Gwen John: Art and Life in London and Paris
Gary Raymond looks at Gwen John: Art and Life in London and Paris, a new illustrated biography by Alicia Foster.
‘Nobody knows exactly why birds sing as much as they do. What is certain is that they don’t sing to deceive themselves or others. They sing to announce themselves as they are. Compared to the transparency of birdsong, our talk is opaque because we are obliged to search for the truth instead of being it.’ So says John Berger in his 1989 essay ‘A Load of Shit’. One thing Alicia Foster’s new book, Gwen John: Art and Life in London and Paris (Thames & Hudson, 2023) establishes in its careful accumulative portrait of the artist as a young lady is how hard Gwen John worked at being an artist. Not just the effort she put in to becoming good at painting – Foster weaves a detailed, passionate tale of the years John spent studying at the Slade, and her subsequent life in France dedicated to mastering and developing her craft; Foster’s illustrated biography does a solid job of evoking the spirit of a woman’s obsessive and authentic attention to the whole shebang. Gwen John believed great art could only come from a true artist, and she had a very distinct set of views on what a true artist was. When she was younger this might have passed for romantic affectation (friends remember her at art school being very much intent on being the artist), but this didn’t mean she was a poseur (well, not entirely); in a very real sense she walked the walk.
Foster’s framework, taking London and Paris as the palettes from which to colour John’s story, introduces us to a vibrant and alluring world. The parade of impressive figures from history may have a flavouring of Zelig, but there is no denying this is an entertaining cast of characters, and Foster never gets distracted from her central thesis. Her job is to make us believe Gwen John was in these circles because she belonged there, and this Foster does. John never comes across as out of place, be it in the company of Whistler, Rodin, Rilke, or Isadora Duncan. The cities themselves are warrens for these hot ideas and fiery personalities. They are megalopolises of contrasts, though, only when it comes to the extremity of their bohemianism. Paris was, shall we say, more laissez-faire in its attitudes to the creative communities within. London provided John with several important early influences and lifelong friends when she followed her younger brother Augustus from her hometown of Tenby to the Slade at a time when that school was the place to be for anyone with modernist inclinations. There they worshipped Whistler (there is a delightful cameo of him in the book, turning up for a tour of the institution in his wide-brimmed hat and cape, gliding through the classrooms like some condescending exotic bird) and his “arts for arts’ sake” philosophy clearly had a profound effect on the young Gwen (as it did on all the Slade students of the time). But London, it turned out, was too buttoned up, too conservative in requirements of its womenfolk, and once John had tasted Paris it was clear she wouldn’t be going back. When studying there, her friends returned to London for Christmas without her; John decided to stay alone and in the archetypal tradition of the flaneuse walked the city to the bones, alone and free (she even declined an invitation from Parisian friends for Christmas lunch, opting instead to walk alone the whole day from one end of the city to the other).
To read the rest of this article click here.
Thank you Gary for this article. I shall look forward to reading Alicia Foster's book. 'Letters to Gwen John' by the artist Celia Paul is also excellent on the human cost of a life devoted to art.