Part 2
The next day he quit the Academy under the impassive glances of the two bearded sphinxes of pink marble, emerging from the gloomy twilight.
A WRONG START
Leon was free now and left alone with his pride in his recent revolt; but there was also a great void in his soul. A country holiday out at Pavlovsk, the delightful suburban residence district where Constantine, the grand duke-poet, lived, afforded him salutary diversion. In the beautiful English park--the loveliest in all Russia--, where every clump of trees, every hill, every lawn forms part of a grandly-devised and complex general plan conceived by an architectural genius; in this park, in which he walked about carrying the burden of his liberty--a melancholy figure, he found what he lacked most: a friend. This new-found friend was a cartoonist by the name of Shpak, a pupil of Repine, and, though but a mediocre artist, yet one who gave himself to painting with a passionate and unselfish spirit. He guided Bakst in looking for motifs , spurred him on to direct observation of Nature, and awakened in him the proper respect for his profession. But this influence soon gave way to another.
Luck would have it that Bakst, during that same autumn, chanced to meet Albert Nikolaievitch Benois, the celebrated water-colorist who had no rival in Russia. He was a member of that “dynasty” of Benoises who have played so prominent a part in the artistic development of Russia. Albert Benois, a handsome, chivalrous and affable man, handled the brush with remarkable ease. He possessed a technique that was as natural for him as bel canto singing is to the Neapolitan beggar. But while his productions, at the same time that they possessed certain qualities of good taste and true knowledge of his art, nevertheless were rather too tame, their success in the eyes of the public was complete. This success of the “master”, who was fêted and flattered by his aristocratic and feminine entourage , and who was unanimously elected to the presidency of the society of water-color painters, dazzled young Bakst, blunted for a while in him the haughty pride of the seeker after new truths, and stimulated other ambitions in him. The fierce rebel who sneered at the Academy suddenly craved Success!
He achieved a success that was immediate, brilliant, and disastrous. Soon he began to neglect landscape painting in favor of the society portrait. Having tasted the apple, he next painted Eve. And, as he abandoned himself to these effeminate and futile pursuits with that same insatiable fervor with which he went into everything, he undertook, he simply allowed himself to drift. Besides, his good friend Shpak was no longer there to awaken his sleeping artistic conscience--he had died quite suddenly. Serov, too, was far away in Moscow and unable to warn him.
When I questioned him about this period of his life of which there are few traces left, Bakst spoke about them quite eloquently, yes, even persistently. He took evident pleasure in this confession; he seemed even to relish the mortification that it must have cost. Was it that in this race toward the abyss he tasted something of that spirit of adventure, of that happy faculty of spending without counting, of giving oneself body and soul to God or the Devil, which, indeed, was a part of his nature? Or was he dreaming of those pretty hands of women, slender but strong, which stroked his curly hair? As far as we are concerned, we must content ourselves with recounting briefly the outstanding facts in the early history of our friend and hero.
The most important of these is a long stay abroad. At Paris he made friends with Albert Edelfeldt, a Finnish painter and a remarkable man, to whose lot it fell to break the ground for the birth of a national art in his own country, in that he transmitted to it the enlightened knowledge of France. It should be noted in passing that all the Norse revivals which endowed the Scandinavian countries with an intense and original artistic life had their origin on the banks of the Seine. Edelfeldt was neither a creative genius nor an artist in the vanguard. He stuck to the cautious methods of a Bastien=Lepage. But he was a forceful and able painter. Some of his canvases are to be found in Paris, among them, if I remember correctly, his portrait of Pasteur.
The habit of working outdoors, the study of daylight and its effect upon massive subjects which Bakst pursued with his new friend who also in some respects became his teacher, contributed powerfully toward his success in performing the enormous task that was soon thrust upon his youthful energy. The Russian government asked the Prodigal Son
of the Imperial Academy to paint a canvas that was to have for its subject the arrival of Admiral Avellan in Paris.
Perhaps the reader remembers that this visit which, unless I am very much mistaken, took place in 1893, was one of the first formal ceremonies arranged in connection with the nascent Russo=French alliance. This canvas, the result of painstaking and honest labor, which displays a freshness of color and a virtuosity of touch that is by no means vulgar, is preserved today in the Navy Museum at Petrograd. Was the young rebel of yesterday to become the Roll or the Mentzel of the imperial fastes? Today we know that nothing of the sort happened.
