Vanished Splendors: A Memoir [Hardcover]

This Blathus memoir is absolutely beautiful. You feel as if Balthus is sitting right beside you sharing his most personal reflections. He shares not only about his approach to painting but also about many areas he considers to be blessings and difficulties for his life. An intimate and inspiring read. For any young artist or book collector of art this is a must have.

I enjoyed reading these short meditatios or memoirs. These memoirs, dictated the year before he died, are small meditations with no chronological order. Rather, they are brief memories expanded upon by the artist with his comments on painting and the artistic community in which he worked. The events he describes are often lacking context and students of art history will be able to make much better sense of these short memories than would someone not familiar with these artists and art movements.

The interpretation of his work is a theme that he returns to repeatedly in these memoirs. Many have pointed to the beautiful young women in slightly suggestive poses are Freudian. Balthus rejects t his interpretation. He tells us that his work is a mirror or passage toward the creative force of the universe or God and that it is the beauty of young girls, which is contemplated for their angelic beauty, and serves as a passage past the actual image toward a spiritual truth. This is not unlike the explanation of the use of icons in the Eastern Orthodox churches. There is much talk of God in these memoirs which due to Balthus' age may be reconciliation with God that might not be so dominant if the memoirs were dictated by a younger man. Balthus tells about his conversion to Catholicism, along with his brother, when he was a young man, so that he might inherit from a Catholic relative.

Balthus' parents divorced and his mother became the lover of poet Rainer Maria Rilke. Despite loyalty to his father, he does credit Rilke with influencing him, especially in the theme that the work of art, poem or painting, should act as a passage to a glimpse of spiritual truth, primarily or the artist but also for the sensitive and meditative viewer. Oddly enough Balthus is harsh on the philosophy and work of the surrealists who indicate the work is a passage to the human unconscious. Balthus listened often to Mozart and his comments and appreciation for Mozart are insightful.

At the time of writing, his two sons by his first marriage are old men, and thus rarely does he discuss his first marriage. More detail is provided about Setsuko and their daughter.Balthus does relate some detail about his family heritage in Poland, he is Count Balthasar Klossowski de Rola and Balthus is his name as an artist.

One major insight for me was that I finally made the connection between the static time frozen aspects of the work of Balthus and that of Piero della Francesca whom he admits is a major influence on his work. Many other artists are mentioned including those with whom he was a friend, Giacometti or Picasso, those older artists that were family friends, Bonnard, and those whom he currently admires, Tapies. His reflection on Bonnard is very nice for when the family of Balthus went bankrupt; Bonnard bought some family personal items from the auction to give back to the family. Bonnard also took an early interest in the paintings of Balthus and advised him to study the works of the Tuscan artists. His commentary on Picasso's output as an old man is also interesting for he relates that in his old age, Picasso painted dozens of canvases a week which Balthus indicates was related to the elderly artist's anxiety. I also found his disdain for Francis Bacon insightful since he says Bacon painted hunks of bloody meat. Balthus is also very leery of the work and persona of Jean Cocteau, whose visibility and action in the world is the opposite of Balthus. The most interesting aspect of the book is the stream of comments Balthus makes regarding the nature of painting and the creative process - all of which ring true.

When it comes to twentieth century painters, Balthus is one of the most important and certainly one that stands out from the rest. He is enigmatic and people often misunderstand his paintings. Vanished Splendors is Balthus' memoirs that he was working on at the time of his death. In it he puts forth his philosophy on many subjects such as art, modern art, life, religion, family, love and history. He's known or met most of the important artisians of the last century. Picasso, Camus, Artaud, Monet and more. This is a quick read and gives insight into his world and how he painted (he often took years to finish one canvas). Very enjoyable and informative.