Kenneth Clark: the authorised view
Chairman of Sotheby’s UK
By Gareth Harris. News, Issue 236, June 2012
Published online: 18 June 2012
The chairman of Sotheby’s UK
has signed a publishing deal to write the authorised biography of the late
Kenneth Clark, the former director of the National Gallery in London
“The Clark biography is a
magnificent project and I believe that his life will tell the story of the arts
in the 20th century,” says James Stourton, who is leaving his post at Sotheby’s
later this year to embark on the project. Approved by the Clark
estate, the book is due to be published in 2016 by Harper Collins.
The book will be the first official biography on Clark, who
died in 1983. The UK
publisher John Murray commissioned the Oxford University
After the Second World War, he helped launch what became
the Arts Council, but his 1969 documentary “Civilisation: a Personal View by
Kenneth Clark” is considered his most far-reaching achievement. Criticised by
some at the time for elitism, the 13-part series, which traced the history of
Western art and philosophy, is now credited with bringing art to the masses.
From 1939 until 1945 Clark
was the chairman of the War Artists’ Advisory Committee. Stourton believes that
this period was a turning point for Clark . “Of
enormous interest is the change that took place in Clark
during the war and the early 1950s—the transition from the rich young man on
the side of the [National Gallery] trustees to the emerging communicator who
had such a profound effect on arts policy in the post-war era. The war changed Clark . He began to think about how the arts might be
marshalled for the common good.”
Stourton seems prepared to tackle the more delicate aspects
of Clark ’s professional and personal roles,
including the often cited claim that he was anti-contemporary art. Clark ’s collection included works by artists who
reportedly became close friends such as Victor Pasmore, Graham Sutherland,
Sidney Nolan and especially Henry Moore.
“His acceptance of post-war contemporary art was
qualified,” says the Sotheby’s chief. “The Blot and the Diagram [a lecture
given by Clark in 1962] is a good place to
start an enquiry into what he felt about abstraction.”
Two former directors of the National Gallery, Neil
MacGregor of the British Museum and Charles Saumarez Smith of the Royal Academy
of Arts, hinted at a conflict of interests between Clark’s private and public
buying in a BBC radio programme in 2003.
“I don’t believe there was really a conflict between what
he bought for the National Gallery and for himself,” Stourton says. “The
purchases were very different. I think the main charge against him at the
gallery was a failure to breach the divide between the trustees and the staff.
He failed to gain the latter’s trust and this will certainly have to be
examined carefully.”
Clark famously fell out with one trustee, the English art
dealer Joseph Duveen, who, according to a 2004 biography by Meryle Secrest
(Duveen: a Life in Art), enraged Clark by
attempting to sabotage the museum’s campaign to obtain works by the
15th-century Sienese artist Sassetta.
The mention of Clark ’s
name also ignites a strong reaction in scholars—something Stourton will have to
tackle. The art critic Brian Sewell, who was taught by Clark ,
says that his “failure as a connoisseur” is evident in his misattribution of
four panels to Giorgione, acquired by the National Gallery in the 1930s (the
pieces have since been attributed to Andrea Previtali).
“He was possibly the worst director the National Gallery
ever had. There is also a question mark over how he dispensed patronage to artists
during the war,” Sewell says.
Stourton is relishing the task ahead, saying that the
majority of the source material, more than 12,000 documents, is at the Tate.
“In addition I have identified more than 30 other archives with substantial
material to be visited,” he says.
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