Simon Hantai Villa Medici Rome.

While walking around the narrow streets near Piazza di Spagna in Rome I went up to Trinita' dei Monti. I wanted actually to view an exhibition in Villa Borghese but I ran out of steam! I managed to get to the top of the hill and see there the amazing views of Rome. I was surrounded by tourists and street vendors and it was very warm so I decided to cut my walk short and just go and relax inside the French Academy/Villa Medici in Trinita' dei Monti. Originally I wanted to visit their gardens and building because they are stunning; unfortunately I arrived too late in the afternoon and was only able to view the exhibition which, nevertheless, was very interesting. But I would recommend if you intend to go to call them up and find out at what time you have to be there as you cannot just wander around the building in your own time - you have to be shown around by a guide in your language. I have to say I was rather annoyed that they charged me the same to visit the exhibition when I couldn't view the building with the gardens. Outside of the exhibition space there was a video showing Simon Hantai at work. In the first room you were straightaway hit with his very large work on canvas. Overall the exhibition had many of his paintings in different sizes, 40 I was told by the gallery attendant; there were also smaller paintings from his period in the 1960's  and 1970's. The first part of the exhibition included the Galla Placidia (1958-1959), and the

Ecriture Rose, composed of small brush strokes similar to calligraphy. There are also works that show his famous 'pliage technique' (folding as a method) or the first Mariales, apparently his answer to Pollock and Matisse. 

Ecriture Rose

 

The second half of the exhibition includes his 'Tabula series' (1974-1982) and after that the Laissees (1981-1994). There are also works that have not been shown to the public before which I was very excited to see, like the Great Mariale (1960-1962) which was stored in the Vatican Museums and was not exhibited in France at the Centre Pompidou. Simon Hantai  (Hungarian, born 1922) became a French National in 1966 and died in 1985) He studied Fine Arts in Budapest (he was detained by the Gestapo due to the fact that he was the president of the student union in the Academy but then was allowed to continue his Fine Arts training at the Academy of Fine Arts).  What I found interesting about him is that for 15 years he removed himself from the artworld as he was concerned with his work becoming too commercial. It has been said that Hantai had to be forced to show his paintings. I relate to this, and as he said himself he always worked in the margins. 

Simon Hantai said. 'I was starting to receive commissions. I was being asked to paint the ceiling of the Paris Opera House. Society seemed to be preparing to paint my work for me. I could have obeyed; many, perhaps most, painters do. The prospect did not coincide with my desire'. So he went back to seclusion in his later years.

To escape Soviet ruling in the area he moved to France in 1948  were he met Andre' Breton. He was following Surrealism at the time but he broke away around 1955 to focus deeper on abstract art thus becoming a known voice of abstraction in post war France. His work is made of organic forms, it drips in calligraphy style; he used a spatula to spread the paint and he started working on the A Galla Placida  (pic. below) where he used the bell of an alarm clock (I found this quite funny) to take away the more superficial levels of paint.  More religious is this painting where there is an element of theology combined with mysticism in his work and it is also very gestural and the work generally is of a large scale which actually reminded me of a monument to abstract painting influenced by Georges Mathieu and abstract expressionism.

 He had a keen interest in the surface quality of a canvas and in the 1960's he was part of a group called Support Services. In some of the paintings in the exhibition I noticed that, while he was an artist with a great sense of colour, some of the work seemed monochromatic. In others, like the Encrose Rose, the pink writing is done with multicoloured lettering, combined with Christian, metaphysical undertones and philosophical text (he was interested in Philosophers such as Kant and Heidegger). 

Mariale

Mariale

 

In all his work three things are important: colour, movement and texture; in some the paint covers the entire canvas, while in others - especially with the 'folding' technique - precise white areas were left showing. Some of them make you think of the surrealist and automatic writing, others of Jackson Pollock's action painting. But Simn Hantai makes it his own - the colours in the paintings are impressive, some with a motion feel to them like scattered leaves or broken glass and an assemblage of colours, others such as Encruse Rose, composed of pink, delicate, dense, multicoloured writing. Some of the combinations of colours have a metaphysical effect while others made me think of earth elements such as water, fire etc. 

Tabula series

The second half of the exhibition include is 'Tabula series' (1974-1982) and after the Laissees (1981-1994). 

Laissees

His work is mechanical, a combination of blindness of execution (which again like in Hans Hartung  looked very precise) and a geometrical component but they also remind you of natural forms. With the method of  'folding' he didn't just use the canvas as surface to paint on he used the actual fabric and folded it scrunched and tied and he added the paint afterwards so the end result of this is a repeated pattern across the canvas with pieces of canvas left empty. This is due to the fact he was working with ideas of silence and absence, some critics say that he created a  visual silence due to him being in exile but I find his work anything but silent as the colours in some of the paintings are so strong and in your face due to the large sizes of the canvases.