Almighty painter

Chapter 854 Henry IV and the Thirty Thousand Peasants
"In Alexander's story, it sounds like Camille is a victim controlled by a love spell. An extremely weak person, without a strong opinion, only empty love and empty devotion."

Gu Weijing pondered for a moment.

"No, I apologize for what I just said--"

"I guess I shouldn't use the word weak."

"I didn't live in Europe in the 19th century, or in Europe during the Renaissance. So, maybe I can't really empathize with them and really feel what life was like for the lower classes of that era. When I was studying, the men and women I saw in Western history and the figures I saw in oil paintings were mostly famous men and women. Raphael, Leonardo da Vinci, Turner, King Charlemagne, Henry IV, Anne Boleyn, Catherine the Great or Queen Elizabeth... These people each had their own personalities and their own lives, and they brought us a lot of historical materials..."

“But for a very long time in history, the entire lower social class and the relatively disadvantaged have always been the voiceless in traditional narratives… I have always told myself that artistic creation should have empathy. Many of those kings, queens, monarchs, great painters, and members of the Royal Society of Arts have a tough side in their personalities, which does not mean that the little people who are drowned in history are weak.”

Gu Weijing shook his head seriously.

"I should have a 'weak' perspective. I can't really fully understand what kind of social pressure ordinary people of that era had to face, and I can't really understand what kind of social pressure female artists who were excluded by the art world of that era had to face. Even if what Alexander said is really the truth, can I say that Camille is weak? In other words, even if we are discussing Rodin's lover Camille, the artist Camille who was locked up in a mental hospital until her death? Can I say she is weak?"

"To put it bluntly, who am I, Gu Weijing? Have I ever experienced the suffering she has gone through? Can I, Gu Weijing, feel the hardships they are facing?"

Gu Weijing said self-deprecatingly: "How can I be qualified to say that?"

"It may be too arrogant to say this, and it sounds a bit like victim blaming. Because you are not strong enough, you are guilty, so you deserve to be exploited. Because you are weak, because others are the king and you are a peasant, you deserve to be exploited."

"In that famous story, Henry IV stood in the snow for three days and three nights in order to gain the Pope's forgiveness, and finally the Pope gave him a kiss. Later, Henry IV made a comeback and occupied Rome with his army and the Pope he supported. Historians praised Henry IV for his forbearance and strength. But I think that the greatest humiliation Henry IV suffered in the first half of his life was just standing in the snow for three days. While he was standing in the snow with thirty guards, perhaps three hundred farmers and farm women were freezing to death in the heavy snow, and perhaps thirty thousand farmers and farm women were shivering in the heavy snow. For Henry IV, this was the famous 'Humiliation of Canossa', but for the remaining thirty thousand people who did not leave a word in history, it was just the true face of the burden of life."

"Are you qualified to say that they are all weak people?"

"No. This is just too much."

Gu Weijing shook his head.

"Being bullied is because you are born inferior to others, because you are weak. Because others are Alphas and you are Beta (note: the quality level of humans produced on the production line in Brave New World), this is what you should endure, so you have no right to happiness at all - I come from a very ordinary family. I won't insist that I am at the bottom of society. There are many people who are more miserable than me, but I can say that I have seen the dark side of this society. I am not a strong person, I am a weak person. I am not the emperor in the story, I am the farmer in the story, so I personally hate this kind of narrative logic."

"But I can say the other way around. Those who can rise above all these hardships, those who can bravely pursue their own happiness in the face of a hundred different kinds of sad things, are braver and stronger than those who have not gone through all this, and those who have spent their lives surrounded by servants, in banquets, salons, and balls."

"It's a pity. Monet's wife Camille is also a person who has lost her voice in history. We can no longer understand her real life. We can only restore her vague appearance from the records of people around her.

Just like looking at Monet's "Woman with a Parasol", we stand in front of the canvas, looking at the woman looking back in the sun under the painter's brushstrokes, and imagine her figure under the hazy veil. "

There isn't much skill in Gu Weijing's words.

He occasionally paused for thought, but overall he spoke very fluently.

Miss Elena listened to his voice, placed her fingers on her knees, and looked naturally at the spotlights on the audience seats in front of her.

In old-fashioned traditional theaters, in the days when Shakespeare's Hamlet was first performed on the stage of a small theater in London, all chandeliers were lit by candles, and a few of them were lit by whale oil, which burned whiter.

This thought ran through Anna's mind.

"If the opera house still maintained this tradition today," the hostess suddenly thought, "the candlelight would definitely be brighter because of his voice."

"Mr. Gu, then in your mind, what kind of person should Camille be?"

then.

The woman inquired.

