Reflections on a Quote from Chagall
I am currently reading the Centre Pompidou’s publication from the Paris-Paris 1937–1957 exhibition held in 1981, and last in a series of shows after Paris-New York in 1977, Paris-Berlin in 1978, and Paris-Moscou in 1979 that preceded it. All were curated by Pontus Hultén, who was the museum’s director at the time. A Marc Chagall quote at the start of the section “Paris — Paths of Art and Life”, struck me for its beauty and accurate description of a certain Parisian ideal I think many, including myself, still have: “ As if pushed by destiny, I have arrived in Paris. My mouth spewed words from the heart. They almost choked me, stuttering. The words, anxious to catch, to possess the Parisian light, pressed upon me from the outside […] I visited neither academies nor professors. I found the city itself, at each step, in everything. It was the grocers at the market, the garçons de café, the concierges, the peasants, the workers. Above all, there was the stunning “freedom-light” I have never seen elsewhere” (46, Trans. Filippo Vanni). There is a quality that remains specific to Parisian light (light can be unique anywhere; in Venice, Rome, or New York, for example), even now. The impressionists to render this “douce lumière d’Île de France” (tender light of the Île de France) in the way it hit surfaces. When I spoke to an artist and professor who had worked in France for many years, he said that the light curved…
