London’s best kept secret:

The Courtauld Gallery

I first visited The Courtauld Gallery on a chilly Saturday morning in October searching for Cézanne. What I found was a sublime sanctuary.

A beautiful spiral staircase delivers you to a painterly heaven; pastel hued rooms quietly housing impressionist masterpieces. Unlike larger London galleries, there I felt no need to rush, so spent a long time contemplating the fate of the girl in The Bar at the Folies-Bergère by Edouard Manet. Her melancholy is so absorbing, and the more you analyse the painting the less sense it makes, an almost surrealist mystery.

 

Never before had I fully appreciated the true beauty of Two Dancers on a Stage by Degas. The composition is pure perfection; the delicate angle of the ballerina’s arms is mimicked by the lines on the stage and the position of the dancers upon it. The large area of empty stage is contrasted on a diagonal with the detailed dancers and blossoming scenery behind. The spotlight on the ballerina’s face is so realistic that for a second you could believe you were sitting in The Royal Opera House in Paris.

 

In the adjoining room I found the treasures I had been seeking: works by Cézanne. Unfortunately The Montagne Sainte-Victoire had gone on loan to Budapest, but Lac d’Annecy was still hanging there in all its splendour.  Reproductions never give justice to its vibrant blue tones. A precursor to cubism; its flattened perspective and emphasised lines are mesmerising. Cézanne was the master of the new still life, showing more than one angle of the objects at a time to give a truer reality. The Courtauld owns some of his best

 

The next level provided further impressionist wonders from the landscape genre, as well as an impressive display of 20^th Century art including works by the Fauves, The Bloomsbury Group and German Expressionists. My stand-out piece from this collection was Female Nude by Modigliani. The tilt of the woman’s head could be read as both shyness and provocation Its strength is in its simplicity; the restraint of colour and detail, save for the loose strand of hair that has fallen onto her chest, clinching a realism that gives the painting its warmth.

 

I was further indulged upon discovering a new display of recently acquired etchings by Lucien Freud. As an art student I borrowed a heavy hardback of these etchings from my local library and attempted to copy them in pencil, in the vague hope that some of Freud’s genius would rub off. I never made much of an artist but I adored those etchings. Freud has always been noted for his intense gaze when observing his subjects which in turn produced his detailed work. His etchings are a perfect example of this process, more so than his brush dabbed portraits in paint, as the intricate nature of etching commands attention to detail. Small scale and in monotone they present a delicate alternative to his large fleshy paintings.

 

The best galleries these days provide something in the way of refreshment, and the Courtauld does not disappoint. Its basement café offers majestic homemade cakes and mouth-watering seasonal lunches. Suffering from a sore throat, their fresh lemon and ginger ‘tea’ with honey was true salvation. I must confess that I sneakily devoured the whole dish of honey!