Friday, November 18, 2022
Admirable Beings
John House, "Renoir and the Earthly Paradise," Oxford Art Journal
8.2 (1985) 21-27 (at 21):
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But he felt that the southern landscape was as much the province of the pagan Gods of antiquity as of the Christian God; shortly before he died, Gasquet recorded, he said: 'What admirable beings the Greeks were. Their existence was so happy that they imagined that the Gods came down to earth to find their paradise and to make love. Yes, the earth was the paradise of the Gods . . . This is what I want to paint.'Joachim Gasquet, "Le paradis de Renoir," L'amour de l'art 2.2 (February, 1921) 41 (non vidi):
'Quels êtres admirables que ces Grecs,' disait Renoir quelques jours avant de mourir . . . 'Leur existence était si heureuse qu'ils imaginaient que les dieux, pour trouver leur paradis et aimer, descendaient sur la terre . . . Oui, la terre était le paradis des dieux.' Et il ajoutait: 'Voilà ce que je veux peindre.'
