Two Stories About Marc Chagall, by E. P. Lande

Les Amoureux à la Fenêtre, by Marc Chagall (France, b. Belarus) 1954. Image courtesy of the author.

Les Amoureux à la Fenêtre    

“Bonjour, bonjour. Entrez,” Vava said as she greeted us at the door of their home, La Colline. “Mon mari sera ici en quelques minutes,” and she ushered us through the hall into the living room.

“What have you been doing?” Vava asked.

“We've decided to rent the doctor's house in Saint Jeannet,” Jane told her. It had been Vava who, on a walk in Sils Maria where we had vacationed with them that summer, had suggested that Jane and I rent a house on the ramparts of Saint Jeannet owned by Marc’s doctor, Maurice Charles-Alfred.

“Marvelous. I'm sure Maurice will be delighted, as well he ought to be,” Vava told us. “You will be excellent tenants. Now, what about the university? Have you made a decision what you will doing, Eric?”

I told Mme Chagall that I would be continuing my doctorate at McGill where I had an advisor.

“But that will involve spending much time there, no?” Vava asked Jane.

“Yes, so we've decided to sublet a furnished apartment not too far from McGill ....”

“And very close to where my parents live,” I added.

“You sound well settled. That is good. As I said to you when we were in Sils, this is your life, and you should take whatever decisions necessary to make it fulfilling. Ah, here are Irmgard and Alfred now,” and Vava got up and went to greet their closest friends who lived nearby, in Vence.

“Well, children, I'm glad you got here before us,” Irmgard said as she entered the room.

“If Marc is in his studio, I'll go fetch him,” Alfred said, and left the room. Not more than two minutes later he returned, with Chagall holding onto his left arm.

“Ah, bonjour, mes enfants,” he greeted Jane and me. “Vous aimez Chagall?” and he took Jane by the arm and led us to his studio.

Marc had already placed six pictures — gouaches — on easels, gouaches he had chosen from those he kept locked away from the prying eyes of his dealers — principally, from Aimé Maeght and Pierre Matisse.

The space was large, with a high ceiling and lots of windows. That day, the sun poured in, flooding the entire room with natural light. Other than the rustic-stone flooring, all the other surfaces were white, a soft white to blend as background for the pictures placed here and there, some being worked on, others lying-in-wait.

Chagall held back, as if waiting for someone — anyone — to say something — anything.

“Je pense ... celui ici,” Irmgard said, pointing to a circus scene of an acrobat on a horse — or was it a clown riding bareback? She then moved to another, and slowly with deliberation, carefully inspected each picture without making any more comments.

Included in the group of gouaches was a vase of flowers set on a table in front of a window — wild flowers, hollyhocks and forsythias. Another, a self-portrait throwing a large bouquet into the void against a hilltop village — possibly Saint-Paul-de-Vence — appealed to Jane.

“Tu l’aime?” Chagall asked, stepping to where Jane was, in front of the picture.

“Oui, maître; ça me plaît.” 

The artist took her by the hand and walked her over to the next pictures.

One was of Moses, with horns of light illuminating his surroundings, holding up the Ten Commandments above the Israelites … and another, a very colourful gouache of what looked like a composite of many different subjects, all appearing to be moving about.

“C'est la vie,” Chagall explained to me. I was standing in front of the picture. “Pour moi, le plus important thème quand je suis seul, ici,” and he led us to the last gouache.

It was of a rabbi, dressed in a tallith and wearing a yarmulka, who appeared to be dancing. The colours were mostly black and white but vibrant primary colours offset the figure of the rabbi. 

“Extraordinaire, n’est-ce pas?” Chagall said with arched eyebrows, looking intently at his painting as though examining its details. “C’est le choix des coleurs, tu sais. Pour moi, quleque chose nouveau.”
After about twenty minutes during which Irmgard and Alfred discussed the merits of each picture — Jane and I, looking and commenting a little to the artist himself — Chagall disappeared. When he returned, he was holding another gouache.

This gouache was of lovers, placed to the left of a window through which was seen a blue sky. In the middle, dominating the gouache, was a large head of a donkey, in profile, painted in pulsating emerald green with an intense blue eye, holding a large bouquet of multi-coloured flowers and mimosas. 

I approached the gouache and, my hands shaking, held it up and brought it to a window. It was truly breathtaking.

“Maître,” holding the picture, I turned to face the artist, “nous devons avoir ce tableau,” and I returned the gouache to a pleased Chagall.

“Voilà. C'est celui-là que je veux pour toi,” and smiling, Chagall handed the picture to Jane.

                                                            ***  
                                        
Later, when we were eating suplunch with Irmgard and Alfred in their home, Irmgard told us, “Chagall never paints flowers when they are alive,” referring to the picture of wild flowers, hollyhocks, and forsythia. “He lets them wither and then he paints them.”

“I liked the one of him throwing a bouquet into a void, because it was of Chagall himself,” Jane told Irmgard.

“That's sentimental rubbish,” Irmgard replied. End of discussion.

“What did you think of the one of the rabbi?” I asked. “Marc’s use of black and white was rather daring, I thought.”

“Not one of my favourite themes,” Irmgard told us, “... though I will agree with you, that Marc’s use of black and white, with stark primary colours offsetting the figure of the rabbi, rather radical, especially given his age. All in all, I think the gouache Marc chose for you is a true masterpiece. To me, it was obvious that Marc had decided to keep it for himself. You should consider yourselves very fortunate.”                                             
“I tried not to look around,” I told Jane when we were back in our villa at Château de Domaine St Martin, “but how could I not?”

“I almost felt that we were bystanders,” Jane said, “as though we had been invited to a viewing but weren't expected to express an opinion.”

