Poussin

Summary

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 countryside. This idealised nature, which he calls "Apollonian", is not a place one seeks to escape from2. It remains entirely external to the subject and wholly ordered by human presence. 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 session, and he notes that Poussin painted several versions of it. Elsewhere, he cites Poussin as an example of a painting whose parts are simultaneous3. He also points out that nature enters painted settings, in contrast to the medieval gold background.

1. 1#5.4 Introduction: nature or landscape?25 Jan 2019 · 5:12
2. 2#5.4 Introduction: nature or landscape?25 Jan 2019 · 25:29
3. 3The music of history26 Apr 2015 · 16:28

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