53 - ENSOR, James (1860–1949).

ENSOR, James (1860–1949). Autograph manuscript, “James Ensor as Seen by André Lhote,” Ostend, July 23, 1932; ¾ page, in-4 (small tear). Description: A fine essay on his painting, written for *Le Carillon*, in which he speaks of himself in the third person, echoing the highly laudatory article published by André Lhote in the *NRF*. During the retrospective dedicated to Ensor at the Musée du Jeu de Paume, “the finest French critics celebrated the master’s work,” which helped establish in France “the pictorial significance of Ensor’s art.” Thus, in the *Nouvelle Revue Française*, the painter André LHOTE published a comprehensive study of the great Ostend painter, from which we have excerpted a few passages: “Paris,” writes Lhote, “could no longer ignore the last survivor of the generation that gave us Rodin, Cézanne, Renoir, Manet, and Van Gogh. Ensor is the last of the heroes of painting. Without him, there would remain only would-be heroes, pretenders to eternity. […] Ensor belongs to that category of painters of which Breughel the Elder is the supreme master.”… His discovery of Ensor’s painting fascinates him. Lhote emphasizes the master’s vision and technique: “‘That is the entire Impressionist program. […] His exhibition includes two canvases painted thirty years apart, a comparison of which recounts the painter’s marvelous adventure in search of the lost craft.’” The two paintings are titled *Le Salon bourgeois* and were painted in 1891, when he was 21, and in 1911… “André Lhote then subtly traces the evolution of Ensor’s use of paint from one work to the other—two works that are so similar and yet so different at the same time—and continues: “I know of nothing more moving than this ardent quest for Truth, through a composition perfected by the great, ever-dissatisfied painters—among whom El Greco, who repainted the same paintings up to six times […], remains the preeminent model.”