One afternoon as Bakst, back from Paris, was lording it over a tea table surrounded by beautiful ladies, and was basking in the sunshine of his reputation, with flattering chatter all about him, he noticed a young man enter whose manners at first offended him. With a monocle in his eye, with haughty pride writ across his dark=complected face, round=shouldered, attired in the student’s green blouse with blue collar, he carried on the conversation with an ease that bordered upon disdain and insult. Yet in the very arrogance of the young upstart there was something that fascinated. Bakst took him aside and, when he pressed him for an expression of opinion as to what he thought of his painting, the young man replied candidly that, while he had the profoundest respect for the technical mastery of his questioner, the painting itself absolutely displeased him, and for good cause.
This young man’s name was Alexander Benois. As for Bakst, little did he imagine that he had arrived that afternoon at a turning point in his artistic career.
THE CLUB
For a number of years a group of students from May College a private institution, had been in the habit of meeting at the home of their comrade, Alexander Benois. Among them was Constantine Somoff, a son of the venerable director of the Hermitage, and the future originator of “Echoes of Days Past”; Philosophov who later, when he was associated with Dimitri Merejkovsky, was destined to become one of the revivers of religious sentiment in Russia; and others besides who afterward constituted the nucleus of the society named “The Artistic World” and who still later supplied the staff of the Russian Ballet. Unique, indeed, was the atmosphere of this house.
I have already had occasion to speak of the Benois family. They were the descendants of one of those numerous immigrants who for more than a century, from the accession of Peter the Great till the Moscow Fire, were called upon to help in the transformation of Russia. All of these newcomers went through a similar experience: the tremendous opportunities for initiative, the vast geographical extent and the artistic impulses of the young empire called forth the highest development of their abilities. Many a mediocre artist--or at least one assumed to be mediocre--who had become half suffocated amid the rabble of the western world, became transfigured in these favorable surroundings. The originality of the Russian character, the breadth of view of the grands=seigneurs of Catherine II’s time, the primitive simplicity of the life of the people--all this stirred their imagination. And so these men, who transplanted into Russia the artistic methods of the West, the conceptions of style and the traditions of art that had matured in Europe, became Russians themselves in heart and spirit. More than that: it is to these “Russianized” fellow=countrymen of ours that, in a large measure, we owe the birth of a modern Russian art.
The Benoises were related to the Cavos family, a veritable progeny of artists. Alexander’s maternal grandfather had been a noted composer of music, his uncle a theatrical architect of distinction. The Cavos family were of Venetian origin and never lost contact with their former
fatherland; the Benoises had French blood in their veins. All this is of importance to those who are interested in looking for the origin of certain aspirations, of certain artistic inclinations and habits of mind, in atavism or in the call of blood. All of which did not prevent the Benois brothers, two of whom we already know and the third one of whom was an architect and later was made rector of the Academy of Fine Arts, from becoming the eminent Russian artists that in fact they are.
As for Alexander, from earliest childhood he possessed all the qualities needed for becoming, if not an intellectual leader, at least an intellectual centre. His general culture, broad indeed and so varied as to have become eclectic; a certain pedagogic inclination,--a tendency to instruct, to educate, to make ideas spring forth; added to this, a liveliness of temperament, an acuteness of perception which made him a malcontent, a wide=awake dreamer--all these rare qualities determined his life’s work. His attempts at painting, excepting only his theatrical creations, never seemed able to free themselves of a certain amateurishness. But this was a natural complement to the fact that he was primarily a theoretician or rather a man of artistic tastes who re=enforces his intuitions and his sensibilities with an exact sense of logic and with the true talent of a writer.
For many years Alexander Benois has been the most famous critic of Russia. He is passionate and imaginative. He proceeds either by invective or by panegyric. He is a thunderbolt. He gets worked up over some artist, some idea. Oftimes he is mistaken and his candidate for fame fails. That is due to the fact that Benois, who had really constructed his hero from his imagination, endowed him with his own ideas, and magnified his own conceptions in him, would suddenly, some nice day, leave the poor wretch to his own designs.
When Bakst was admitted to this group, or club, the school boys had become students and the original circle had widened. Philosophov had introduced into it a cousin of his, just in from the provinces,--a fat, chubby lad, exceedingly free in his manners, dictatorial and quite aggressive, inexhaustible in paradoxes which at times were absurd, but which he defended to the limit without in the least attempting to be polite about it. Benois was the soul of this group; the newcomer was to become its will, its moving power--he was to lead it to its supremest heights. The name of this fellow from the provinces was Serge Diaghileff.
