What Matisse and Picasso Owed to Jewish Collectors and Dealers

Abstract

While the prominence in twentieth-century painting of Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso remains unquestioned, neither of these great artists could have emerged in their shared Parisian art world without the direct support of Jewish collectors and dealers. Foremost among the Jewish collectors of their earlier works were Americans living in Paris, especially the Steins: Leo, Gertrude, and Michael and Sarah Stein. While Leo followed by Michael and Sarah was an early purchaser of Matisse’s bold early Fauvist works, led by Bonheur de Vie (1905), Gertrude turned increasingly to Picasso, who painted her portrait (1906). Their support for Matisse was avidly seconded by the Cone sisters, whose extensive collection was donated intact to the Baltimore Museum of Art. Jews were also early adopters of French modern art in general as dealers. Chiefly led by the Rosenberg brothers, Léonce and Paul, prominent Jewish dealers during the teens also included the perceptive, if underfunded, Berthe Weill as well as the German immigrant Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler. Both of the latter gave crucial support to experimental art, the latter in particular to the art of Picasso’s Cubist phase (including a Cubist portrait of the dealer). In addition, a number of Jewish art critics served as influencers, supporting contemporary artists, albeit often castigating paintings by immigrant Eastern European Jewish artists, whom they viewed as outsiders. In their view, it was the multinational School of Paris’ often Jewish immigrants, against the greater, local School of France.