A Vatican commission which is reviewing its outdated exorcism procedures will this week remould the Devil’s cloven-footed image into a
A Vatican commission, which is reviewing its outdated exorcism procedures, will this week remould the Devil’s cloven-footed image into a more mundane, bland definition, compatible with modern ideas of `psychological disturbance’. The Devil is to lose his old image. With the crowds queueing in London’s Piccadilly, Toulgouat notes sadly that the Monet exhibition will not be seen in France.Jean-Marie Toulgouat at Francis Kyle gallery, London, from 24 May. Only in scenes of trees is there any similarity, according to Francis Kyle, the London dealer who has shown Toulgouat for the last 15 years.
Yet both are more popular in Britain than in their native country. “You have to take these kind of colours,” she would tell Toulgouat. During the Second World War, when materials were hard to come by, she even gave the younger artist some of Monet’s last tubes of paint.Their works, however, are quite different. Though his English was not as fluent as his great-grandson’s, Monet understood a great deal and loved the theatre.When Toulgouat first picked up a paintbrush at around the age of seven, even his palette was the same as Monet’s because he was guided by his great-aunt Blanche, Monet’s step-daughter, who was the only person ever to accompany the master on his painting excursions. He speaks of a man who did not discuss art with his family, apart from his second wife, Alice Hoschede (Toulgouat’s great-grandmother). He would say hello to friends in Giverny, but never to those who simply recognised the great artist in the street.
When he stayed at the Savoy Hotel in London, painting the scenes now on show at the RA, he loved roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. “Not the French, not the British,” he notes.It is curious listening to Toulgouat speak. He has been so close to Monet all his life you almost forget they never met. But eventually, two groups of people began to pay attention – the Americans and the Japanese. It is very important work.”Yet Jean-Marie Toulgouat points out that despite Monet’s huge international following today, “nobody” was interested in his late dramatic flowerings for a long time They were not acclaimed, he says, as earlier works had been. “It was when I was eight, nine, 10 that I think I began to be impressed by them because I was beginning to understand how difficult it was to paint.