Now what was it that transpired during these interminable confabs? The club had set itself up as a supreme court which was to judge the quick and the dead. Before doing anything constructive--they didn’t know themselves what--its members first wanted to wipe out everything existing. They would agree upon the victime, appoint someone as prosecutor, and then conduct a trial. The defendant might be a Shishkin or a Verestchagin--in any case he was one of those celebrities whose wrongly acquired reputation was debasing the real character of Russian genius in the eyes of the whole world! But this whole work of tearing down could not satisfy this enthusiastic group of young people. They felt the need of giving themselves over to something, of consuming themselves
for something. At first their idol was Tchaikovsky, the composer of the “Sleeping Beauty”. Tchaikovsky had already become famous; there was therefore no “Battle of Hernani” to fight. It was merely a question with them of which work of this master should be given preference. They decided upon the “Queen of Spades” and placed it upon the pinnacle. What thrilled our friends about this work was the fact that it conjured up the 18th century in Russia. The action of the opera, the text for which was taken from a story by Pouchkine, takes place amid a setting that is an exact reproduction of “Old Petrograd”,--amidst a scenery that is familiar and famous. The promenade in the summer garden, the little bridge over the winter canal--this, when displayed on the stage, called to mind anew the beauty of the venerable capital--a beauty ever present, but unappreciated and neglected--and rehabilitated its declining fame.
If I have dwelt rather at length upon the feats and exploits of a group of unknown youths, it is due to the fact that these young men, who after theater would walk along the quais during the “white night” singing a duet from the “Queen of Spades”, or would lean pensively over the cold granite parapet to listen to the clock of the Cathedral of Peter and Paul pealing forth its crystal melody over the gloomy walls of the prison fortress,--it is due, I say, to the fact that these young men were destined to reshape Russian artistic sense from top to bottom. Later, on the eve of the new century, the “Mir Iskousstva” Society was founded; with the generous aid of Princess Tenicheff, a magazine was published; art expositions were arranged. A new epoch was beginning. Bakst helped to shape it--and we already know that he gave himself to every task whole heartedly.
At this point I do not propose to narrate the story of “Mir Iskousstva”. It was a revolution and was outrageously attacked as such. But its exponents held that it saved Russian art. Today some people contend that it was a menace to art. A quarter of a century lies between these two conflicting opinions. It is not for me to judge which is right. But Bakst’s participation in the work of this society forms a beautiful page in the life of my friend and therefore, too, of this story of mine. And my task would be incomplete were I to omit giving a brief description of this great movement of ideas which for a long time determined the future of Russian art.
“MIR ISKOUSSTVA”
The small vanguard took position hastily; impetuously it fell upon the enemy. Diaghileff, charging at the head of this handful of friends, sounded the rallying cry. He was successful. Moscow, too, had its raising of the shield. Serov supported the movement. Levitan, the landscape painter, contributed his tremendous popularity to the young cause. During this recruiting fever mistakes were not wanting; for instance, Vasnetzoff, the insipidly sweet imitator of icons, was singled out for praise. He had soon to be dropped. But instead Golovine, Polienov and others joined them who drew upon the real popular sources. It is further true that they almost succeeded in “reforming” Vroubel, the great romantic decorator who was haunted by the Demon.
Above everything this group was looking for allies from abroad. These were to be found at the very gates of Petrograd. A “young Finland” was rising about Edelfeldt as founder--the Axel Galiens, the Jaernefeldts, the Enkels; in short, all those who were destined to endow the “country of a thousand lakes” with a national art. The Finns accordingly took part in the first exposition in which “Mir Iskousstva” faced Russian public opinion. At the second there appeared French guests who after three generations found their way back to Russia.
This proved a decisive feat. An end was thus put to the isolation in which a waning Russian art found itself. For, at that time the whole European artistic movement was ignored in Russia. The prize winners of the Academy would go to Rome to perfect themselves and would there copy the Stanze of Raphael, or else, perhaps, they would go to study historical painting under Piloty, the De la Roche of Munich. The moving spirits of the school--a Kramskoi, or a Repine--would return from their western travels with nothing but contempt for the “futile” (as they called them) masterpieces of beautiful painting or else an infatuation for the virtuosity of the brush of a Fortuny or a Meissonnier.