"I'm not saying she's weak, but the image Mr. Alexander pieced together of Camille has a very delicate temperament. She's a blade of grass, and Monet is the strong wind. Wherever Monet blows, she falls. That's not the case. I just wanted to tell Mr. Alexander what I just said. I've also studied the relevant materials and read those documents. In the impression I pieced together in my mind, Camille is much stronger than this—"

"Oh, how do you say that?" Anna asked with interest.

"For her part, I believe Kamel has a choice."

Gu Weijing said.

"I believe that she took the initiative to choose her own destiny. She had the opportunity to choose not Monet. There were so many painters in the studio. She could have chosen not to choose Monet, but she chose Monet. Her parents did not approve of their marriage. She could have chosen not to choose Monet, but she chose Monet. She could always choose not to understand Monet, but even in the face of so many difficulties, they still spent a relatively happy ten years... According to Alexander's understanding, there are two possibilities. Either she was so delicate that she never expressed any dissatisfaction, or all the dissatisfaction she expressed was erased by Monet. But as far as I am concerned, I prefer to understand that she chose to understand Monet."

"She knows what kind of person her husband is. Sometimes he seems a little stubborn, and sometimes he seems a little indifferent. But she still accepts him and loves him. This is her courage."

……

"So, what's the difference between this and the empty love and empty devotion you just mentioned?" Miss Elena asked back.

“Only when you understand can you love.”

"Empty love is not love. It is just a psychological illness like Stockholm syndrome. Submission without warmth makes people feel sympathetic. But true love with warmth requires real courage that makes people admire it."

Gu Weijing thought for a moment.

“Love is not only about loving others and understanding others, but also about loving yourself and understanding yourself. I believe Camille not only understands what Monet did and its significance, but also fully understands what she did and its significance. After reading those letters and the descriptions of Monet and his friends, I am willing to believe that Camille is the master of love, not a prisoner.”

"Without so much struggle, the power of courage cannot be demonstrated..."

"You think it is this kind of love that makes Camille not a servant of Monet's greatness, but a part of Monet's greatness, right?" Anna thought for a moment and asked back.

"That's probably what I mean. If I say that it is this kind of love that makes Camille a part of Monet's greatness, it might sound like I am making Camille the 'other'."

Gu Weijing tapped the back of his hand with his fingertips.

"I think it is the existence of this kind of love that closely links the fates of Camille and Monet, not just the connection between a painter and the most important model on his canvas, but a closer relationship - and the two of them together constitute a very touching page in the history of art."

Gu Weijing remembered a letter he had read that was displayed at the Monet letter exhibition.

"--Camille and Jean (Monet and Camille's son) are the only light in my darkness... Her patience makes me ashamed... I want to cry, I swear to win dignity for them with my brush--"

It doesn't sound like a very touching love story.

But this is Monet's own style of speech. Strangely, male artists throughout the 19th century rarely expressed their vulnerability in their letters.

As if that was an unacceptable label.

Tears mean weakness.

In Monet's letters, such emotional outbursts are only rarely revealed, and then they are tightly covered up.

When Gu Weijing read this letter, he didn't have any special feelings.

Until later.

When Gu Weijing was reading relevant documents, he read that Monet had achieved success and fame in his later years. A friend visited his estate and saw Monet staring at the water lilies in the pond for a long time. He said to himself: "The water lilies in the garden are blooming, and the light and shadow are like the folds of her skirt--"

"She should have seen it all."

that moment.

Gu Weijing seemed to be hit by something.

You are a down-and-out painter. Your wife eloped with you and raised your children with great difficulty. You saw all this and felt that you were incapable of providing them with a happy life.

You sit by the river and paint, gritting your teeth, holding the paintbrush, wanting to cry but not daring to.

Many, many years later, you have become the most successful artist in the world. You own a large estate with a pond and a beautiful bridge. Your name has spread all over the world, across the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. Collectors from America and Asia all come to you to order your works.

This is not even the pinnacle of fame for you, but just the beginning of the journey to the top.

You don't know that in the next hundred years, you will become more and more famous, more and more famous, and become a great giant in the art world, until any of your paintings can directly buy the town where you once lived in seclusion, and then fill it with mountains of paint and bread.

You will never again face the choice of paint or bread.

But you don't care that much about it.

It seems that all this does not seem to have such a strong meaning to you. You are still sitting by the stream, painting, muttering to yourself, wanting to cry but not daring to, just like many years ago.

This is probably life, right?

Gu Weijing later learned that according to Monet's granddaughter, when she was young, there was always a sketch of Camille hanging in her grandfather's study.

No one was allowed to be touched.

