Poussin

What Dominique Pagani says

Dominique Pagani makes Poussin, and above all The Arcadian Shepherds, the emblem of classicism in painting. He sees in it a daytime, orderly and pastoral nature. The figures are arranged in counterpoint along the diagonal1. He also finds the reference to Antiquity, symmetry, and a human figure placed at the centre of a well-ordered countryside2. This idealised nature, which he calls "Apollonian", is not a place one seeks to escape from3. It remains entirely external to the subject4 and wholly ordered by human presence5. In the 2019 cycle on nature and landscape, the painting serves as the classical point of reference: it is one of the three paintings shown at the first session6, and he notes that Poussin painted several versions of it. Elsewhere, he cites Poussin as an example of a painting whose parts are simultaneous7. He also points out that nature enters painted settings, in contrast to the medieval gold background8.

1. 1#5.4 Introduction / Nature ou Paysage ?25 Jan 2019 · 5:12
2. 2Racine4 Feb 2019 · 50:53
3. 3#5.4 Introduction / Nature ou Paysage ?25 Jan 2019 · 25:29
4. 4Chateaubriand26 Mar 2019 · 1:35:40
5. 5Schumann2 May 2019 · 1:21:50
6. 6Staël (Mme de )26 May 2019 · 1:36
7. 7La Musique de l'Histoire26 Apr 2015 · 16:28
8. 8Griaule (Marcel)18 Oct 2017 · 1:44:23

Summary produced automatically from 10 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.