Diaghileff and Benois flung the doors wide open. A motley crowd enters pell=mell; even the “decadents” of the Viennese Secession, with Renoir and Carrière. Mistakes are made; there is as yet no scale of values; the obscure Belgian, Léon Frederick, is put upon a pedestal while Cézanne is ignored until 1904. The reason for this is the fact that this group at first has no positive program. But its negative influence is inestimable. Repine, one of the most powerful exponents of this ideologic naturalism which I have mentioned in passing, launched a counter=attack in the name of the survivers of traditional academic style. Diaghileff, by his virulent reply, threw the champion of routine out of the saddle. It is a great period of ringing battles, of hard contests with the adversary who mangled even Ingres’ very name. These struggles were the more heroic since the public remained averse to them.
The editorial offices of their magazine were the hot=house in which new ideas were hatched and the staff headquarters where the big offensives were planned. Now, the editorial staff itself was divided into two sections. In the large salon we find Philosophov, handsome and slender as a thoroughbred courser, who meets the contributors to the literary section. There is Merejkovsky, who contributes his best works to the review and who introduces us to the art and the doctrines of Tolstoy and Dostoievsky; Leon Shestov, the apostle of “eradication” with his emaciated face of a Jewish Socrates; Rosanov who pried into the very depths of the sexual problem, a towering spirit who used to bare his inmost thoughts with candor. Of all these men, who were radiant in their young fame, Rosanov alone did not profess a supreme philosophical contempt for the fine arts. The painters, accordingly, would shrink back from the haughtiness and the affected attitude of the literary folk and would seek refuge in the office of the secretary=general, the headquarters of the artistic section.
There they would find Bakst, who was collecting the material that oftentimes was queer enough, and who in fact worked out the whole review. No task was too hard for him. He would group the various component parts and make up the pages. It would happen that Diaghileff, disconcerted over an engraving that came out badly and that had the earmarks of a confused work, would come to Bakst who would take up the work on the plate and give form to an amorphous jumble of touches. Another one of his steady tasks was that of decorating the book, of designing the cover, of drawing the ornamented letters, of supplying the tail=pieces. In this connection it should be recalled that the art of book decorating was revived at the end of the last century. The English, with Walter Crane at the head, started the procession. It was an Englishman, furthermore,--Aubrey Beardsley--who designed arabesques of extraordinary sharpness and delicacy upon the geometrical quadrangles of the pages. This new method was also being experimented upon in Petrograd. A number of artists of the second generation of “Mir Iskousstva”, such as Narbout and Mitrochin, are exclusively “vignettistes”. As for this first group, they had to do everything and accordingly they did everything. Benois, Somov, that other Russianized Frenchman Lanceray--all were experts at this art. Bakst, too, went through it. There are magazine covers of his extant
on which statuettes in Directoire style flank a medaillon, or on which there are artistic frames. At the same time he tried his hands at pure illustrating; there is, for instance, a water-color of his which illustrated “The Nose”, a grotesque story by Gogol. Today we look upon these designs as the first attempts at the masterful costume-pages of later days. “Bakst has hands of gold”, wrote Benois in his history of Russian painting, a work of which we shall speak again later. He admired his manual skill and the elasticity of his spirit and of his workmanship. But he was unconscious of his powerful personality.
Later on, dissatisfied with pen sketching that was then reproduced by the mechanical process of engraving, the group tried themselves at original lithography. Here, again, Bakst was successful: a head of Levitan brings out in sharp juxtaposition the intense black and white of the drawing.
Thus, then, we see Bakst working away at his table, which is covered with waste paper, with photographs and proofs. Around him, people talk idly, or loll about the couches, or draw caricatures, or debate. Then, through a cloud of smoke produced by ten cigarettes, Diaghileff comes rushing in, chasing a new rainbow. He tells of his latest discovery, or he scoffs at some idol that he adored the day before. His enthusiasm is as intermittent as it is uncompromising. He is the life of this party of outspoken, unreserved painters; he cares little for men of letters. Alexander Benois, on the other hand, forms the connecting link between the two clans; he arranges and coordinates everything by virtue of his broad and supple understanding. Soon new initiates--Grabar and Jaremitch, the artist=writers, and Kouzmin, the poet=musician, and others--join in the work of strengthening the somewhat difficult union of these two sections.
Within this community of painters, however, there was little agreement as to the road that should be followed. They agreed in their hatreds, but differed as to aims. Diaghileff, always hyper=sensitive to the sensations of the day and ready to take his ideas out of the clear sky, would misjudge the value of ephemeral tendencies and therefore
at times get himself into an impasse. Thus he allowed himself to be carried away into enthusing over that atrocious “modern style”, the architectural vestiges of which today disgrace every large city in the world. Bakst together with his older friend Serov set himself against painting in the style of Gustav Klimt and against architecture à la Olbrich in the name of an honest, direct and robust art.