There is a Nazi repression-related strand to much of the current exhibition.“In terms of the [Second World] war, these artists were considered degenerate artists, and they were exhibited under that name by the Nazis in 1937,” explains Kamien- Kazhdan, referring to the “Entartete Kunst” (Degenerate Art) show that took place in Munich in that year. “The fact that the collector survived [the Holocaust] and these works are celebrated is a kind of victory,” says the curator. “The beginnings of the Merzbacher Collection came from what Gaby’s parents had collected.”The forerunner collection included Interieur à Collioure (Interior at Collioure) painted by Henri Matisse in 1905 and was a formative influence of the Merzbachers’ collection mind-set. Matisse, along with fellow Frenchman André Derain, instigated the short-lived Fauve movement in 1904. “This Matisse was given to Werner and Gaby, so they were led in that direction,” Kamien- Kazhdan notes,” although Gaby’s parents went more in the direction of Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, and then Werner and Gaby decided to go in the direction of Fauvism and Expressionism when they had the funds.”Interieur à Collioure is one of the first items in the show.“You can see from this painting that Fauvism was interested in patches of color and how color transmits light,” the curator observes. “Matisse is not concerned with finish. This was painted in Collioure, which is in southwest France, where there is strong light. By the way, that is why people [artists] are enthusiastic about our area, too, because of the light.” The Matisse is, indeed, a striking work, which conveys an intriguing balance between the interior of a bedroom, with Matisse’s wife Amélie depicted in a languid repose, scantily clad on the bed, with a more formally dressed young girl, thought to be Matisse’s daughter Marguerite, drawing the observer’s eye to the exterior section of the work on the bedroom balcony.“The Fauvists called this approach trying to make their colors sing and to transmit what you sense, in terms of light and intensity of light, into color,” she explains.There is also strong illumination, color, and not a little smoldering sensuality in a work by French Fauvist painter Maurice Vlaminck, called Dancer of the Rat Mort. The picture shows a model with a breast exposed and garters, with many of the salient physical and sartorial details accentuated in red. The model is also wearing a richly adorned hat, and the curtain behind her is depicted by means of robust multicolored brushstrokes that convey the notion of a torrent of colors. There are plenty of nods in the direction of late Impressionists-cum-Expressionists in the exhibition, including in Vlaminck’s Potato Pickers, which nominally references Van Gogh’s Potato Eaters, and some of the colors and the energized dynamics of the picture are clearly influenced by the Dutchman.Other “Color Gone Wild” standouts include Georges Braque’s Landscape at L’Estaque, Flower Garden – Woman with Purple Dress by Emil Nolde and Entrance by Karl Schmidt-Rottluff. In truth, however, there is never a dull moment or spot in the entire display.
“Color Gone Wild: Fauve and Expressionist Masterpieces from the Merzbacher Collection” closes on November 2. For more information: (02) 670-8811 and www.imjnet.org.il.