कोण जिंकले, कोण हरले? जॉन रस्किन का द ग गोडसेंचा आवडता जेम्स मॅकनील व्हिसलर?...Nocturne in Black and Gold, a Meaningless Blob?

 दत्तात्रय गणेश गोडसे यांनी "नांगी असलेले फुलपाखरू"- १ आणि २ असे जेम्स मॅकनील व्हिसलर (१८३४-१९०३) ह्या कलावंतावर दोन लेख लिहले हे आता त्यांच्या  "नांगी असलेले फुलपाखरू" (प्रसिद्धी १९८९) ह्या पुस्तकात समाविष्ट आहेत. 

त्या बद्दल मी पूर्वी लिहले आहे. 

त्यातील काही भाग व्हिसलर आणि तत्कालीन प्रसिद्ध टीकाकार जॉन रस्किन (१८१९-१९००) यांच्या मधील न्यायालयातील खटल्यावर आहे. गोडसे हे  व्हिसलर यांच्या बाजूने आहेत, मला तर वाटते ते स्वतः व्हिसलर सारखे आहेत असे त्यांना आयुष्यभर वाटत होते. 

 ह्या खटल्यावर इंग्लिश मध्ये अलीकडे एक पुस्तक प्रसिद्ध झाले Paul Thomas Murphy's "Falling Rocket: James Whistler, John Ruskin, and the Battle for Modern Art", 2023.

तो खटला सुरु झाला कारण मर्फी यांचे पुस्तक सांगते “…A true work of art, by Ruskin’s definition, conveyed a great number of great thoughts. These dark and discernibly unfinished messes conveyed nothing but physical and spiritual emptiness. They were nothing but variations upon the plague cloud. All of this might have occurred to Ruskin as he contemplated these paintings—but might not have. His written reaction to them is less intellectual, much more visceral: overwhelming, instinctive contempt and disgust. He had his Theoria, but did not need it: in this case, Aesthesis—sensation alone—was more than sufficient. He loathed these poor excuses for art.

One painting of the seven stood out as worst of the bad: the darkest, most chaotic painting of the lot. Not only was Nocturne in Black and Gold a meaningless blob; it was also an effortless one—clearly the work of an hour or two. To ask a couple hundred guineas for this—this nothing: it was an obscenity.

Ruskin left the Grosvenor Gallery with rage in his heart and soul, surely mulling over the thunderbolt he would hurl at the two men responsible for this affront to culture: Sir Coutts Lindsay, for thinking this thing art, and James Whistler, for thinking himself an artist….”

 “Nocturne in Black and Gold – The Falling Rocket”, 1875

ह्यामुळे अब्रुनुकसानीचा खटला सुरु झाला आणि तो व्हिसलर यांनी कोर्टात जिंकला, पण Without costs: that is, with each side saddled with its own costs.!

"But if James McNeill Whistler touted his victory, and John Ruskin acknowledged his defeat, few others saw it that way. In the eyes of the world, the victory the jury had given Whistler with its verdict it had simultaneously taken away with its derisory damages, which posited Ruskin’s loss, while real, to be insignificant. Whistler’s great wit on the witness stand might have proved him to be a master of the mot, but it convinced few if any that he was a master of the palette. Many critics and most of the public continued to be baffled by his work. Sales of his paintings, if anything, shrank after the trial. As time passed and Whistler underwent his highly reported insolvency, it became clear that he and not Ruskin had suffered the most from the verdict."

"Who then, Whistler or Ruskin, had the most lasting and impactful legacy? Quantifying and comparing achievements so diverse, so full, is an impossibility beyond the fair deliberation of any jury. Who won Whistler v. Ruskin? In the greater contest between the two men—the contest of two centuries rather than two days—neither did.

Or rather, both did."

 

 Punch magazine’s (Dec 7 1878) verdict on Whistler v. Ruskin- as a  loss for both sides, if you look at the "cost" serpents at the bottom

 

खटल्या संबंधित महत्वाच्या गोष्टी (खटल्याने त्याला जवळजवळ दिवाळखोर केले) आणि त्याचे झालेले अनेक दूरगामी परिणाम गोडसे सांगतच  नाहीत! त्यासाठी मर्फी यांचे पुस्तक वाचा. 

मराठी लेखकांच्या वैयक्तिक तीव्र आवडी निवडी काही वेळा त्यांच्या पुस्तकांमध्ये वाचकांना सत्यापासून दूर ठेवतात.