
movement that it never had here–
tofore. (In the Renaissance, by
contrast, the fonns of being grace–
ful were fixed by tradition.)
Just as Renaissance artists drew
on Greek and Roman images, Mo–
digliani drew on the forms of
African sculpture. The "primitive"
is particularly apt as a model for
depicting modern sensibility, be–
cause modem people live like sav–
ages. They tend not to respect
either the forms of civilization or
one another, and are at the mercy
of impulse.
The sleeping nude in the pic–
ture, although in repose, conveys
an emotion in extremis, an excite–
ment on the verge of exhaustion.
Her beauty, integrally simple, as
early Greek beauty, is tremulous.
Awakened from that sensitive
somnolence, she might become dis–
traught, even wild. Once wild,
once confidence breaks in anger
or grief, beauty as a
simple
ex–
perience becomes obstructed by
the vast effort to regain balance.
The attempt to be simple becomes
