French masterpieces frame the modern era

The ongoing exhibition Picasso, Modigliani & Modern Art: Masterpieces from LaM Museum at the Bund One Art Museum in Shanghai marks one of the largest showcase of Italian modern artist Amedeo Modigliani in China, "a rare opportunity" for locals, according to Xie Dingwei, founding director of the museum.

Modigliani, who passed away at age 36, left behind about 300 paintings scattered around the world. The Shanghai exhibition features six paintings and three works on paper, which makes this the first time Modigliani's art has been exhibited on a large scale in China.

The exhibition is jointly presented by the Bund One Art Museum and the French institution Lille Museum of Modern, Contemporary and Outsider Art, and is open to the public through Feb 9.

It presents 61 paintings from 18 avant-garde artists, led by five paintings by Pablo Picasso and six by Modigliani. According to the exhibition's curator, Jeanne-Bathilde Lacourt from LaM, the French museum was founded in 1983 at the bequest of French collector Jean Masurel. Masurel was the nephew of entrepreneur and art connoisseur Roger Dutilleul, one of the important collectors of Modigliani's works.

Dutilleul and his nephew Masurel built an exceptional body of work, both very personal and representative of the greatest artistic movements of the modern period in France, Lacourt says.

This is the first time LaM has presented an exhibition in China. Lacourt says: "We want to show our best masterpieces and also show something representative of the story of the collection.

"We picked Cubist paintings, Fernand Leger and Modigliani. We also wanted to show less famous artists who didn't get as much fame as Modigliani and Picasso and the collectors' interest in self-taught artists and more abstract painters such as Andre Lanskoy."

The Italian painter and sculptor Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920) is widely recognized as one of the most important portrait artists of the 20th century.

His portraits and nudes are characterized by asymmetric compositions, elongated forms and contours that are simple, yet powerful.

In the past few years, Modigliani's paintings made the news for their record-breaking auction sales, drawing public attention to the artist who lived a troubled life, didn't get much public recognition during his life and died of tubercular meningitis in 1920.

LaM is temporarily closed for renovations, which allows the museum to lend its six original Modigliani paintings to the Shanghai exhibition. LaM collaborated with other European museums to hold the exhibition Modigliani's Secrets from 2021-22, which later toured Helsinki and Budapest.

The exhibition in Shanghai marks the first time LaM's collection is shown in Asia, Xie says.

These artworks from LaM will not be able to travel to other parts of China, Lacourt says, "because we wish to have them back before the reopening (of LaM)".

The LaM collection of modern art features the connection between three series — modern and contemporary art and Art Brut, or Raw Art, and a French school that produced art in the early 20th century that is crude, childlike and primitive.

The exhibition at Bund One Art Museum is designed in chronological order, arranged in four sections — Cubism, Amedeo Modigliani, Dream Paintings and Expressive Color — to show the short history of France's modern art through the eyes of LaM's founding collectors.

While Cubism was a revolutionary new style reflecting the rupture between the artistic world and authority, the works of Modigliani, an artist of Ecole de Paris, present a personal style questioning the canon of art history, Lacourt says.

Upstairs at the Bund One Art Museum, another French exhibition is being held till Jan 5. The Journey of Ink: Modern and Contemporary Chinese Paintings from the Musee Cernuschi and the LaM exhibition are projects celebrating the 60th anniversary of diplomatic ties between China and France. These two exhibitions create an interesting cultural dialogue between French and Chinese arts, Xie says.

If you go

Picasso, Modigliani & Modern Art: Masterpieces from LaM Museum 10 am-6 pm (last entry by 5:30 pm), till Feb 9.

Bund One Art Museum.1 Zhongshan No 1 Road East, Huangpu district, Shanghai.