Critiques et galeries d'art, 1942-1946. Entre esprit de résistance et petits arrangements
Résumé
Over the past twenty years, research has shed light on the methods that ensured the prosperity of the art market during the Second World War: significant sums of capital flowed around, with the aim of making easy investments; a black market existed, stirred up by the fear of monetary devolution; and there was a glut of stolen works and reduced prices as a result of desperate Jewish collectors. Furthermore, Laurence Bertrand Dorléac's pioneering research has shown the “meager courage and cowardliness” that characterized the wait-and-see attitude in the art world during the Occupation. Taking as examples the careers of art critic Gaston Diehl and art dealer Paul Martin, this article explores the way in which certain actors of the period, neither members of the resistance nor collaborators, slipped into a complex “in-between,” created by the sudden incapacitation of their Jewish colleagues. "