KAllEN WILKI N
225
of Bazill e as " Prophet of Impress io ni sm " hard to defend. Yet one o f the
most original , if awkward , pi ctures was a gro up o f male bathers on a sunlit
riverbank , an odd p aintin g th at combined inventiven ess, experimentation ,
incipient sli ckn ess, and ineptitude in an ex tra o rdin ary way , and w as ac–
cepted for exhibiti o n at th e Salo n o f1 870.
Bazille made no grea t paintin gs in hi s tragica ll y sho rt career, but h e
produced some ve ry good o nes - no mean achievem ent. Th e solidity of
his work , th e se nse of search, and th e evidence o f growing mastery o f m a–
terials and enlargin g ambiti o n suggest th at he could well have become a
painter to be rec ko ned with. His surviving w o rk may not be propheti c of
Impressionism , but w hat w e think o f as Impress io ni sm mi ght have been
even more di verse if th at Prussian b ull et had mi ssed its mark.
Different
:IS
th ey we re , the Baz ill e and Basquiat shows both reminded
us of the intimate !ink betwee n rea l maturity and mature art. The Gi o rgio
Morandi and H ans H o fm ann ex hibiti ons emph as ized th e point. At
Baldacci-Dave rio Gall e ry , M o randi' s magica lly still , p ellu cid images w ere
testimony to how yea rs o f intense sc rutin y ca n ex trac t poe try fro m the
most banal experi e n ce , w hile th e H o fill anns at Andre Emmeri ch Galle ry
were proof of th e rewards of a lifetime's se ri o us thinking and uninhibited
practice.
Morandi 's wo rk dep ends o n wo rdless, fragile vi su al re lationships, on
solemn considerati o ns o f nu ance, o f tin y shifts in to ne , shape, and surface ,
minutely adju sted and compellingly presented . Th e still !ifes are all sur–
face , almost wh oll y frontal, intimate but mo nume ntal. And whil e you
rapidly become fa mili ar with th e parti cular character o f M o randi's protag–
onists - the oil cans, pitch ers, vases, and bo ttl es - yo u are equally awa re of
their
paillfedll c5s.
Th e best pi ctures are o ften clumsy, artl ess, as though they
came into bein g thro ug h th e exe rc ise of sh ee r will, no t c raft .
In
the
drawings , a few tremulous lin es and som e hatchin g ca n call up a whole
table-top world , with o verton es o f architec ture or geo logi cal phenomena .
(Guston's drawings, eve n th e ca rtoon-y late o n es with th e Klansmen and
the
shoes, owe a grea t dea l to M o randi 's, in th eir econom y, th eir fe rocity,
their concentration. )
Perhaps th e m ost surpri sin g wo rk in th e show was a
1954
can vas,
Courtyard:
a group of unl o vely stu cco buildin gs and a steep staircase we re
reduced to esse nti als, j ammed toge th e r like a still life, and unifi ed b y
creamy ochre and rose paint. A blank wall sli ces o ff the right-hand side of
the
picture, furth er compressing th e architec ture, making th e casual vi ew
s.
urgent and somehow turning an undi stingui shed fragment o f Itali an ver–
nacular into a metaph o r fo r M o randi 's own single-minded , focused , cir–
cumscribed life. T he show was accompani ed b y a handsom e, w ell-illus–
trated catalogue w ith an essay by Pao lo Baldacc i th at suffe red from too
