Original title: "Modern Lover": The Fire of Art Burning in Love
Ordinary people are often faced with such a choice: because of the limited time, energy and luck, love and career, can only choose one of them (of course, it is possible that neither can choose).
Others are very lucky: love and career are both obtained, and even love and career are complementary and mutually reinforcing.
Even more enviable is that they also live a poetic, artistic life.
Dorothea Tanning and Max Ernst with his sculpture, Capricorn, 1947
Credit: John Kasnetsis
Modern Couples: Art, Intimacy and the Avant-garde (10 October 2018 – 27 January 2019) features more than 40 pairs of artistic companions active in the first half of the twentieth century. Paintings, sculptures, books, letters, photographs... More than 600 exhibits tell us about the intimate relationships and artistic collaborations of these partners. Although some people's feelings do not last a lifetime, the intimate relationship that serves as a catalyst for each other's companionship explodes with great energy in art.
Exhibition site
Credit: © John Philips / Getty Images
It should be noted that the word "couple" has a polyamory in the exhibition. It refers to both "spouses" and "couples", such as the Dada artist and poet Jean Arp and the artist and interior designer Sophie Taeuber-Arp, the painters Diego Rivera and Frida Caro, the architects Alvar Aalto and Aino Aalto, and also to "lover" relationships such as the Cubist painter Pablo Picasso and the surreal photographer Dora Aalto. Dora Marr, sculptors August Rodin and Camille Claudel, photographers Man Ray and Lee Miller; and beyond friends, but not formally together, such as the Viennese secessionist Gustav Klimt and fashion designer Emilie Flöge, and Salvador Flöge. Dalí and his same-sex friend Federico Garcia Lorca; and even polyamorous love that ordinary people can't understand, such as the relationship between the three members of the American photographic art group PaJama— Paul Cadmus and Jared French were originally gay couples, and then Jared became margaret French's husband.
Due to the large number of partners who appear in the exhibition, we have selected a few interesting but not well-known artists to highlight them.
Jean Alp and Sophie Tauber-Arp
Image: Gallery's official website
"The exhibition at the Tanner Gallery in Zurich in November 1915 was the most important event of my life. That was where I first met Sophie Taubel. --Jean-Arp
Jean-Arp (1886–1966), born in Germany and three years older than the Swiss artist Sophie Taubel (1889–1943), met for the first time in 1915 at an exhibition containing Arp's work. Two years later, they settled into a relationship.
Marionettes by Sophie Taubel-Arp appear in the exhibition
Credit: Suzanne Zhang
Jean Arp was one of the founders of the Dada school, writing mainly collages and poems, occasionally illustrating books and Dada publications. Tobel often uses geometric shapes to create tapestries, sculptures, etc., and she is also a successful interior designer.
They share the same artistic concept, which is to establish the "anonymity" of the work, eliminate the traces of the artist in the work, and let contingency dominate the final presentation of the work. This is also one of the very core concepts of Dada art.
Jean-Arp and Sophie Taubel-Arp married in 1922
© Archiv Fondation Arp, Clamart, photographer unknown
Together, the two created many works, including collages and wood carvings in many forms. After spending nearly thirty years with each other, Taubel died of carbon monoxide poisoning.
Gustav Klimt and Emily Frogy
A playboy who often toyed with women, Klimt (1862-1918) never married. However, this does not prevent him from being a father of 14 children. These toyed women did not include his muse and confidant Emily Frogy (1874-1952) – the two of them were never officially together. The friendship lasted 27 years until Klimt's death.
In 1891, Emily's sister Helene married Klimt's younger brother Ernst. When Ernst died young, Klimt became Helene's guardian. He often visited the Frogge family and became acquainted with Emily, who was 18 years old at the time.
Emily Froggy in 1909
Image: Getty Images
Emily later became a successful fashion designer. The fashion salon she and her sister held became known as the "Froggie Sisters" and became the vanguard salon of the Viennese fashion scene. The ladies who often came to meet here also became patrons of Klimt art.
Klimt often portrays Emily in his work. Some art historians even believe that Klimt's lover in his famous work The Kiss is himself and Emily.
Gustav Klimt, The Kiss, 1907–1908, Österreichische Galerie Belvedere
It can be said that their spiritual and emotional relations are greater than physical relations. More than 400 letters from Klimt to Emily survive, some of which are exhibited in the exhibition. When Klimt died, the repeated words in his mouth were "Call Emily over."
Lee Miller and Man Ray
Lee Miller (1907–1977) was a native of New York, USA. She was already a million fans when she was a teenager. When she decided to go to Paris in 1927, many of her lovers even decided to decide who to go with her by tossing a coin. In the end, though, she crossed the ocean alone.
In Paris, she wanted to study photography under the surrealist master Man Ray (1890-1976). Man Ray had vowed never to take an apprentice, but eventually Miller became not only his apprentice and assistant, but also his muse and lover— even though he had a long-separated wife at the time.
The two conducted a lot of photographic experiments when they were together, which is reflected in the exhibition. The most important of these was the invention of the "halfway exposure method" (some say it was entirely Miller's personal achievement). This method is mainly to allow the photosensitive film to make a short second exposure during the process of developing the development, so that the photo image produces a delicate outer contour line and promotes the conversion of the black and white part of the tone. In the films made using this method, Miller's charming contour lines are even more prominent.
A photograph of Miller washed out using the halfway exposure method, 1930
Later, Man Ray wanted to marry Miller. But Miller, who is on the rise, has no such intentions, and Man Ray's pressure is growing. In 1932, after an argument, Man Ray threw Miller out the door and the two officially broke up. Man Ray then fell into a long period of depression and repeatedly drew Miller's lips for two years. In 1937, the two were relieved of their former suspicions and maintained a friendly relationship for the rest of their lives.
Lee Miller's lips fly in Man Ray's 1934 work Observable Time: Lover
The Israel Museum/Man Ray Trust
Salvador Dali and Federico García Lorca
Salvador Dali and Federico García Lorca hand in hand
In 1923, Dalí (1904-1989) and Lorca (1898-1936) met in Madrid, both of whom were studying. Lorca was impressed by his attire when he first met him, and Dalca admired the poetry of Lorca. The two men were very close until Lorca died of assassination in 1936. Lorca was gay, but Dalí didn't seem to give him the opportunity to change their relationship—if he did, Dalí's life would have changed, after all, his success was not unrelated to the support of his later wife Gala.
Dalí and Lorca in 1925
In 1969, Dalí said in an interview: "As everyone knows, Lorca is gay and loves me madly. He tried to me twice... I was very angry that I was not gay. ...... But I'm also honored for that. Deep down, I felt like he was a great poet, and I owed him a divine Dalí asshole. ”
In addition to the artists, there are also examples of the companions of writers and musicians in the exhibition. Modernist writer Virginia Woolf is a bisexual who exhibits both the manuscript of her iconic novel Orlando, a work commemorating her love affair with her same-sex friend Vita Sackville-West, and the results of her collaboration with her husband, Leonard Woolf, the first edition of 35 books published by the Hogas press they founded. The exhibition also features exhibits depicting the relationship between political activist Nancy Cunard and his partner poet and jazz musician Henry Crowder.