A really good thing to read if you have any interest in the gossipy stories about Picasso, Matisse, Cezanne and the circle of Bohemian painters Gertrude Stein collected is The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, Gertrude Stein’s life-time companion, amused observer of the early-20th century Montmartre atelier scene, and great cook. (I tried to buy her cookbook at the show last night, but apparently kitchens are too ordinary for the Grand Palais gift shop. Recipes are never ordinary here, so don’t miss Alice’s chicken at the end of the blog.)
I started the Autobiography just before this trip, and now I feel as if I live with these people, which, believe me, is a whirl. I know that Matisse was virile, his wife not so much, but she made an excellent potted hare, and finagled the first sale of a Matisse work to Gertrude Stein and her brother, which began a lifetime of friendship and patronage.
Fernande, Picasso’s deadly dull but gorgeous girlfriend, could only talk about makeup, dogs and hats. Indeed, the Stein Collection currently exhibited at the Grand Palais includes a painting of the Montmartre gang done by Laurencin, and there’s Fernande to the left in a huge, fruit-covered hat. Fernande apparently believed a hat was a success only if it drew street attention. This one got a whole painting. Picasso’s famously dolorous early lover is comically tolerated by both Gertrude Stein and Alice. Gertrude is always sending Alice off to keep Fernande busy, while she and Picasso talk about serious things. Picasso always seems to be in a state of being driven out of his mind by Fernande’s vapidity, and unable to abandon what a great model she is, or something else. She also seems alarming incapable of taking care of herself, and Picasso feels guilty enough to keep her on. At one point Picasso has ended it with her, but sets her up in an apartment on Montmartre, hoping she can give French lessons to earn a living (and he can therefore quit with helping her.) Gertrude believes if Fernande is ok than Pablo’s ok, so she sends Alice off to be Fernande’s first student. First of two. Ever.
According to Alice, Picasso believed - actually believed! - he looked like Abraham Lincoln. There’s a case of body dysmorphia if ever there was one, and just another Toklas gem.
Stein’s artists almost all showed in the great salon shows in the Grand Palais, the glittering glass vaulted building steps from the Seine. But Toklas didn’t like the building. She says that before the war, the Independent show was always in a building that was put up just for the event, and taken down afterward. They were always putting up and taking down buildings in Paris in those days, Toklas says. “Human nature is so permanent in France they can afford to be temporary with their buildings.”
(Some of those up and down buildings didn’t even keep out rain; Seurat supposedly caught his fatal cold hanging his work in a Salon show.)
But, Toklas bemoans the move after the war of the exhibit to the permanent head quarters at the Grand Palais. “It (The Independent Show) became much less interesting. After all it is the adventure that counts.”
But it’s like coming home for the Stein Collection to show at the Grand Palais, so many of these artists were associated with the Salons here. And yet this show is clearly one person’s personal taste extracted from - or imposed upon - now gigantic artistic characters. There are so many hugely important painters here whose paintings and sculpture are emblazoned in our cultural memories with their Big Museum Works: Gauguin’s tropics. Cezanne’s tables of fruit and his Mont St. Victoire paintings. Matisse’s cut-outs, and patterned interiors. Picasso’s Demoiselles, his Guernica, his blue period, his Cubism.
This is like looking at Gertrude and Leo Stein’s wardrobe after they’ve been shopping at the top floors of Bergdorf Goodman. Yes, these are designer clothes, but the selection and arrangement is personally Stein.
Stein disliked Derain, and, sure enough, I saw only one small Derain in the show. She didn’t like Gauguin’s figures as much as his sunflowers, according to Alice, and when I saw the painting of a cascade of burned-looking, autumnal sunflowers, I agreed with her. The sad, blue period Picasso of a twig-like seated character, his long-fingered hands resting like short branches on his thighs, broke my heart. I’m certain it broke Stein’s when she first saw it.
It's magnifique being here, walking these streets, thinking about all these characters.
Guillaume Apollinaire was one of Gertrude Stein’s greatest friends and favorite poets. I wish he’d been my friend, but has always been my favorite poet. The Mirabeau Bridge is just yards from my hotel. I’m going out to take a stroll there now, and think about Apollinaire.
The Mirabeau Bridge
by Apollinaire
Under the Mirabeau flows the Seine
And our amours
Shall I remember it again
Joy always followed after Pain
Comes the night sounds the hour
The days go by I endure
Hand in hand rest face to face
While underneath
The bridge of our arms there races
So weary a wave of eternal gazes
Comes the night sounds the hour
The days go by I endure
Love vanishes like the water’s flow
Love vanishes
How life is slow
And how Hope lives blow by blow
Comes the night sounds the hour
The days go by I endure
Let the hour pass the day the same
Time past returns
Nor love again
Under the Mirabeau flows the Seine
Comes the night sounds the hour
The days go by I endure
Alice B. Toklas Chicken
Ingredients
1 medium-sized (about 3½ pounds) roasting chicken, preferably free-range
Salt
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
½ cup ruby port
½ cup orange juice
3 tablespoons heavy cream
Zest of 1 orange, grated
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
When you bring the chicken home from the market, unwrap it and sprinkle it generously with salt. Cover and refrigerate it until ready to cook. Bring the bird to room temperature before cooking. Do not rub off the salt.
Preheat the oven to 400°F.
In a large ovenproof skillet warm the butter and olive oil over medium heat. Brown the chicken breast side down, for 3 to 5 minutes then turn it over and brown the other side for 3 to 5 minutes.
Place the skillet in the oven and roast the chicken for 45 minutes. Pour the port over the chicken and baste it. Roast for 10 minutes more, than add the orange juice and baste again. Roast for about 5 minutes more. The chicken is done when the juices of the thigh run clear when pierced with the blade of a sharp knife, or when the thigh wiggles easily. Remove the chicken from the oven, transfer it to a cutting board, and let it rest as you make the sauce.
Skim as much fat off the top of the juices in the skillet as you can and discard. Place the skillet over medium heat and add the cream, stirring up the crispy bits on the bottom. Add about half the orange zest and allow the sauce to reduce as you stir constantly for a few minutes.
Carve the chicken and transfer it to a serving platter. Pour some of the sauce over the chicken and transfer the rest into a gravy boat or small pitcher and serve it at the table. Sprinkle the remaining orange zest over the chicken.
Lastly, here's a photo of my dinner last night at the Grand Palais cafeteria. At that point I'd flown the Atlantic, walked all over Paris, and toured a major art exhibit. There may have been better meals to be found in Paris, but this tasted divine.
