Installation view of the exhibition “Gottlieb: École de New York” at Galerie Rive Droite, Paris, April 1959. Eclipse (1952), Threads of Theseus (1948), Totemic Figures (1948), Crimson Spinning (1959), and Polychromed Maze (1956).
"I dwell on Gottlieb's future because he is one of the handful of artists on whom the immediate future of painting itself depends."
–Clement Greenberg in the exhibition catalogue
From April 3–30, 1959, Adolph Gottlieb exhibited a selection of artwork at Galerie Rive Droite in Paris, France. The exhibition, titled Gottlieb: Ecole de New York, consisted of eleven paintings from 1948–1959 and later traveled to the ICA London in June. The exhibition was accompanied by a catalogue with an essay written by Clement Greenberg.
Gottlieb was the second member of the New York School to be given a solo show in Paris. Therefore, Jean Larcade, the director of Galerie Rive Droite, aimed to make this important exhibition of new American art in Paris a great event. The gallery had a publicity budget of 1,000,000 francs, placing advertisements and articles about the exhibition in many publications and "on all the street corners in Paris."
Below are some installation images and documents from our archives on Adolph Gottlieb's one-man show at the Galerie Rive Droite.
Installation view of the exhibition “Gottlieb: École de New York” at Galerie Rive Droite, Paris, April 1959. Black and Black (1959), Pink Smash (1959), Figures in Pictoscape II (1949), Exclamation (1958), and Horizontals (1955).
View of advertisement for “Gottlieb: École de New York” at the Galerie Rive Droite posted in Saint Germain on the left bank, April 1959.
Exterior view of the Galerie Rive Droite, Paris during “Gottlieb: École de New York,” April 1959. Pink Smash and Black and Black (both 1959) visible through the window.
A letter from Jean Lacarde of Galerie Rive Droite finalizing the details of the exhibition with Gottlieb, May 19, 1958.
Adolph and Esther Gottlieb traveled to Paris for the exhibition's opening and arrived in March 1959. Jean Lacarde planned a welcome party to greet them upon their ship's arrival to promote the exhibition further.
An invitation to the exhibition preview on April 2, 1959.
RECEPTION OF THE EXHIBITION
The exhibition's reception by the French press was a highly anticipated event, but there was some nervousness about the local support for the exhibition.
As Esther recounts in her 1975 interview, "Larcade had said to us, “I’m very disappointed but last week when I was at an opening at the Gallerie de France, I heard the young painters talking, and they say they’re going to boycott Gottlieb’s show.” Larcade said, “I really can’t believe they’re going to do that, because, after all, I always go to their openings. I’ve always been very friendly and showed some of them in a group show.” But there was a strong feeling against Americans in Paris at that time...At the opening, the young men stood across the street and looked in the window, but some of the older men whom we knew and who were Adolph’s age, like Soulages, Mathieu, and Hartung, those men came. The younger fellows didn’t come. Even after the opening, they didn’t come. You’d see them across the street looking in and talking about it."
The protest of young French artists continued after the exhibition's opening. A Frenchman who disliked the work even threw a note scrawled on an announcement pamphlet at Gottlieb. Jean Larcade tore up the note and threw it away, but Gottlieb later gathered the pieces and put them back together to take home as a souvenir. The original note is pictured mounted on a sheet of paper with an English translation below.
An announcement flyer for the exhibition "Gottlieb: Ecole de New York".
A protester's note to Gottlieb and the Galerie Rive Droite thrown at the artist.
However, the exhibition was positively received in the French and American press. Below are some excerpts reviewing the show:
Massat, Rene. ''Adolph Gottlieb, Peintre de l’Incertitude'' (Adolph Gottlieb, Painter of Uncertainty), La Nation Française, April 8, 1959.
"Above a fissure made of a large patch of color whose discordance cuts through the dark background of the canvas, he [Gottlieb] places a heavy oval shape, sometimes encircled by a lighter halo, which leaves an impression of heaviness, of suspended danger, a constant reminder of uncertainty and fear."
–Rene Massat. ''Adolph Gottlieb, Peintre de l’Incertitude'' (Adolph Gottlieb, Painter of Uncertainty), La Nation Française, April 8, 1959.
"For the first time in its history, America is in a position to offer a place to its painters, architects, and sculptors. The end of their obscurity and exile, their present prestige and relative security are due to the tenacity of a generation of painters like Mr. Gottlieb, and to the consistent and critical support of Mr. Greenberg."
–Annette Michelson, ''Gottlieb Exhibition'', New York Herald Tribune, April 8, 1959
P.D. ''Peintres Francaise, Gare A Vous! Gottlieb Est La!'' (French Painters Beware! Gottlieb is here!), La Gazzette Lauzanne and Tribune de Lausanne, April 12, 1959.
The Gottliebs intended to stay in Paris for four months but Gottlieb was unable to find a suitable studio space in the city. He longed to return to his work and to New York where he felt a stronger sense of inspiration as illustrated in the below quote.
"My feeling about most French art today, of painters of my generation, is that it's... tremendously well-painted, but it's, it takes on a little of the form of cuisine: it will have a built-in patina, for example. It'll have the same feeling as a lot of older paintings. It doesn't have the feeling of our particular time, precisely. It doesn't pinpoint the experience of our time. And this may have something to do with the French way of life or their outlook, and so on, which I felt very much in 1959 when I was in Paris. Paris... is seductive, and it makes you languid. And New York is uncomfortable, but it's invigorating. And I think that, personally I can paint better here. This may have something to do with it."
–Adolph Gottlieb in a 1962 interview with Casper Citron