ARTS

Exhibitions

The Study of Italian Drawings: The Contribution of Philip Pouncey (Department of Prints and Drawings, British Museum, 28 January- 24 April 1994)

A vintage connoisseur

Bruce Boucher

Exhibitions of drawings normally encompass the oeuvre of an artist or the tri- umphs of a collector, and they have become ever more popular with the gener- al public. The basic requisite for such shows is that a name like Modigliani, Michelangelo, Chatsworth or Getty must figure as the principal drawing card. Why, then, has the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum begun the year by commemorating a former deputy keeper? The answer could only be because the person in question is Philip Pouncey, undoubtedly the greatest British connois- seur of Italian drawings in this century.

Since his death in 1990, Pouncey has been the subject of exhibitions at the Lou- vre and at the Uffizi — in itself a remark- able tribute to a man who wrote little but made acute comments about drawings in collection throughout Europe and Ameri- ca. Those who met Pouncey professionally never failed to be impressed by his uncanny ability to recognise the hand of an artist, even from a photograph of a drawing, and then crown this feat by adding a few, pre- cise words to support his attribution. What made such encounters all the more impres- sive was that Pouncey's comments were delivered in an engagingly unassuming way, implying that a half a minute later you, too, would recognise the drawing in question as by Scicolante da Ser- moneta.

Born in 1910, Pouncey was typical of his generation of art historians in that he was largely self-taught, mov- ing gradually from the study of art to its histo- ry via visits to museums and galleries. Art for him meant the Italian Old Masters, and he imbibed the late 19th- century tradition of studying the evolution of an artistic personality through works and doc- umentation. Pouncey was fortunate, too, that his career unfolded dur- ing the Thirties and Forties when important drawings came onto the market, and the attentions of his department in the British Museum centred on cataloguing its great Italian Renaissance collection.

Long before he entered the department, Pouncey ventured into the realm of attribu- tions when he identified a small sketch, now on exhibit, as a preliminary study for a saint in an altarpiece by Luca Signorelli. An uncharacteristic work in metal-point, the drawing had shuttled between Venetian and Florentine artists before Pouncey saw its connection with Signorelli. Even the

`Three Heads, attributed to Giovanni Bellini, black chalk

great Bernard Berenson grudgingly admit- ted that Pouncey was right—although not for many years.

Pouncey once quipped that 'an attribu- tion a day keeps depression at bay', and the pleasure of identification obviously gave a fillip to his work. But he also felt strongly that `a preparatory drawing for a painting . . . nearly always has an exciting quality which, except in the case of the very best artists' work, begins to evaporate in the end product'. When a spectator could disentan- gle the thought processes contained in a drawing, he or she entered into the artist's mind, retrieving something of the genesis of his work.

Undoubtedly, the study of drawings appealed to the artist-manqué in Pouncey, and perhaps for the same reason he pre- ferred the spontaneous pronouncement over the coolly meditated article or book. He had a great eye but never tried to ele- vate connoisseurship into the mystical cere- mony practised by some of his more pretentious contemporaries. His extraordi- nary visual memory was buttressed by an equally remarkable capacity for taking pains over his work, whether making his own drawings after paintings or cataloguing photographs or cross-referencing his enor- mous quantities of notes. What makes Pouncey's achievement even more remark- able is that he began his work before the study of art had become `institutionalised' in this country, long before art historians could rely upon well stocked libraries or computerised data bases.

The Study of Italian Drawings bears out

the fruits of Pouncey's 20 years at the British Museum and his subsequent work as a consultant at Sotheby's. The exhibition is divided into four parts, cover- ing his career and method of working as well as endearing glimpses into his pri- vate life. (Always methodical, Pouncey even indexed his cel- lar-book with details on purchase, vintage, and average cost per bottle.) The strength of the exhibition lies in the range and quality of drawings assembled.

Major masters, like Michelangelo, Raphael, and Parmigianino, are there though often represented by unusual or slightly uncharacteristic sheets, as in two beautiful black chalk studies of heads ascribed to Giovanni Bellini or the powerful Michelangelo study of Christ at

the column. There is also the great rarity of Bruegel's 'Calumny of Apelles', which Pouncey spotted in a miscellaneous lot of drawings and was able to acquire for the British Museum.

The value of Pouncey's detective work lay not only in reclaiming drawings by great artists that had languished unrecognised, but also in reconstructing the oeuvre of minor figures like Avanzino Nucci or Gio- vanni de' Vecchi. In such cases, Pouncey was able to analyse the graphic style of an artist and also shed light on lost frescoes or paintings preserved in sketches and car- toons. Several artists like Peruzzi or Bat- tista Franco, whose careers Pouncey helped to reconstruct, have subsequently been recognised as far more significant than they were held to be 50 years ago.

The British Museum's tribute to Philip Pouncey is an extremely genial exhibition that captures something of the character of a remarkable connoisseur. His humanity comes to the fore in his fondness for way- ward and unsuccessful artists, like Lorenzo Lotto, and in one of his rare publications, Pouncey vividly describes a pen sketch of an ecclesiastic in his study, with words that contain more than a little self-identifica- tion:

The young prelate has interrupted his read- ing for a moment to glance at us and to invite us hither: we are in the presence of a man who is cultivated and well-to-do, who likes books, tasteful furnishing and comfort. From the shadows emerge the more disparate and profane objects: vases, a bust, a bell for call- ing servants, an open jewel-box; there is also a little dog.

Bruce Boucher is Reader in History of Art at University College London.

'It's still there!'