Mark
Antliff starts his book with a rather in depth discussion of the current state
of scholarly study of the generic fascism phenomenon. In a welcome
recupitulation of the main actors and orientations in this subject he posit as
his goal the incorporation of the Sternhell/Griffin “philosophical” take and a
more pragmatic and economical take exemplified exemplified by Jacques Julliard
of whom I have little to no experience.
Wheras this
introduction in itself constitutes a valuable summary, it seems the focus will
remain throughout most of the book on the idealistic aspects of the doctrines,
which obviously for a volume treating of the links between art, modernism and
the different avatars of fascism, seems unavoidable.
...
The meat of
the book is essentially structured in four chapters, each covering a decade of
the french fascist thought and it’s interconnection with the arts and design
movements of that time, but also with the previous manifestations of the
antiparlementarian politics, and in doing so tracing a complex set of
genealogies, some connected and some independant.
George Sorel (1847-1922)
The first
of those four periods concern Sorel himself and describe his evolution,
seemingly crucial in it’s constant radicality and his opportunistic shifts in
allegiance, prefiguring what seems to me the quintessentially composite nature
of later fascisms. Assessing the real importance of Sorel’s thought in european
fascisms must be a tricky exercise as must be the Strasserite legacy in germany
or the corporatist in Italy but in the particular case of France Mark Antliff
makes it clear that the movement between anarcho-syndicalism and royalist/neo-christian
milieu, with their shared reaction against the bourgeois dreyfusards, constitute the turning point where the
pre-existent reactionary ideology become infused with the revolutionnary
leftist credentials.
Georges Seurat, The Eiffel Tower, 1889
The artists
then associated with the movement range between late symbolists and
neo-catholics. Wheras it is easy to see how symbolists shared Sorel’s
fascination for the myth, the movement was also, as typically fin de sciecle, rather
diverse in it’s political –and racial- expressions. When Sorel shifted towards
the Action Francaise, he was introduced to the more refined mystique of the
likes of Charles Peguy or Georges Seurat or Maurice Barres. Other than the
stark nationalism and the christian mythology this is were, under the influence
of Arts and Crafts maybe, we can trace the roots of corporatism.
...
We move on
to examine George Valois and his french fascism, whose approach, of particular
interest, makes a move towards a defining feature of the era, modernist “makroprojekt”
and the tendancy towards fully planned, all encompassing, urbanism. In the tradition
of utopias and phalansteres, we learn that the Citée Francaise has become a corner stone of the fully re-imagined
society, reflects the classless and corporatist ideals of a french fascism
borrowing as much from the Cercle Proudhon (the missing link between Sorel and
later fascists) and the blossoming movement in Italy.
This
chapter also examines the interesting relationship between Le Corbusier and the
different fascist groups – with whom we can suppose he shared a certain sense
of ambitious aesthetic, without agreeing of their some time populist synthesis.
Reinforced concrete, as the defining feature of modernist architecture, was
promoted alongside a rationalisation of space and construction, which in the
industrial arena, under the guise of tailorism, was to pose the first
contradiction with the corporatist and craft-oriented ideals of the previous
generation.
...
The study
of the third “generation” is built
around the character of Philippe Lamour whom crystallizes the cult of youth,
not in the common form of the volkish fascination for the body and for sports,
but in the glorification of the machinism. This one period is of particular
interest on the level antisemitism: Also present from the root in Sorel and co. it seemed less central in the modernist strain like the one of Lamour, who
welcomed Robert Aron and other right wing jewish thinkers. This same generation
of fascist who seemed somewhat more focused on a politic of novelty, somewhat
cosmopolite, would also be the ones contemporary to a fully blown third reich
with whom french fascism always had ambiguous and often hostile relationships
at the time.
Germaine Krull, Eiffel Tower, 1928
The
defining feature Antliff identifies is an interesting manifestation of the cult
of youth: generational warfare. In their concern with overcoming the class
conflict that plays in favour of their communist rivals, the focus of the
mythic opposition is transfered onto the opposition between the middle-aged “bourgeois”
who never experienced the first world war, and a coalition between a dynamic
youth and the veterans, spiritually rejuvanated by the experience of the war. The
art popular in that third wave, in continuation with the modernist fascination
of Valois, extended on other, more daring forms, in the persons of Germain
Krull, Eisenstein, Man Ray or even Bunuel – Partly in reflection of it’s
fascination for innovation and youth, under the aegis of Lamour fascism will
seemingly find in this period it’s more cultural expression.
...
The fourth
and final wave of fascists Mark Antliff examines is at the dawn of the second
world war: the particular case of the war time fascism and of the collaborationist
agenda are left for an other book. Thierry Maulnier look back at the roots of french
fascism, before it’s more modernist manifestation, in the form of the Cercle
Proudhon: feeling cornered by the socialist Front Populaire, those late fascists
draw a parallel with the situation of Sorel and the early Sorelian when
confronted with the rising power of parliamentary socialism.
Aristide Maillol, Les Trois Nymphes, 1930-8
Revolving
largely around their opposition to the art forms profusely promoted by the Left
in power,
their cultural policy was one of classicism, centered around
Racine, whose martial epics fitted their ideology as much as his formalism
pleased their conservative taste, and incorporating sculptors like Despiau, Maillol
and architect Perret. The continuous reference to Ancients in terms of
litterature, art or architecture echoed their doctrine of Classical Violence,
drawing on a an existing association between fascism and the Roman and Greek
civilizations, idealised into self-less citizen soldiers.
...
The
dissection of fascism into different movements, different tendencies that are
studied independantly, has been a constant in the study of fascism of Ernst
Nolte, Paxton or Sternhell. Mark Antliff emphasizes the chronological evolution
between those diverse manifestations. Placing the “classical violence” of
Maulnier in the late 30’ after the resolutely modernist urbanism central to
Valois in the 20’ helps making sense of the contradictory elements in the
general idea of fascism. It is tempting to project onto the fascist phenomenon
the usage of post-modernism, as this would resolve the paradoxes and pose it as
an accessible reaction against modernity, but fascism, on it’s own scale, has
an history of it’s own and ignoring this reality comes down to falling for it’s
own mythical presentation, as outside of human time.
The
relationship of fascism to time and it’s fictionalised, mythological quality is
obvious, as exemplified in Antliff’s or Griffin’s suscription to the the idea
of palingenesis, but here we see the loop being looped within fascism itself: the
fourth part of Maulnier and his classical violence, goes back to the root,
avoiding in part the maybe more liberal heritage of Lamour and Valois, to
rejuvenate fascism itself.
Fascism
like most mythical ideologies is essentially a negation of time, replaced for
the sake of a narrative by the controlled and sublimed dimension of myth. As
evidenced in this book, what is most striking is that even towards it’s own contemporaneous
history fascism seems to be adopting the same policy.
.jpg)
