“Abstract” Art as a Veil: Tricolor Painting in Vichy France, 1940–44

Abstract

This article examines the claim by postwar French art historians that a little-known vanguard art movement in Paris during World War II, “la peinture bleu blanc rouge,” was a symbol of freedom during the Occupation years. On the contrary, it appears that the uncensored display of this art in Paris galleries acted as a veil simulating freedom and suggesting normalcy in the midst of the Holocaust. The idea that traditional modes of representation in painting are always “ciphers of regression” is also examined, revealing that in Resistance-inspired images of this period “the visual codes of recognizability” were frequently in use.

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Notes on contributors

Michèle C. Cone

Michèle C. Cone is a New York- and Paris-based art critic who received her Ph.D. from the Institute of French Studies of New York University in 1988 and teaches at the School of Visual Arts. Her book, Artists under Vichy. A Case of Prejudice and Persecution, has just been published by Princeton University Press [5 rue du Docteur Blanche, 75016 Paris, France].