Most biographies of Impressionists shower the reader with
scenes of innovative artists standing in French fields, peacefully painting
light and color with a wide palette. Certainly, there are enough such scenes in
any book about Camille Pissarro. But because of who he was, the additional
dimensions of his politics and ideas would have to be examined. Pissarro was an
anarchist and an atheist of Jewish extraction, as well as a leading member of
his generations’ most revolutionary artistic movement.
The authors who wrote this biography are politically suited
to sympathetically cover Pissarro’s radicalism. Ralph Shikes was Public
Relations Director for both The National Citizen’s Political Action Committee
and Henry Wallace’s Progressive Party, as well as having written for “The
Nation.” He established the Shikes Fellowship for Civil Liberties & Civil Rights,
at Harvard Law School.* Paula Harper was described as "one of the first art historians to bring a feminist
perspective to the study of painting and sculpture"**.
For
politically-minded readers, the authors do not disappoint. They suffuse their entire
portrait of the artist with discussion of his anarchist and radical views. Not
only do they show Pissarro actively involved with fellow anarchists (primarily
through his illustrations for periodicals, political contacts and quotes of
topical views), but additionally they discuss his painting in radical political
terms. “Artists who painted in a non-academic, unconventional style…were
attracted to anarchism’s stress on the rejection of authority and the
exaltation of the individual” (Shikes & Harper, p. 226). The authors
analyze Pissarro’s figures, pointing out that the people he chose to represent
were “people in humble circumstances, the class to which he was consistently
attracted most of his life” (Shikes & Harper, p. 30). Even when he is
painting scenes of natural beauty without humans, the artist is aware of his
revolutionary motives: “Pissarro…noted, ‘Proudhon says in La Justice
that love of earth is linked with revolution, and consequently with the
artistic ideal’” (Shikes & Harper, p. 67).
Pissarro’s
anarchism and sense of social justice are closely related to his atheism. “Pissarro,
a convinced atheist, felt that religious beliefs were a dangerous hindrance to
social reform” (Shikes & Harper, p. 157). While the biographers mention
several times that Pissarro was an atheist, they fail to explore his thoughts
on the subject beyond its political implications.
Not just
his politics, but also his life and times are seen through a radical lens. Shikes
and Harper portray the artist’s ancestors as Marrano Jews who escaped the
Spanish Inquisition, immigrated to Portugal and from there to St Thomas in the
Virgin Islands. In spite of this experience of persecution, Pissarro’s family
owned two slaves until slavery was abolished in 1848 (Shikes & Harper, p.
20). Later in Paris, the authors present the artist and his views against a
backdrop of changing political regimes, French imperialism in Indochina, the
Paris Commune and the socio-political scene of Pissarro’s subculture. Towards
the end of the book, and the end of Pissarro’s life, Shikes and Harper discuss
the Dreyfus Affair and resulting anti-Semitism endured by their subject from
both society at large and his artistic circle. Renoir and Degas were both
anti-Dreyfusards and anti-Semites, whereas Sisley and Monet sided with progressives
and Pissarro on the issue (Shikes & Harper, pp. 304-309).
For an
artistically sensitive, apolitical reader, this book would not be the best of
choices unless that person were seeking to expand her horizons. By the same
token, Pissarro's life itself would not be an enjoyable topic for any apolitical reader. But those who are art-focused, and political from any
perspective, will find a great deal to activate their thinking in this book.
Shikes, Ralph E. & Harper, Paula. Pissarro. His Life
and Work. New York: Horizon Press, 1980.
*"Ralph
E. Shikes Is Dead at 79; Publisher, Editor and Art Writer." The New York
Times. The New York Times, 31 Mar. 1992. (Web. 10 Oct. 2014).
**Grady,
Denise. "Paula Hays Harper, Art Historian, Is Dead at 81." The New
York Times. The New York Times, 25 June 2012. (Web. 10 Oct. 2014).
