Art: 75th Cezanne

In a rare mood of affability, the world’s most distinguished collector of modern paintings, Dr. Albert Coombes Barnes, arrived from Paris on the Normandie last week accompanied by his friend and collaborator, Miss Violette de Mazia, the manuscript of a new book and half a million dollars worth of pictures. Talking easily, the inventor of Argyrol announced:

“I had good fortune this year in picking up Le Linge, a splendid Manet, and two very important Cezannes, The Drinker and The Woodchopper which had been held in a private collection in Switzerland, and I have four Matisse interiors, new ones. It’s an amazing thing about Matisse. He’s getting on in years, you know, and everyone thought he had shot his bolt in art. He’s 67 or 68 years old and he hadn’t shown anything in two years. But this year he had a show in Paris that would knock your eye out.”

Other Barnes purchases included two canvases by Raoul Dufy, a 5th Century Greek figure and an Egyptian stone head of approximately 1800 B.C.

“That Egyptian piece turned up in Paris very mysteriously,” continued Dr. Barnes. “No one seems to know when or how it got out of Egypt. I was thunderstruck when I saw it. The chap who had it had been over to London with it but the British museum couldn’t raise the money.”

The two Cezannes Collector Barnes brought back with him last week were the 74th and 75th to be added to the Barnes Foundation, which includes the largest collection of Cezannes in the world. Few U. S. citizens have had a chance to see them, for the Greco-Roman temple outside Philadelphia that houses the Barnes Foundation is surrounded by an eight-foot iron fence, guarded by savage dogs. Only specially invited guests may view his pictures, and not a few of them have been bodily ejected from the building when their appreciation of what they were shown did not seem to be sufficiently lively.

Irascible Dr. Barnes on the other hand is given to sudden generosity. Not long ago he found four young U. S. artists whose work he approved. He paid their debts, canceled their leases, bought steamer tickets and sent them to France for a year’s study.

“I wanted to see eight eyes pop,” said this prime U. S. patron of Art.