It is a once-in-a-lifetime experience: the chance to see one of the greatest -- and most fragile -- works of European art before your very eyes. The illustrated manuscript known as the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry contains images that have shaped our view of the late Middle Ages, but it's normally kept under lock and key at the Château de Chantilly, north of Paris. It's only been exhibited twice in the past century. Now newly restored, the glowing pages of Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry are on show to the public for just a few months. "Approche, approche," the Duke of Berry's usher tells the visitors to the great man's table for the feast that will mark the start of the New Year. It's also your invitation to examine closely the illustration for January, one of the 12 months from the calendar in this Book of Hours -- a collection of prayers and other religious texts -- that form the centrepiece of this exhibition in Chantilly. It's su...
It was by accident, not design, that we found ourselves viewing the art collection of a German-turned-Swiss arms manufacturer.
On our recent trip to Paris, we were on our way to see the excellent show about the Nabis at the Musée du Luxembourg when we walked past the Musée Maillol, which was showing a loan exhibition from the Emil Bührle Collection in Zurich, with Monet, Manet, van Gogh and more. That looks interesting, we thought, let's pop in and see it on the way back. So we did, and it turned out to be very enjoyable. But back to the paintings in a minute.
Because, as debate rages over the funding of art and museums, with the Sackler family now under attack for their pharmaceuticals company's role in the opioids drug-abuse crisis sweeping America, it's impossible not to acknowledge a certain degree of queasiness about the way this collection, one of the most prestigious in private hands in Europe, was built up.
Emil Georg Bührle was a controversial figure who died in 1956 after making a lot of money from weapons sales by his company Oerlikon-Bührle, including to France and Britain before World War II and then to Germany during the war. He started collecting in the 1930s, but much of the collection was put together in the 1950s.
The focus is very much on late 19th-century French painting. Bührle's artistic preferences were fixed when he was a student in Berlin before World War I. "I decided," he said, "that if I were ever to adorn my walls with paintings by the masters, my choice would be Manet, Monet, Renoir, Degas, and Cézanne."
The collection in Zurich hasn't been generally accessible since four paintings were stolen in an armed robbery in 2008, so the Paris show provides a chance to see a selection before the pictures are moved to a new extension of the Kunsthaus museum in the Swiss city, scheduled for next year.
And what a choice collection it is. And let's face it, the art is in no way diminished by the man who collected it. The show kicks off with Edouard Manet, and two of his works stand out. Painted with broad brushstrokes, The Swallows represents a snapshot of modern life for Manet, with his mother in black and his wife holidaying by the sea along the Channel coast.
Manet's naturalistic treatment of the view is contrasted with a painting from two centuries earlier by Aelbert Cuyp that shares similar characteristics, highlighting the way Bührle liked to assemble his collection. Thunderstorm over Dordrecht also has a dramatic cloud-filled northern European sky, a bucolic landscape and of course a windmill- and church-filled backdrop.
A later work by Manet has a more Impressionist feel and was painted in the open air: A Corner of the Garden at Bellevue, with a woman dressed in blue sitting surrounded by dabs of red flowers and green foliage. A rake and watering-can lead your eye into the picture, pointing her out amid the greenery.
Some of the purchases Bührle made before and during the war turned out to be of art that was looted by the Nazis and then disposed of via the Swiss market. Bührle restituted a number of paintings to their rightful owners after the war, and then he bought some back again. One room in this exhibition gives details on all this -- there's a clear effort to exculpate the collector with lots of documentation -- and one of those works on show is Alfred Sisley's Summer at Bougival:
The Bührle collection excels in the Impressionists, with Claude Monet's Poppy Field near Vétheuil one of the outstanding works. A couple of works by Edgar Degas also really catch the eye: Before the Start manages to combine an almost photographic record of the moment before the off at the races with a frieze-like format that appears to create a continuing narrative. Meanwhile, Little Dancer Aged Fourteen is the only sculpture Degas made as a work in its own right. It's a real masterpiece.
Bührle was fascinated by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and that artist's affectionate portrayal of two women In Bed -- one of several he painted on the same theme -- is among the most prominent post-Impressionist works in the show.
There are no fewer than six pictures by Vincent van Gogh on display here. The Sower pays tribute to works of the same name by Jean-François Millet, with its dramatic sun acting as a kind of halo behind the farmer and that tree that's escaped from a Japanese print.
And no survey of late 19th-century French art would be complete without Paul Cézanne, represented by this Self-Portrait with Palette among other works.
This is certainly a fine show, and one that appears to be pretty popular with the Paris exhibition-going public. It was packed when we went (some of the exhibition spaces are quite small), and there was a queue to get in.
