Martine Lacas explores the hidden depths of painting in 'Au fond de la peinture'

Martine Lacas's book 'Au fond de la peinture', published by Éditions du Seuil, delves into the obsessive practice of scrutinizing the backgrounds of paintings, a habit often indulged by art lovers despite museum security. Lacas portrays this viewer as one who seeks a privileged, intimate relationship with art, discovering a 'shelter' away from the foreground's publicity. She guides the reader not merely to spot details but to interpret them dialectically, sometimes subverting the main subject. Drawing on Georges Didi-Huberman, she aims to reveal 'an image in crisis, an image criticizing the image'. The book is structured into chapters with pertinent examples, though the reproductions are criticized for being too small to allow easy comparison between full paintings and close-ups. Lacas argues that backgrounds make visible 'the passage of time not in its succession but in its expanse'. They can contain metaphors of voyeurism (as in depictions of Susanna or Diana), disrupt perspective to highlight artifice (Piero della Francesca), or express 'the depth of thought' as in Watteau's lady gazing at a distant couple. A modernist eye will note the ornament of a hairstyle that in Degas is merely a reserved patch of canvas. Catherine Millet reviewed the book.