I wish I could say that I recognised at once their beauty and their great originality. Now that I have seen many of them again and the rest are familiar to me in reproductions, I am astonished that at first sight I was bitterly disappointed. I felt nothing of the peculiar thrill which it is the property of art to give. The impression that Strickland's pictures gave me was disconcerting; and the fact remains, always to reproach me, that I never even thought of buying any. I missed a wonderful chance. Most of them have found their way into museums, and the rest are the treasured possessions of wealthy amateurs. I try to find excuses for myself. I think that my taste is good, but I am conscious that it has no originality. I know very little about painting, and I wander along trails that others have blazed for me. At that time I had the greatest admiration for the impressionists. I longed to possess a Sisley and a Degas, and I worshipped Manet. His Olympia seemed to me the greatest picture of modern times, and Le Dejenuer sur l'Herbe moved me profoundly. These works seemed to me the last word in painting.
我真希望當(dāng)時(shí)我就能看出這些畫如何美、具有如何偉大的獨(dú)創(chuàng)的風(fēng)格。這些畫里面有許多幅我后來(lái)又有機(jī)會(huì)重新欣賞過(guò),另外一些通過(guò)復(fù)制品我也非常熟悉了;我真有些奇怪,當(dāng)我初次看畫的時(shí)候,為什么居然感到非常失望。我當(dāng)時(shí)絲毫也沒(méi)有感到藝術(shù)品本應(yīng)該給我的那種奇異的激動(dòng)。我看到思特里克蘭德的繪畫,只有一種惶惑不安的感覺(jué);實(shí)際上,我當(dāng)時(shí)根本沒(méi)有想到要購(gòu)買一幅,這是我永遠(yuǎn)不能原諒自己的。我真是失去了一個(gè)大好的機(jī)會(huì)。這些畫大多數(shù)后來(lái)都被博物院收買去了,其余的則成為有錢的藝術(shù)愛(ài)好者的珍藏品。我努力給自己找一些辯解。我認(rèn)為我還是有鑒賞力的,只不過(guò)我認(rèn)識(shí)到自己缺少創(chuàng)見(jiàn)。我對(duì)于繪畫了解得不多,我只是沿著別人替我開辟的路徑走下去。當(dāng)時(shí)我最佩服的是印象派畫家,渴望弄到一張西斯萊(阿爾弗雷德·西斯萊(1839—1899),法國(guó)畫家)或德加(埃德迦·德加(1834—1917),法國(guó)畫家)的作品,另外,我對(duì)馬奈也非常崇拜,他的那幅《奧林庇亞》我覺(jué)得是當(dāng)代最偉大的繪畫,《草地上的早餐》也使我非常感動(dòng)。我認(rèn)為在當(dāng)代繪畫中再也沒(méi)有別的作品能超過(guò)這幾幅畫了。
I will not describe the pictures that Strickland showed me. Descriptions of pictures are always dull, and these, besides, are familiar to all who take an interest in such things. Now that his influence has so enormously affected modern painting, now that others have charted the country which he was among the first to explore, Strickland's pictures, seen for the first time, would find the mind more prepared for them; but it must be remembered that I had never seen anything of the sort. First of all I was taken aback by what seemed to me the clumsiness of his technique. Accustomed to the drawing of the old masters, and convinced that Ingres was the greatest draughtsman of recent times, I thought that Strickland drew very badly. I knew nothing of the simplification at which he aimed. I remember a still-life of oranges on a plate, and I was bothered because the plate was not round and the oranges were lop-sided. The portraits were a little larger than life-size, and this gave them an ungainly look. To my eyes the faces looked like caricatures. They were painted in a way that was entirely new to me. The landscapes puzzled me even more. There were two or three pictures of the forest at Fontainebleau and several of streets in Paris: my first feeling was that they might have been painted by a drunken cabdriver. I was perfectly bewildered. The colour seemed to me extraordinarily crude. It passed through my mind that the whole thing was a stupendous, incomprehensible farce. Now that I look back I am more than ever impressed by Stroeve's acuteness. He saw from the first that here was a revolution in art, and he recognised in its beginnings the genius which now all the world allows.
我不準(zhǔn)備描寫思特里克蘭德拿給我看的那些畫了。對(duì)繪畫進(jìn)行描述是一件枯燥乏味的事,再說(shuō),所有熱衷此道的人對(duì)這些畫早已了如指掌了。今天,當(dāng)思特里克蘭德對(duì)近代繪畫已經(jīng)產(chǎn)生了這么大的影響,當(dāng)他同少數(shù)幾個(gè)人首先探索的那塊蠻荒之地已經(jīng)測(cè)繪了詳細(xì)地圖之后,再有誰(shuí)第一次看到他的畫,早已有了心理準(zhǔn)備了,而我則是破題兒第一遭看見(jiàn)這類作品,這一事實(shí)請(qǐng)讀者務(wù)必記住。首先,我感到震駭?shù)氖撬嫹ǖ谋孔?。我看慣了的那些古老畫師的作品,并且堅(jiān)信安格爾是近代最偉大的畫家,因此就認(rèn)為思特里克蘭德畫得非常拙劣。我根本不了解他所追求的簡(jiǎn)樸。我還記得他畫的一張靜物,一只盤子上放著幾只桔子,我發(fā)現(xiàn)他畫的盤子并不圓,桔子兩邊也不對(duì)稱,我就感到迷惑不解。他畫的頭像比真人略大一些,給人以粗笨的感覺(jué)。在我的眼睛里,這些頭像畫得象是一些漫畫,他的畫法對(duì)我說(shuō)來(lái)也完全是新奇的。我更看不懂的是那些風(fēng)景畫。有兩三張畫的是楓丹白露的樹林,另外一些是巴黎市街;我的第一個(gè)感覺(jué)是,這些畫好象是出自一個(gè)喝醉酒的馬車夫的手筆。我完全被弄糊涂了。他用的色彩我也覺(jué)得出奇地粗獷。我當(dāng)時(shí)心想,這些繪畫簡(jiǎn)直是一出沒(méi)有誰(shuí)能理解的滑稽戲?,F(xiàn)在回想起來(lái),施特略夫當(dāng)時(shí)真稱得起獨(dú)具慧眼了。他從一開始就看到這是繪畫史上的一個(gè)革命,今天全世界都已承認(rèn)的偉大天才,他早在最初的那些年代就已辨視出來(lái)了。
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