What about Bührle the arms magnate, though? Well, it's difficult, isn't it? How many rich men have acquired splendid collections through business practices that might now be seen as distasteful, dishonest or much worse? It's impossible to rewrite the history that saw these paintings end up where they are, and the chances are you've seen a number of these works in isolation in individual exhibitions at some point recently without giving their provenance too much thought. Whatever your feelings about the way these pictures were acquired, the art remains superb.
Alfred Sisley, Summer at Bougival, 1876, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © SIK-ISEA, Zurich (J.-P. Kuhn)
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, In Bed, 1892, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © Dominic Büttner, Zurich
Vincent van Gogh, The Sower, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © SIK-ISEA, Zurich (J.-P. Kuhn)
Paul Cézanne, Self-Portrait with Palette, c. 1890, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © SIK-ISEA, Zurich (J.-P. Kuhn)
On our recent trip to Paris, we were on our way to see the excellent show about the Nabis at the Musée du Luxembourg when we walked past the Musée Maillol, which was showing a loan exhibition from the Emil Bührle Collection in Zurich, with Monet, Manet, van Gogh and more. That looks interesting, we thought, let's pop in and see it on the way back. So we did, and it turned out to be very enjoyable. But back to the paintings in a minute.
Because, as debate rages over the funding of art and museums, with the Sackler family now under attack for their pharmaceuticals company's role in the opioids drug-abuse crisis sweeping America, it's impossible not to acknowledge a certain degree of queasiness about the way this collection, one of the most prestigious in private hands in Europe, was built up.
Emil Georg Bührle was a controversial figure who died in 1956 after making a lot of money from weapons sales by his company Oerlikon-Bührle, including to France and Britain before World War II and then to Germany during the war. He started collecting in the 1930s, but much of the collection was put together in the 1950s.
The focus is very much on late 19th-century French painting. Bührle's artistic preferences were fixed when he was a student in Berlin before World War I. "I decided," he said, "that if I were ever to adorn my walls with paintings by the masters, my choice would be Manet, Monet, Renoir, Degas, and Cézanne."
The collection in Zurich hasn't been generally accessible since four paintings were stolen in an armed robbery in 2008, so the Paris show provides a chance to see a selection before the pictures are moved to a new extension of the Kunsthaus museum in the Swiss city, scheduled for next year.
And what a choice collection it is. And let's face it, the art is in no way diminished by the man who collected it. The show kicks off with Edouard Manet, and two of his works stand out. Painted with broad brushstrokes, The Swallows represents a snapshot of modern life for Manet, with his mother in black and his wife holidaying by the sea along the Channel coast.
A later work by Manet has a more Impressionist feel and was painted in the open air: A Corner of the Garden at Bellevue, with a woman dressed in blue sitting surrounded by dabs of red flowers and green foliage. A rake and watering-can lead your eye into the picture, pointing her out amid the greenery.
Some of the purchases Bührle made before and during the war turned out to be of art that was looted by the Nazis and then disposed of via the Swiss market. Bührle restituted a number of paintings to their rightful owners after the war, and then he bought some back again. One room in this exhibition gives details on all this -- there's a clear effort to exculpate the collector with lots of documentation -- and one of those works on show is Alfred Sisley's Summer at Bougival:
Bührle was fascinated by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and that artist's affectionate portrayal of two women In Bed -- one of several he painted on the same theme -- is among the most prominent post-Impressionist works in the show.
What about Bührle the arms magnate, though? Well, it's difficult, isn't it? How many rich men have acquired splendid collections through business practices that might now be seen as distasteful, dishonest or much worse? It's impossible to rewrite the history that saw these paintings end up where they are, and the chances are you've seen a number of these works in isolation in individual exhibitions at some point recently without giving their provenance too much thought. Whatever your feelings about the way these pictures were acquired, the art remains superb.
Practicalities
Works from the Emil Bührle Collection are on display at the Musée Maillol in Paris until July 21. The museum is open daily from 1030 to 1830, with lates on Fridays until 2030. Full-price tickets are 13.50 euros and can be bought online here (in French; the English version of the site appears to be faulty). The gallery is on rue de Grenelle in the 7th arrondissement, with Rue du Bac station on line 12 of the Metro just a couple of minutes walk away.Images
Edouard Manet, The Swallows, 1873, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © SIK-ISEA, Zurich (J.-P. Kuhn)Alfred Sisley, Summer at Bougival, 1876, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © SIK-ISEA, Zurich (J.-P. Kuhn)
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, In Bed, 1892, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © Dominic Büttner, Zurich
Vincent van Gogh, The Sower, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © SIK-ISEA, Zurich (J.-P. Kuhn)
Paul Cézanne, Self-Portrait with Palette, c. 1890, Emil Bührle Collection, Zurich. © SIK-ISEA, Zurich (J.-P. Kuhn)
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