Swiss Artist Félix Vallotton

"Better with their clothes on." The Guardian, 3 November 2007 [On Swiss artist Félix Vallotton]; Also published in Die Weltwoche, n. 42, 18 October 2007: 52-57.

From the Essay:

"When I was teaching [at Johns Hopkins University] a dozen years ago, I used to call in at the [Baltimore Museum of Art] between classes. At first, Matisse and the other big names occupied me, but over the weeks the picture I would find myself standing most faithfully in front of was a small, intense oil by the Swiss artist Félix Vallotton. The Lie had been painted in 1897 and bought 30 years later by Etta Cone from Félix's art-dealing brother Paul in Lausanne. It cost her 800 Swiss francs - little more than small change, given that on the same day, and from the same source, she bought a Degas pastel for 20,000 francs."

Félix Vallotton: An Idyll at the Edge is at the Kunsthaus, Zurich, until January 18, and at the Kunsthalle, Hamburg, from February 15 to May 18 2008. Visit the Baltimore Museum of ArtWebsite.