“You know, Jane, it was really Vava who orchestrated our being allowed to choose a picture,” I told her.

“Irmgard made us feel that she was the one who arranged it all.” Jane wanted to believe that Irmgard was the one to whom we ought to be grateful, but I was right.

“In the end, we have Chagall himself to thank. He was the one who suggested that we select one from his collection,” I concluded as we got into bed.

“Actually, Eric, it was Marc who selected the picture he thought we should have.”
​
“Aren’t we lucky?” I said as I pulled the covers up to our chins. “He chose the best of those he had set aside for himself and Vava,” and I switched off the light.

**

Musée Message Biblique de Marc Chagall     
 
 
After I gave Jane a calculus lesson based on my doctoral thesis, we walked to our car, parked in a road on the outskirts of our village, Saint Jeannet, and drove down to Nice to meet our friends Irmgard, Alfred, and the Chagalls, at the Message Biblique. When we arrived, we saw a group of school children in front of Alfred's Bentley. 

We watched.

Within a minute or two, Alfred opened the door and helped Chagall, who was riding in the passenger seat. The children immediately started talking — loud, high-pitched voices — and began pushing pieces of paper in front of the artist.

“Reminds me of a movie star,” I commented, amused by the scene. 

Chagall, surrounded by the enthusiastic children, began shuffling his way to the entry of the museum, while Alfred helped Irmgard and Vava to get out of the back seat of the car. No one appeared to be disturbed by what was happening as everyone was smiling and talking, not being alarmed by Marc's reception.

“Bonjour, Jane; bonjour Eric,” Vava greeted us, as we all followed Chagall with his troupe of admirers.
The museum — of which the building itself comprised one part, the other parts being the extensive gardens of cypresses and olive trees, and a pool watched over by a Chagall mosaic — suggested repose. Sitting on a bluff overlooking the Mediterranean coast, the ochre stone and glass building gave the appearance of being enveloped by its setting. Inside, the over-size paintings, representing scenes from Genesis, Exodus, and The Song of Songs, were exhibited on individual parallel walls that one saw on entering the main gallery, as though a progressive series of events, taking the viewer visually through the Old Testament. The effect was breathtaking.

“I could stay here all day,” Jane said, as we tagged along behind the artist who was on Irmgard's arm, followed by Vava and Alfred. The school children had been corralled by their teacher and were boisterously discussing each of the paintings.

“This is like my walks with Marc along the idiotenwegg in Sils,” I told Jane, referring to our recent vacation with the artist in the Swiss Alps, as we stopped when Chagall stopped, straining to hear his explanations or comments.

“Don't worry about what my husband says,” Vava told us. “They're his paintings and he regards them as though they were his children,” she laughed.

We stopped before a painting of an angel, holding a man in its arms, floating up to a heaven, ablaze in colour.

“Ce n'est pas mal,” Chagall said, critically admiring his own work. 

He turned.

“Tu aimes Chagall?” he asked, rhetorically, then passed on to the next painting. 

When we reached the room containing the five paintings depicting The Song of Songs, the school children had placed themselves in front of each painting and were actively talking amongst themselves and pointing to the paintings.

“We saw one of the paintings in the Paris exhibition, remember?” Jane said to me.

“Ils sont l'avenir, ces petits,” Chagall said as he walked into the middle of one group. The children parted, as though Moses had entered the Red Sea.

“Venez, venez,” he told them, and they crowded around him.

Pointing to one of the paintings, he told them, “Tu sais, ma petite,” placing a hand on the shoulder of one of the girls, “c'est l'amour qui est la plus importante en la vie.” He looked at the painting, all reds and pinks and soaring figures, lost in his own imagination.

“Cheri,” Vava called to him, “viens.”

We continued walking, stopping in front of each painting, looking, then walking on. No one talked, each in his own reflective mood.

When we had looked at all the paintings in the main gallery and in the room with the Song of Songs, we entered the auditorium where concerts would be held. In place of walls of glass, there were stained glass windows — Chagall-stained glass windows — and on the stage, a grand piano totally decorated by the artist, as though it were a three-dimensional work of art.

“Ici, on peux recueillir ses pensées,” Marc said. “Pour moi, c'est la raison pour cette musée.” 

“Marc hopes that in the future the museum will exhibit paintings and other objects of a spiritual nature,” Vava told us. “He doesn't want it to be solely for his paintings of biblical themes.”

“La message biblique, c'est vraiment un thème spirituel, tu sais,” Chagall explained. “Mes peintures sont un partie d'une évolution mondiale.” He turned and, taking Jane by the hand, walked out.

“What did you think?” I asked when we were in our car, driving back to Saint Jeannet. We drove in silence through Nice and were on the route leading to our village.

“I found the experience very moving,” Jane said. “I understood. It's not a museum like so many others.” She sat, collecting her thoughts. “Standing in front of one of his paintings, well, it's a little like being enveloped in another world, one that protects you from the outside, one in which you feel safe.” Again, Jane fell silent. “And seeing the paintings with Marc made it special. I imagine that's what Münchinger meant when he said that Bach speaks to him when he's conducting,” referring to her conversation with the conductor of the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra at the home of Irmgard and Alfred the previous year.

We continued to drive, in silence.
  
E.P. Lande 
         
E.P. Lande was born in Montreal, but has lived most of his life in the south of France and Vermont, where he now lives with his partner, writing and caring for more than 100 animals, many of which are rescues. Previously, he taught at l’Université d’Ottawa where he served as Vice-Dean of his faculty, and he has owned and managed country inns and free-standing restaurants. Since submitting two years ago, his stories have been accepted by 75 publications in countries on five continents. This year, his story “Expecting” has been nominated for Best of the Net.