Journal ARS 47 (2014) 2

Dace LAMBERGA

Latvian Cubism

(Summary)

During World War I, a new generation born around 1890, entered the Latvian art scene, and they focused their creative work on the exploration of contemporary trends. In March 1920, the Riga Group of Artists held its first exhibition, and the opening was attended by virtually the entire art world of the capital. In the introduction to the catalogue, the Riga Group of Artists declared its platform: “We are no longer satisfied with a simple depiction of realistic nature. All our strivings are at present directed towards revealing the personality. It is not nature, objective external nature, that we wish to show in our works now, but our own, individual nature, our spiritual essence.” This exhibition by the Riga Group was a radical turning point in the search for means of expression in Latvian painting, the historic testimony to the beginning of a process of changing values. Of the Classical Modernism movements, it was Cubism that had the most evident and wide-ranging influence on Latvian early 20th century painting. Classical Cubism is considered to last from 1907 up to 1921, but in Latvia the earliest examples of Cubism appear much later than in Western Europe – only around 1918. In other European countries, familiarity with Cubism was more readily obtainable, by living in Paris and studying under the direct tuition of French artists. But Cubism reached the minds of Latvians only during the time of the First World War. Unfortunately, the war also brought long isolation from developments in Western Europe, so young artists gained their initial acquaintance with modern painting only from reproductions in journals. The Latvians saw their first real examples of this current movement only in the war years in the private galleries of two truly wide-ranging Moscow collectors, Sergej Shchukin and Ivan Morozov. The time until the end of 1922 is considered the initial period of Cubism in Latvian painting. In the initial stage, the most consistent exponents of Latvian Cubism were Oto Skulme, Valdemārs Tone, Romans Suta, Jānis Liepiņš, Aleksandra Beļcova and Ludolfs Liberts. When in 1921 the Republic of Latvia was recognized de iure, the artists’ dream to travel to Western Europe was realized. From 1922 onward many of the Riga Artists Group members headed for Paris on Culture Foundation of Latvia grants, there to study the collections at the Louvre and to attend exhibitions. The Rosenberg Galleries, owned by baron brothers, with the choicest works of the best-known representatives of Cubism were particularly esteemed. At Paul Rosenberg’s the Latvians were passionately enthusiastic about Picasso’s newest innovations, but at Léonce Rosenberg’s gallery, about Georges Braque, Charles-Edouard Jeanneret (Le Courbusier) and Amédée Ozenfant. In 1921 and 1924 Suta’s articles were published in the Purist journal “L’Esprit Nouveau” about the latest in Latvian art as represented by the Riga Artists Group. (SUTA, R.: L’Art en Lettonie: La Jeune Ecole de Peinture. In: L’Esprit Nouveau, 1921, no. 10, pp. 1165–1171.; Lettonie. In: L’Esprit Nouveau, 1924, no. 24). The creative and impression-rich visit to Paris influenced the second Riga Artist Group’s exhibition in 1923, which turned out to be decidedly Cubist, and for its time, innovative avant-garde. But it didn’t get a positive reaction from critics, and unprofessional accusations appeared in the press, stating that the exhibition was modelled conspicuously on a “Paris pattern” and the art was reminiscent of a bad copy of the “Rosenberg salon”. It is doubtful that the critics had even seen a “Rosenberg salon” exposition, because they had not even noted that there were two galleries. Some of Suta’s paintings testify to the fact that he is one of the Latvians who tried to master the laconic expression style of the Purists and therefore the critics reproached that he flatly and pure copies Le Corbusier. The French painter disclaimed it the answer to Sutas letter: “You and I, we both painted bottles and glasses but completely differently.” (Le Corbusier, letter of February 12, 1924. Document nos. R3 04450001 and 002, Fondation Le Corbusier, Paris). The powerful influence of French Cubism cannot be denied, but Latvians managed to create a local version, which stylistically was a unification of the synthetic stage of basic principles, but each artist found an adequately individual interpretation. In any case, even though an artist could only stay for a few months in Paris, it fundamentally changed his or her creative work explorations. “It seems that the apathy ascribed by foreigners to Latvians has died, and we can surely bank on the hope that our exploring artists will not stop mid-stream on the way to developing an absolute form and that they will be able to get directly at the heart and finally at the end at what is real in their work, which we can then feel with all the senses of our organism. The path by which all of this is to be achieved, already has been set by triply commensurate Picasso’s immeasurable genius, and, in order to flee from misfortune in the field of art of our era – individualism, thus the individual’s separate self must be curbed, in order to create traditions, a school, without which it is impossible right now not only to forge ahead along all fronts in the art field, but also a unique art cannot be developed for any nation. It is the only way, because Picasso’s influence in every country, and now in every artist, has appeared to a greater or lesser degree and his authority has not yet been overshadowed by anyone else,” wrote Uga Skulme (SKULME, U.: Divas mākslas izstādes (Two Art Exhibitions). In: Latvijas Vēstnesis, 1921, January 22). In contrast to the milieu of its native France, in its Latvian variant Cubism lacked several important preconditions. In the first place, there was an absence of outstanding creative leaders such as Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso, and the movement entered Latvian painting as a mature, internationally popular and modern phenomenon, as a conscious opposition to the ruling conservative Academism. Secondly, the Latvians, without considering the three basic phases of the movement’s development, perceived Cubism as a finished and united whole. The spectrum from insignificant simplification of forms up to compositions constructed almost abstractly cannot be deemed simply a diversity of forms, but rather is connected with each particular artist’s understanding, or lack of it, as to the style. Thirdly, in contrast to the French, there was an absence of developed figural works, and the movement was mainly expressed through the genres of still life, landscape and portrait. Fourthly, the more extensive spread of Cubism in Latvia was hindered not only by society’s unpreparedness for it, but also by the lack of patronage of the arts. A significant feature of Latvian Cubism is that many young artists reached this movement not as the result of a prolonged search for form and means of expression, but rather actually began their creative work with geometrisation. But their work is on a professionally high level, and at the present day it has come to represent one of the most vivid episodes in Latvian art history. The works by Latvian artists – and not only the still lifes – as in French Cubism, made use mainly of bottles and musical instruments, which the Latvians had a greater respect for and have not particularly attempted to distort their traditional form. The letters favoured by the Cubists also appear, placed in a manner similar to ornamental signs, as well as textures imitating wood and other materials. The favoured palette of the French Cubists consisted of black, grey, green and earth tones, while Latvian painters did not avoid a diversity of colour.