It was a temple in his life.

Therefore, Gu Weijing has always been willing to believe that there is true love between Monet and Camille.

"I think Camille's significance to Monet is more important than many predecessors imagined. She is not only Monet's model, or even Monet's wife..."

"So what you mean by that is beyond the artistic relationship between the painter and the subject?" Anna asked.

"Yes." Gu Weijing nodded.

"Partner. She was never Monet's slave or prisoner. She was Monet's partner, both in family and in artistic creation. Her help to Monet and her significance to Monet far exceeded that of a model, and even far exceeded that of a source of inspiration—"

"She is not the wood that lights the fire, she is the ring of the flame," Miss Irena summarized.

"Correct."

Gu Weijing answered simply, "I think existing research may have overlooked this point."

"In that case, it sounds like you don't deny that it might be Camille who painted that picture?" Anna blinked.

"I should have mentioned that I have seriously considered the possibility that Camille, or even Camille and Monet, worked together on the painting "Old Church in a Thunderstorm" as collaborators."

The young man pursed his lips.

“Who could resist finding a work that might have been done by Claude Monet?”

"Emotionally, The Old Church in a Thunderstorm is a painting about breaking free. If this painting was really created by Camille, I would like to understand it as a painting about breaking free from constraints."

"What's the difference with Mr. Alexander's point of view?"

"The difference is that, in my initial speculation, this is a painting in which Camille and Monet broke free from the constraints of their two families, the pressure of society, poverty... rather than a painting that Camille painted to break free from the constraints of her husband Monet."

Gu Weijing glanced at Alexander on the side again.

"Of course. This is my speculation, and it could be wrong. This is just an academic discussion, and I respect Mr. Alexander's right to raise objections."

"Maybe he has some unique materials that led him to this conclusion, and maybe one day other scholars will find new and more powerful evidence to prove a new point of view."

“Of course this is possible. Female artists are indeed a relatively neglected marginal group throughout the history of classical oil painting, lacking opportunities for their voices to be heard. This needs to be addressed.”

“It’s not just female artists. I’ve always felt that it’s very brave and necessary to pay attention to the stories of the little people in art history who have been overshadowed by the great figures and painters. The frustrated also have their own stories. The ignored also have their own efforts. That’s what I mean by paying attention to the thousands of farmers who were also standing in the snow when Henry IV was standing in front of the Papal Palace.”

"Doesn't that mean you're not strong enough?" Anna smiled.

"no way."

Gu Weijing said, "I just have some different opinions on the arguments used by Mr. Alexander to draw conclusions."

Hao Ge is a villain, but that doesn't mean everything he says is wrong.

Alexander is a liar who is full of lies, but that doesn't mean that everything he said on the stage today was a lie.

Facts are facts.

Bad intentions mean bad intentions.

Two different things.

Gu Weijing looked down on Alexander simply because he came to the wrong conclusion.

It is not wrong to pay attention to Camille, nor is it wrong to explore the pain she endured or the contributions she made, or even to say that Monet exploited his wife's artistic achievements.

It is not impossible.

This is certainly not wrong.

In academic research, one naturally has the right to raise questions.

But not in the way that Alexander tried to force "Old Church in a Thunderstorm" onto Camille on the stage today.

The only one who was wrong was Alexander.

Gu Weijing was willing to remain restrained today and did not insult the other party in the same way as Alexander.

Because he was not good at debating with others, he was worried that he would not be able to explain to the audience in a short time the difference between people like Alexander and scholars who were really willing to do research seriously - maybe from the point of view, the arguments of the two people were exactly the same. He also felt that Camille was being exploited.

But that doesn't mean.

They are just like Alexander. On the contrary, as long as there is enough convincing evidence, those who come to such a conclusion may also be brave people who have done careful research.

Gu Weijing believed in the sincerity of the feelings between Monet and Camille. Is it possible to understand the union of Monet and Alice as Monet's betrayal of his feelings?
Of course you can.

No problem.

It is very unfair to lump together art scholars who are truly willing to study the weak outside of the brilliant light with people like Alexander.

He worried that he could not separate Alexander from Alexander's ideas, Alexander's ideas from the process by which he arrived at them.

He was unwilling to risk giving the audience the impression that he was a sinister person who wanted to profit from gender issues by "facing Carroll's contribution to Impressionism and facing the lack of attention paid to the weak groups in classical art history."

Just as he said - paying attention to the thousands of farmers who were also in the snow when Henry IV stood in front of the Papal Palace was actually a very brave thing to do.

and so.

Gu Weijing would rather suffer the loss himself.

He didn't want to accidentally hurt scholars who deserved respect.

(End of this chapter)