Standing in the Musee Nissim de Camondo recently, I couldn’t stop thinking of the Jewish family who built this collection. The Camondo family was dedicated to French patronage and demonstrated this through their collection and valor in the First World War. They devoted themselves to France and the country’s ideals of equality and freedom. A nation, that in the end, would hand them over to the Nazis. The Camondo were not alone in their advancement of art patronage in the early part of the 20th century. Jewish families like the Reinarch, Ephrussi and Rothschilds contributed to France and left great collections for future generations. The early 1900s also saw the rise and contribution of post-impressionist and modern art masters who were also of Jewish descent.
Amedeo Modigliani, a counterpart of Picasso and Cezanne, was one of the great expressionist painters of the early 20th-century. Modigliani started painting at a young age, and unlike many Jews living in Eastern Europe, his family, having settled generations earlier in Livorno, Italy, faced little antisemitism. His first real success was “The Jewess,” (1908) which had similar melancholy themes to that of Picasso’s blue period works. Modigliani’s style quickly changed after moving to Paris, abandoning his early work, and trading his bourgeois upbringing for a bohemian lifestyle. Modigliani’s work falls into two categories, nudes and portraits. His style became known for its melancholy nature and elongated features, most notably the necks and mask-like faces, as seen in “Portrait of Lunia Czechowska” (1919). Even with these vanguard features, Modigliani was able to capture the expressions of his subjects. His nude work was a departure from classical and mythological paintings and contained the overt sexuality of his subjects, like in “Reclining Nude” (1917). His work with nudes was thought to be salacious and scandalous. Modigliani’s heavy use of drugs and alcohol aided in his succumbing to tuberculosis in 1920 at the height of his career.
Chaïm Soutine came from a shtetl in what is present-day Belarus. A great expressionist painter, Soutine often looked to Rembrandt van Rijn and other well-known old masters as references for his work. Though many historical references exist, his has a more personal emotional factor than his predecessor’s work ever did. Having experienced persecution growing up as a Jew in Eastern Europe, Soutine’s work had a deep, personal and often darker tone than many of his Western European contemporaries. Soutine’s paintings of animal carcasses are some of his most emotionally laden works. “Carcass of Beef,” (1925) was inspired by a work of Rembrandt, but in Soutine’s work, you feel the emotion of the work, a crying out of pain that comes from the slaughtered animal that only Soutine’s mastery was able to portray. During the Nazi occupation, Soutine went into hiding to escape deportation. Unfortunately, due to health complications, he left the safety of his hiding place to seek medical attention and died during surgery in 1943. Soutine’s life and career were cut short.
Marc Chagall grew up in the Russian Empire. Because Jews were denied education in Russia, he attended a Jewish school and learned Hebrew. While many Jewish artists were encouraged to hide their Jewishness, Chagall embraced his faith and identity, making them the central theme of his work. His style had elements of both expressionism and cubism. His work soon gained prominence for his portrayal of Jewish life, both in the biblical nature and depiction t of the life of Jews in Eastern Europe, like in “The Drover and The Cattle Dealer” (1912). Though a celebrated painter, the rise of Nazism in Germany caused his work to be slowly discredited with only the help of the Museum of Modern Art was Chagall and his family able to escape Nazi-occupied France. After the war, Chagall returned to France and continued making art until he died in 1985. At the time of his death, he was the last remaining artist of his generation, outliving all his contemporaries.
Modigliani, Soutine and Chagall remain some of the greatest examples of Jewish artists who shaped the early 20th century. They embraced movements that were initially closed off to Jews and expanded their art form, paving the way for generations to build upon. While so many Jewish collectors shaped the art landscape of this time, it was these artists who had a lasting impression and were at the heart of this time in history.
