ON CRITICS AND GREENBERG: A COMMUNICATION Why is it that America, despite considerable creative vigor and an unusual curiosity about painting, has never produced a reputable art critic? The situation deserves to be investigated. In Paris there has long been a tradition of avant-garde writing on cultural subjects, It has depended, not so much on giving out random opinions and evaluations, as on following an artist's development and meeting him on his own terms. To critics of this type, if it were Cubism in which they happened to be interested, it would not be of prime importance whether the Cubists were necessarily as “great as Seurat, whether anybody at all could equal the best of other cultures, or any such hazardous judgments; for them it was no more fatal for Picasso to imitate Lautree than it was for Veronese to imitate Titian; they would explore what appealed to them and present it to the public as best they could. Of course I do not overlook the many ignorant and mistaken columnists who clutter the Paris scene as noisily as here; however, there always seemed to be a few® who could get their fingers into the subject, and who acquired an eye for quality as well. Unhappily the New York periodicals (and this goes for London, too) have never offered anything comparable; even in the magazines of intellectual standards one encounters only capricious snap-judgments, and a complete absence of instinct for pictorial structure, The approach —completely irresponsible as to accuracy or taste—has been with us so Jong that we might say that it amounts to a tradition. It is against such a background that we approach the writing of Clement Greenberg. Greenberg offers a peculiar problem for the pro- gressive artist. He has for some years recognized that modern painting * Tt is encouraging to remark that there are again several names, new since the War—Degand, Marchand, Vrinat, Estienne, Descargues—affixed during recent months to important articles on the younger abstract painters. 681PARTISAN REVIEW was being done in America; he has exposed officialdom at times when exposure was imperative; one has instinctively felt that he would line up on the side of right. In the face of this it may seem ungracious to infer that his aesthetic appraisals usually manage to be wrong. However, it must be understood that knowingly-presented superficialities can confuse the issue even more than the obvious ignorance of the journal ists. And worst of all, the artists, upon whom the avant-garde critic depends for his own development, are unable to help him out much either; as an example, when Greenberg's truly disgraceful report on American art (in Horizon) was ridiculed by Time—for all the wrong reasons of coursc—no one felt obliged to defend it. “The Decline of Cubism” (March PR) comes near to being a typical example of that irresponsible criticism we have been discussing, ‘One must stretch a point to call it criticism at all—rather it is an ap- praisal-sheet built around a thesis. So deftly and inaccurately are the appraisals contrived that one suspects the thesis of having been the starting-point—especially as several names that do not follow the pattern get left off the lists entirely, The field of contemporary art is given the semblance of a tournament. Umpire Greenberg charts the last rounds somewhat as follows: the expected champions (Picasso, Braque, Arp, etc.) have lost their punch, and no new blood is coming along—so to every- one’s surprise, a couple of Old Timers (Matisse, Bonnard), who have been relying all these years on poky lobs and drop shots rather than spectacular rushes to the net, were the ones to reach the finals after all, I do not fee! that anything as elusive as the ultimate values of contemporary art can be graded as simply as this, certainly not without considerable substantiation. And such a prearranged result might prove highly irritating to a different referee, who thought he saw Matisse pass out of the tournament in love sets around 1917.* It would have been rewarding if Greenberg had indicated in what ways the works of our losers have declined since the thirties. What he has cited for us are the external events that account for a decline already presupposed. And if he had been clearer on this point I think his thesis might have been undermined at the start. To clarify this point I must pass on to the next one, which discloses Greenberg in the act of lumping together Cubism and Abstract art. # T hope that it will be understood that my distaste for the recent “supreme achievements” which Greenberg credits to Matisse and Bonnard is on the grounds ‘of quality, and not because I find them insufficiently abstract, While speaking ‘of quality, for the critical booby prize of 1948 T should like ta submit Greenberg's statement that Beckmann is painting better than Picasso today! 682ON GREENBERG AND CRITICS Now this is a very serious error, for they differ in a quite fundamental respect. It need scarcely be pointed out that all Cubist paintings were projected as renditions of objects; in a given period the figures might ‘be broken into fragments, in another flattened across the plane, at times all but obliterated through the excessive emphasis on structural symbols. Tt is often forgotten that they retain the old chiaroscuro symbols for the rendition of objects—high lights, shadows, and dark-markings to inscribe the contours. Even in the flattest Cubist paintings, the image (to borrow the Whistlerian phrase) is “behind the frame.” The “win- dow-conception” remains, even if it is a window with the shutters closed. Not by chance has it often been noted that pictures by Picasso and Braque show up to greatest advantage in Louis XV frames, Contemporary abstract painting spearheads a revolt against such a concept. With recognizable objects removed from a painting, surpris- ing changes in scale and space relations become evident; and most sig nificant of all, the painting, instead of being a window bordered by a frame, becomes