Goya to Impressionism at the Courtauld Gallery

In the years from 1923 to 1953, the wealthy Swiss businessman Oskar Reinhardt acquired a hugely impressive art collection ranging from old master paintings to post-modern works. His museum “Am Römerholz” in Winterthur, Switzerland, currently closed for renovation, has agreed for some of its finest pieces to be shown at the Courtauld Gallery. Branded Goya to Impressionism, the exhibition represents something of a canny coup for the Somerset House-based institution owing in no small part to the parallels that can be drawn to the Courtauld’s own collection. Tellingly, the founder Samuel Courtauld was sufficiently intrigued by correlations between Reinhardt’s artistic predilections and his own to invite his Swiss contemporary to lunch in London in 1932- the year of the Courtauld’s birth.

That unflinching capturer of the human condition and searing social commentator, Francisco Goya awaits at the exhibition’s opening. Here is no depiction of Peninsular War barbarity or acerbic portraiture, but instead a stunning still life from 1808-12 of two succulent-looking salmon steaks set against one of those stark, black backgrounds that are peculiarly his own. This being Goya, he never allows himself to escape the fact these tasty morsels are both food and carcass, a hint of the macabre with lines of blood trickling out from the pink flesh. Elsewhere, in this relatively small but constantly rewarding gathering of works, one finds a very different culinary composition by Aix-en-Provence’s favourite son, Paul Cézanne. In Still Life with Faience Jug and Fruit (circa 1900), his precisely structured fruit on a kitchen table bear the observational efforts of their creator. The artist imbues this still life with a sense of the monumental then at odds with the genre, giving it power thanks to the size of the work alone. Another by Cézanne, one of six here, The Pilon du Roi (1887-88) finds him challenging the laws of perspective and focusing on visual harmonies to capture the Provençal landscape.

An influential Frenchman from an earlier era, Gustave Courbet, the leader of the Realism movement in the mid-19^th century casts his eye on the natural world in the opening room. An arresting contemplation of the power of the sea, The Wave (1870) sees the artist drawing on an excursion to Normandy of the previous year. His masterful use of a palette knife enables him to convey the weight of the waves pummelling the rocks, carving out the surging white ocean foam. Courbet, frequently a controversial figure throughout his career, can be found in The Hammock (1844) depicting a young woman in contemporary dress lying eyes closed on the eponymous canvas. It’s a bucolic scene, referencing Victor Hugo’s poem Sara the Bather (1829). Ever the provocateur, the artist unfastens her bodice much to the chagrin of the 1845 Salon which predictably refused to exhibit the work.

The presence of an excellent Manet in Reinhart’s collection, mere metres away from one of the Courtauld’s prize possessions, A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (1882) seems somehow apt.  Au Café (1878) intriguingly turns out to be the left-hand part of a painting of the Cafe de Reichschoffen in Paris, a disgruntled Manet divided in two. The other half was bought by London’s National Gallery in 1924 thanks to the financial clout of none other than Samuel Courtauld. An unidentified young woman meets our gaze, drawing the viewer into the lively urban scene. In a neat piece of symmetry, art historians have discovered that the poster on the window is advertising a trapeze artist’s performance at the Folies-Bergère. An acrobat is rather discombobulatingly visible in the top left of Manet’s celebrated masterpiece of the music hall. A work depicting the flamboyantly attired Moulin Rouge clown The Clown Cha-U-Kao (1895) by another keen observer of Parisian nightlife, Toulouse-Lautrec makes an appearance alongside the Manet. Sporting knickerbockers, a yellow ruff and white wig she strides through the crowd, accompanied by her partner Gabrielle.

Many of the most impressive works on show sit firmly in the Impressionist camp. There’s a strangely captivating, ambitiously large-scale 1864 painting by a young Renoir of potted plants in a greenhouse, which highlights subtle greens and whites on the canvas. A charming later work by the same artist, Confidences (1876-78), finds him characteristically capturing the effect of dappled light on the clothing of two young women whispering to one another – it would seem – over a glowing ring worn by the figure on the left. Monet also features here in the form of The Break-Up of Ice On The Seine (1880-81), one of several works he produced in response to the freezing and subsequent flooding of the banks of the Parisienne River in 1879. The bold, verging-on abstract brush strokes used to render the ice could be said to be a precursor to his celebrated water lilies of latter years.

Perhaps most memorable of all are the two striking paintings by Van Gogh, each of which focus on the hospital where the troubled Dutchmen sought help in the aftermath of his mental breakdown. The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles (1889) sees the artist adopt an elevated vantage point on the first floor to observe and submit to canvas the sun-drenched inner sanctum. Recently this exceptional work appeared in the National Gallery’s superb Poets and Lovers blockbuster. Incidentally, Van Gogh’s haunting Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear (1889), conjured up after he mutilated his own ear, is displayed nearby in the Courtauld’s own collection.

Oskar Reinhart’s second Van Gogh, A Ward in the Hospital at Arles (1889) was, like the aforementioned painting, taken by the artist with him when he moved to a psychiatric institution in Saint-Rémy. Depicting the 30-metre-long men’s ward where Van Gogh would have been housed, the work carries a palpable sense of unease. At the far end of the room, a double row of curtained beds leads to the entrance of a chapel marked by a large crucifix. In the foreground, a motley group of patients huddle around a source of heat. Dr Félix Rey, the man who saved Van Gogh’s ear, identified the straw-hatted figure reading an outstretched newspaper as the artist himself. Oskar Reinhardt would finally reunite the two paintings in 1925. The Swiss collector is said to have voiced his intention for his works to interact with each other be it artistically or thematically. A case in point can be seen in the haunting Géricault portrait displayed at the beginning of this show, A Man Suffering from Delusions of Military Rank (1819-22). It is believed to have been part of a set of paintings depicting insane patients as case studies commissioned by the artist’s patron, Dr Georget. For all his suffering, the individual has been accorded a dignity by Géricault. A hospital tag hangs around his neck like a medal awarded for valour in the field of battle. 

This enthralling exhibition is brought to a conclusion by an artist who was fated to ignite the creative touchpaper of the coming generation, Pablo Picasso. The Spaniard’s 1901 blue-toned portrait of the sculptor Mateu Fernández de Soto, created in the aftermath of the tragic suicide of their friend Carles Casagemas, seems to warn against the dangers of despair and insanity that stalk the creative mind, a recurring thread of the current exhibition. In an added layer of intrigue, the Courtauld disclose that close inspection under an x-ray has shown that  Picasso had painted over a mysterious portrait of a woman, presumably to save money. Oskar Reinhart himself is revealed to have had a great eye for a masterpiece. This cross-section of the collection he amassed over three decades provides the visiting public with privileged access to exciting, often unfamiliar works by major artists.

James White
Image: Vincent van Gogh, The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles, 1889. Image: The Swiss Confederation, Federal Office of Culture, Oskar Reinhart Collection “Am Römerholz”, Winterthur

Goya to Impressionism is at from 14^th February until 26^th May 2025. For further information or to book visit the exhibition’s website here.