Art
Cross-Channel culture
Giles Auty
The purpose of this preamble, other than to reiterate a possibly unreasonable dislike for leather sandals worn by men — an unfor- tunate trait this in one who has to deal regularly with artists — is to express admiration for the way the French try to make a tourist attrac- tion out of almost anything. Unlike us, they have the neck to promote any feature, from free parking up- wards, as a compelling reason to visit their towns. Just how reticent and backward we are by compari- son in Britain was brought home to me earlier this month when invited by the Association des Conser- vateurs des Musees du Nord-Pas de Calais to visit their region.
The Pas de Calais is probably the area of France least loved by the British, perhaps because it is a bit like home. Most of us stop there after crossing the Channel only to refuel our cars or our stomachs before proceeding to east or south. Many of the 30 museums which make up the association are run by young, personable Frenchwomen who are given to displays of high spirits which one would not expect from female art history graduates from the Courtauld; like many of their fellow coun- trywomen they are not insensible to the advantages of self-promotion. But why should they not be so when there are so many excellent museums and galleries in their area? At present, these are visited almost entirely by Belgians, Dutch and Germans so far as foreign nationals are concerned. Now these wily Frenchwomen are planning to entice English art lovers also to cross or, shortly, to burrow under the Channel to visit their museums. As a first step to achieving this they invited a posse of British critics to sample the wares. To our shame, even the more experienced among us were unfamiliar with all but a handful of these fine showplaces.
Our hectic tour took in a number of museums with historic collections of art and artefacts as well as others devoted entirely to the contemporary. At Gravelines, the Museum of Original Prints and Drawings occupies the remarkable 18th-century naval fortress and arsenal. The vaults of creamy brick are beautiful in themselves and, at the time of our visit, formed an excellent setting for the superb etchings of Jacques Villon. The civic museums of Dunkirk and Calais replace 'Portrait of Charles de Calonne', attributed to 'English school, 18th century', at the Chartreuse Museum, Douai earlier buildings destroyed in the war. Both have sound collections of paintings, while the former also features an extraor- dinary collection of model boats and ships and a permanent display which explains the Dunkirk evacuations brilliantly to those too young to remember such heroic days. The Museum of Fine Arts at Tour- coing also has a notable collection, includ- ing a mighty equestrian portrait by Carolus-Duran and the magnificent 'La- mentation for the Dead Christ' by Anni- bale Carracci, the condition of which is also cause for tears.
For me, the highlight of the trip was a visit to the Chartreuse Museum at Douai, an ancient walled town where so many priests were trained to keep the old faith alive in Britain in the years following the Reformation. Old boys of Downside, in particular, will need no reminding of the town's connection. The ancient charter- house is lovely in itself, as is all the old town, and the fine Flemish paintings of the 15th and 16th centuries are an especial bonus. There is a remarkable Veronese and a portrait by Cuyp, of a little child, that is worthy of Rubens. A fine portrait of Charles de Calonne is mysteriously unattri- buted, being described only as 'English school, 18th century'. I would like to know more of the history and origins of this painting. The Hotel Sandelin at Saint- Omer is similarly stocked with excellent paintings, plus extraordinary collections of arms, pipes, toy soldiers and delftware.
The Museum of Fine Arts in Lille, a city maligned only by those who have never visited it, is second in scope in France only to the Louvre. The problems of curators everywhere were man- ifested in the condition of quite a few of the works. Museums on this scale need hefty funding. The museum at Valenciennes is smaller and cannot afford the additional space it needs to show its modern collection. However, majestic Flemish and Dutch paintings, with Rubens well represented, are re- markable to find in a relatively minor town. The museum's collec- tion, which includes a Joachim Buekelaer and two still-lifes by Van Es of supreme quality, is based on work seized from church and aristocracy during the French Revolution; one wonders who the rightful owners of the religious paintings especially should be held to be.
The municipal museum at Saint- Amand is housed in the bell tower of the ancient abbey. The contem- porary ceramics there were some of the finest I have ever seen, but I wish more of the contemporary art put before us had begun to live up to the standards set by earlier artists. The Museum of Contem- porary Art at Dunkirk is set in its own park, complete with moat, but is notable principally for the building itself. The collection within was formed privately by one Gilbert Delaine and illustrates most of the more disappointing aspects of art in our time. The building would not disgrace Hollywood domestic architecture in fanci- fulness and thus may be thought an im- provement on the Museum of Modern Art at Villeneuve d'Ascq, which looks more like a Humberside comprehensive from the Fifties.
More and more gleaming sepulchres of modern art are springing up all over the developed world to house worse and worse art; the modern collections of Dunkirk and Villeneuve d'Ascq should be preserved intact for future generations as near perfect examples of our own era's wrongminded- ness.
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