MY VISITS WITH DUFY, MATISSE, AND PICASSO

When Liv was Chairman of the National Endowment, I had the privilege of being with many well known artists. One day, a friend was answering our telephone, and, in an excited, hushed voice, he said, "It's .... Beverly Stills!" I tried to be more surprised than I was, for, you see, it might have been Isaac Stern, or Lenny Bernstein, or Gregory Peck. Yet one brush with greatness stands out in my mind. It was my visits with Dufy, Matisse, and Picasso -- in an unforgetable sequence.

I was born in Holland, by the sea. Egmont--among the qualities I found appealing was the light of that special part of the world: the light of Rembrandt and Vermeer.

I wanted to be an artist, I wanted to paint. As a child, I visited museums. I started to paint and learn of the great artists, past and present. In the 1940s, I was in Paris to study art. It was a time when the giants of painting were still very much alive. Matisse, Dufy, Braque, Rouault--I never thought I'd meet any of them.

Friends in Paris insisted I take a trip by train from Paris to the Cote d'Azur. I would see the sun rise over the Mediterranean and I could stop for a day or so in Perpignan, which they said was not only charming, but also the refuge of many young painters from Spain, exiled by Franco. So I took the journey, and on the train the thought came to me, "Why not write a letter to Matisse?" Why not indeed and tell him that I was going to his town of Vence and would love to see him. Matisse was my particular hero. I was yet to realize the greatness of Picasso, and so I poured out my heart to Matisse in a letter addressed to his villa Le Reve. I said I would ring the bell at four o'clock on a certain date, and for me it would be like standing on the steps of paradise, wondering if St. Peter would let me in. I would understand if no one would answer, and would leave after five minutes. I mailed the letter in Perpignan.

Sure enough, the village square in Perpignan was filled with young Spanish painters. Their paintings were bold and I thought good. They invited me for cofee and, while we talked, they said,

"Do you see that open window? A famous painter lives there. He doesn't like us. He likes capitalists and Americans. Why don't you try to see him?"

I entered the building and was hesitating a bit in the hall when in came a lovely young woman carrying a basket of fruit. She smiled. I said,

"I understand the maître Raoul Dufy lives here. I am a Dutch-American art student. Do you suppose I could meet him?"

She said, "Yes, you may come at four o'clock and have tea with the master and me."

Back in the square, my Spanish friends were waiting.

"We'll come with you", they said.

"Oh, no," I said, "I'll go alone."

At four o'clock, I rang the bell, and was greeted by the lovely, smiling lady. In the corner of a squarish, somewhat messy room, sat Dufy. On various tables were joyous, jewel-like watercolors in different states of progress. I could tell that Dufy, who was in is seventies, was uncomfortable. His hands were gnarled by arthritis, yet the paintings were so luminous, so musical, so filled with motion and beauty. I went from one to another, exclaiming over their beauty. Dufy seemed pleased. They would be exhibited in the Gallery Carre in Paris, he told me. He asked me to promise to go and see them. It was an easy promise to make, though I did not know that I would meet Picasso there.

But now -- back to that certain, most special date in Vence when at four o'clock I rang the bell of Villa Le Reve. It was a simple, small house surrounded by grass and a white fence. The door opened and a young girl came out. I recognized her immediately as the girl in the ink drawings of Matisse.

"Are you the one who wrote the letter?" she asked.

"Yes," I answered, "Are you the lady in the ink drawings?"

"Yes," she said, "please come in."

Matisse was sitting by a large table and I noticed that he'd gotten dressed up for me. He was wearing an immaculate white blouse, a black vest, and a small straw hat. This moved me deeply, and when he held out his hand, and said, "Madamoiselle, what can I do for you?", I suddenly bent down and kissed his hand--and I said,

"Oh, maître, I think you are the greatest living artiste-paintre, and I am so honored to meet you."

This moved him, and he said:

"Oh, no, Madamoiselle, I am not a great painter, but Picasso is a great painter." To the young woman, he said, "Show Madamoiselle the painting Picasso gave to me."

She brought a painting unframed from behind the sofa. I recognized it at once from my studies: a white skull on a table with a black and purple background. Then I noticed an unfinished canvas on an easel near a table with a bowl of enormous lemons. I said,

"How beautiful is this painting."

Matisse said, "Oh, no, Madamoiselle. You see it is the country, it is the pays -- I paint what the country gives to me."

Then he asked to see my sketchbook, which I had put down when I came in. I protested,

"No, maître, I'm not ready."

He said to me, "An artist must have the modesty to show his work." He paused, "Now, Madamoiselle, what did I just say to you?"

In my limited French, I replied, "You said an artist must have the humility to show his work."

Matisse banged the table, and said, "No, Madamoiselle, I did not say that. An artist must have the modesty to show his work. C'est different!"

Looking at his splendid canvases in the room, I said, "maître, it must be so satisfying to paint a masterpiece every time."

And he said to me, "Madamoiselle, have you climbed the mountains?"

"Yes," I told him, "I've spent some time in the Alps."

"Then you know, " he said, "the last few steps are the most difficult. It is a truth which it seems I am always discovering anew."

Well, when back in Paris, I went to the Gallery Carre to see Dufy's show, and I was off in a corner gazing at the work when suddenly there was a Buzz in the gallery. Buzz, Buzz, Buzz, Picasso, Picasso, Picasso!

The door opened, and there stood Picasso with Jaime Sabartes, whom I recognized from The Man with the Ruffed Collar. Picasso looked around the room. Suddenly, he came directly to me.

"Ah, Madamoiselle," he said, "How nice to see you again."

"maître," I said, "I know who you are, but you don't know who I am."

"Don't tell me that," he said, "Every time I go to the museums, I see your face in every Memling madonna!"

I found it remarkable that he recognized that I had the features of my home country, the Lowlands.

Not long after this, a friend with whom I had gone to school as a child in Holland, and who was married to a French diplomat in Poland, invited me for a visit. The political situation was complicated. Picasso had been invited on an official trip to Poland and he was to be received at the French Embassy, but instead he was invited to the house of my friend's husband. That night we were waiting and waiting and waiting. There was a work of Bonnard on the wall. I was asked for an opinion. I was feeling in those day that I knew everything about art, and I said confidently,

"Oh, I like Bonnard, but he always paints the same thing and is a little bourgeois."

And a few moments later, Picasso entered the room, and the room fell silent. He came straight over to me.

"Now, Madamoiselle, " he said, "Don't tell me we've never met before. We met at the Gallery Carre three months ago."

Then someone said, "Oh, Mr. Picasso, we were talking before you arrived about that painting by Bonnard. What do you think of it?" Picasso turned and looked at the painting.

"Oh, Bonnard does well," he said, "but he is too bourgeois, and he never changed!"

You can imagine how people listened to me after that -- I became a bit of a heroine.

And perhaps someone will say one day,

"Oh, Catharina Biddle, she is somewhat bourgeois, but she is improving!"