an object in itself. The frame acts no longer asa window sash but becomes an integral part, sometimes even thrusts the surface forward. Abstraction resurrects the direct impulsc—secmingly lost for centuries—that aims for the “beautiful object”; perhaps it is closer to the vases of antiquity than to the accepted idea of what a painting should be. ‘There has for some time been a rivalry in Paris, of which Greenberg shows no sign of being aware. Abstraction has long been excoriated by the Cubists, whereas the worst that an Abstractionist can say of onc of his fellows is that he is “stuck in Cubism.” Tn such judgments there is of course an obvious danger in becoming too didactic; there are no precise boundaries for Abstraction, or anything else in art. I merely indicate the characteristics of different trends. While exploring the new fields few artists restrict themselves to a single avenue of approach; many who have embarked on complete abstraction later incorporate Cubist elements and many other things as well; and their works become en- riched by their so doing, The districts that have been opened up are very vast, and far from being in the “exhaustion-crisis” stage they are abso- lutely in their infancy, ‘The most challenging portion of the Greenberg article was for me that in which he presents another of his lists (again offered without sub- stantiation)—this time the “best” of the younger generation of French painters. Whore did he ever get such a list? Perhaps from the Whitney ‘Museum, perhaps from itinerant dealers; in either case he should have known better. I agree with him that all the artists on his list work 683gre PARTISAN REVIEW within Cubism,* but there are many artists in Paris today of far greater attainments than any of these, and who are not “stuck in Cubism” at all. Hartung, Magnelli, Deyrolle, Domela, Schneider, Lapicque, Richard are a few of the younger generation that are doing works of a quite different character. And Jean Arp—far from being the ex- hausted Cubist disciple that Greenberg would have him—is realizing impressive work in many fields, no one of which retains suggestions of the Cubist approach. ‘We are now in a position to return to Greenberg’s main thesis, that in times of disaster the radical artists lose their nerve, and through demoralization become: less radical. I think that this connection between nerve and great painting may be a bit exaggerated; all of which is neither here nor there, as Picasso's latest works I find “nervy” to the point of megalomania, What is now happening to Picasso's painting I am sure would have happened under any circumstances. He has felt his genius dissipated through so many styles, each realized separately; so he has now reached a stage (he has reached it before) when he will join everything together into a series of wallops. In an artist of such disparate attainments this is a very tall order indeed. So much has been accumu- lated that the final works lack coordination and unity of spirit; and the constant emphasis on power often results in highly questionable taste. Abstraction might have tightened the structure and thus made it cred- ible, but Picasso's whole background made such a step uncongenial. However, it is too early to count him out of the tournament. Not infrequently an artist has lost his sense of quality and still pulled together at the end; Corot offers a conspicuous example. I think Léger (who used to be a little short on quality anyway when placed with the others) may be giving us an instance at the moment; he has shown signs of finding himself again since his retum to France, Surcly it is on quality that artists get judged in the end, and not on their innovations. I have indicated that abstraction has marked an attempt at deper- sonalization, and opposes the excessive personality-loving currents long inherent in Western art. It was interesting to hear Arp mention this a few months ago: “I don’t want to be great—there are too many forces throughout the world today that are great.” This was not spoken in © It might be noted here that the American painters whom Greenberg occa sionally favors, similarly work “behind the frame.” 684 rtON GREENBERG AND CRITICS distinction and sensibility in a fragment. Perhaps the anonymous master- craftsmen will be found again who once produced temples and cathe- drals; strangely enough they are often considered the greatest of all in the end. George LK. Morris REPLY As far as T can tell, Mr, Morris’ main complaint is about my taste, and all the rest is his taste, about which I myself complain in turn. If I saw eye to eye with Mr. Morris, I do not think he would mind so much that I hand out marks to the class instead of writing appreciative blurbs as they de in France (does he really want that kind of kibitzing?), In arguing differences of taste it is almost impossible ta say more than fu quogue, and I am given scant opportunity for even that, since Mr. Morris does not mention any of the American artists he—I assume—feels I neglected in. my Horizon piece, and I am insuffi- ciently acquainted with the Paris painters he lists (though on the basis of the little I have seen of Hartung, Domela, Magnelli, and Lapicque, ” I would hazard that most of his swans are rather feeble geese). Nevertheless, Mr. Morris! attack is serious, well written, and sincere, and I must do him the courtesy of answering him, especially since his lecture on the differences between Cubism and abstract art embodies a fallacy that may mislead the unwary. Matisse passed “out of the tournament in Jove sets around 1917.” T feel that anyone with a real “instinct for pictorial structure” would have been unable to write that. This is what happens when literal a priori dogmas about the historically necessary are consulted instead of the pleasure and exaltation to be experienced from painting, Historical necessity does operate, but not with the consistency here expected of it. Matisse’s “Woman before an Aquarium” of 1924 and “Lemons