Why the Sculptor Michel Basbous Turned Away from the Experimental School

In his small studio in Achrafieh I sat with him — and there is nothing like the studio's atmosphere to loosen an artist's tongue and lay his thought bare. I listened to his story with a longing that had stayed with me for nearly a year, ever since the young sculptor Michel Basbous won the Camille Chamoun Prize at last autumn's exhibition.

Basbous came to know art from the moment he opened his eyes to the light. He found himself cast into an artistic atmosphere, surrounded by statues and drawings, pens and papers... for his father, a priest, was an artist by nature, though his circumstances had not afforded his art refinement and polish.

In the church, then, little Michel grew up, serving Mass for his father, his delicate blue eyes gazing at the burning, drowsy candles, their tears rolling down their slender white forms into shape after shape that never ceased to astonish and delight the boy; he would remove them carefully and set about making ones like them, keeping the collection for himself... And in his village, Rachana in the Batroun, he would meet the woodcutters returning at sunset and pick out from their loads tree stumps with pleasing geometric shapes; in his room he would copy them or draw them, or simply display them among his collection.

Michel Basbous received his elementary schooling, and part of his secondary schooling, in Wadi Chahrour, where his father was pastor of the church. At fifteen he left school for good, feeling a heavy material responsibility toward his younger brothers and sisters, and plunged into the struggle of life — but his eye remained on the arts, and his heart with them, until he was able to enter the Lebanese Academy in 1945. There he stayed four years, training his fingers and feeding his senses as far as the institute's limited means allowed, and he passed from the primitive natural state to a guided impressionism. His gifts drew the attention of those in charge, and he showed such excellence in the examination that he won a scholarship to study the arts, specializing in sculpture, in France.

In his second year at the "Higher School of Fine Arts" in Paris, Basbous became conscious of his artistic personality, and felt that he had not been true to himself as an artist, and that his works were not of a kind in which he could rest easy. So he left the art institute and turned his face toward the museums, haunting them night and day, searching, studying, exploring... In the Louvre he discovered his artistic personality in the relics of prehistory... He felt that these

forms answered to his nature, came close to his primitive state, and expressed his inner self more than the classical did... It was then that his attempts began, for the first time, to bear his own stamp, and he left Paris for Florence, the home ground of authentic art, then Rome, then Milan, then Venice, pursuing his studies of the giants of sculpture and painting, the likes of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci and others...

He returned to Beirut in 1953, having settled upon sculpture of the "abstract" kind, and he still considers himself in the stage of attempts, not yet arrived at the final, clear road.

The "abstract" school, whether in sculpture or in painting, stands in the vanguard of the schools of modern art. Here the "subject" in itself has no importance; the importance belongs to "lines, forms, and colors" — in whose harmony lies the basis of deep artistic expression.

Basbous's conviction in this school grew deeper after his recent visit to China and his acquaintance with its venerable artistic heritage, above all the ancient, where he was reassured of the sincerity of his artistic work toward himself and toward art... For he discovered that all the "modern" artistic movements now current in the Western world derive from ancient Chinese art... In China Basbous came to know "aesthetic abstraction," in sculpture and in painting alike, for the Chinese painter or sculptor, when he fashioned the god "Buddha" or the statues of China's leaders, fashioned them as aesthetic forms and spontaneous, harmonious lines, without thinking of them as persons...

It remains for the young artist, to complete his artistic mission, to draw as near as he can to the realization of his artistic self, by way of the things that stir in his imagination and between his fingers — he longs to shed outside influences and borrowing, and to arrive at creation, in keeping with his own personality...

* * *

I took my leave of the sculptor Michel Basbous full of admiration for his courage in undertaking resolute work and breaking free of classicism — he is convinced and believes in himself, and therein lie his strength and his assured success...

It is true that before his statues we feel bewildered... but a longing takes hold of us to understand this obscure kind of art and to grasp its secrets... And as we study the curving of his lines, we sense that behind them lies something hidden, expressing a deep and sincere

feeling...

... We may not be among the connoisseurs of the abstract school, but we can no longer disown it, and we cannot but acknowledge that it suits modern building better than the classical does — yet this school, like every work of art, does not bear cheapening; it must remain at a lofty level...

And I came to believe, at last, that among our young artists there are good seeds which, given the right soil, would yield the finest fruit. I felt for these energetic artists, living their artistic lives in hardship and privation, spurred on by a green hope and an authentic taste... I feared for them, should the paths of art not be smoothed before them, that they would suffocate in this somber atmosphere in which art finds no outlet... And I became certain, at last, that it is by the likes of Michel Basbous that Lebanon lifts its head.