on a 685PARTISAN REVIEW Pewter Plate’ of 1927 (both to be seen at the Philadelphia Muscum of Art’s recent large retrospective show of Matisse’s paintings, drawings, and sculpture) are painted in a style whose elements were formed by 1907; yet who with a real sensitivity to painting could say they are intrinsically inferior as art to the much more historically important pictures Mondrian and Picasso were turning out around the same time? “It would have been rewarding if Greenberg had indicated in what ways the works of [Ficasso, Braque, Arp] .. . have declined since the thirties.” Let me be brief, Picasso: insensitive and disruptive color, arbi- wary space-handling, literary distortions that lack plastic justification, forced emotion, bombast, attempts (which seem motivated only by a kind of despair) to demonstrate his prowess in all departments of paint- ing (the nerviness shown here is histrionic and old-fashioned). Braque: a growing aimlessness (at Jeast until 1939), repetitiousness and flaccidity of design, virtuasic color, lack of real matter. Arp: chronic poverty of means and ideas (sce his monotonous and empty sculpture of the thir- ties). The trouble with all three artists is that they no longer keep on re-creating the styles they work in: they simply work inside them— something that Matisse even at his most perfunctory does not do, though he docs, I will admit, tend to relax his ambition dangerously, All this is not to say that Picasso and Braque still do not produce very good pic- tures from time to time; it is to say, however, that the general level of their performances has declined below that of Matisse's. But aesthetic judgments cannot be probatively demonstrated in words, and T beg to be excused from the rest of this futile chore. : ‘The difference between Cubism and Abstract art is another matter, one of description rather than judgment, and I find Mr, Morris’ descrip- tion superficial in its failure to make distinctions within Cubism itself. “Even in the flattest Cubist paintings, the image . is ‘behind the frame’.” It was of the essence of Cubism after its initial stage to situate the image or rather the pictorial complex, ambiguously, leaving the eye to doubt whether it came forward or receded. But the ambiguity itself was weighted, and its inherent, irrevocable (and historical) tendency was to drive the picture plane forward so that it became identical with the physical surface of the canvas itself. This tendency makes itself very evident in Picasso's and Braque’s first collages in 1911. By 1913, when Picasso painted his “Card Player” (in the Museum of Modern Art), the “image” had come flush with the frame, where it remained, with a few exceptions, during the rest of classical Cubism’s life. As a matter of fact, in such a collage as Picasso's oval “Still Life” of 1912 (in the 686REPLY BY CLEMENT GREENBERG Arensberg Collection) the emphasis with which the central forms are thrust toward the spectator is such that only bas-relief could exceed it. It is rash enough to say that most of Picasso's and Braque’s Cubist paintings of 1911 and 1912 stay inside the illusion of the third dimen- sion, but it would be downright absurd to say that of all but a few of their Cubist pictures in the years immediately after 1913, no matter how well they look in Louis XV frames. As for chiaroscuro—in the later stages of Cubism its “symbols” (shading, modeling, dark-markings) are used for the sake of abstract structure and decoration and are so divorced from their native function of depicting volume and depth that it makes no difference whatsoever whether a recognizable object is involved or not. Ie belongs to the importance of Cubism, to that which makes it the most epochal school of painting since the Renaissance, that it con- clusively liquidated the illusion of the third dimension. It did not have to wait for Malevitch or Mondrian to do that. Pre-figuring the furthest extremes of abstract art in our time, Picasso as a Cubist already con- tained everything that abstract art has since made obvious. Far from revolting against Cubism and its supposed behind-the-frameness, abstract art, in so far as it is successful (and this includes that particularly flat and simplified painting to which Mr. Morris reserves the appellation of Abstract art), takes from Cubism its cue, inspiration, and total sense of the medium. The main reason why the Kandinsky or “non-objective” school is so lacking in quality is because it is the one section of abstract art that has in fact revolted against Cubism and, abandoning the Cubist conception of the integrity of the physical picture plane, retreated to a disguised academicism, (Not that there is not something faintly academic about the way in which the Abstract art Mr, Morris upholds stays rigidly inside the state of mind of classical Cubism. And not that the French painters, aside from Dubuffet, whom I listed originally, and who cling more closely to Cubism’s canon of forms than do Mr. Morris’ friends, are not even more academic, But that, precisely, was one of the implicit points of my article.) To return in closing to the Matisse-Picasso controversy, I should like to make it clear that I do not consider Matisse as important an in- novator as Picasso, but I do think him a better and much more sustained painter, The Philadelphia show, as uneven as it was, made that clear, I believe. (I am told that the Philadelphia Museum was unable to obtain for its show many of the French master’s most important works, parti- cularly for the period since 1920.) PS. Mr. Morris did have a right to complain, perhaps, about my failure to make sufficiently clear the sense in which I used the term 689PARTISAN REVIEW ‘Cubism as the name of a tradition. I should have distinguished more explicitly between classical Cubism as a specific style and Cubism as tradition, Nevertheless, I believe that in the eyes of the future their differences will seem much less pronounced even than they do now. Clement Greenberg