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Balthazar Klossowski de Rola (February 29, 1908 in
Paris – February 18, 2001) was an esteemed
Poland|Polish/France|French modern artist whose
work was ultimately anti-modern.  

==Life and Work==

In his formative years his art was sponsored by
Rainer Maria Rilke, Pierre Bonnard and Henri
Matisse. His father, Erich Klossowski, a noted art
historian (he wrote a monograph on Honoré
Daumier|Daumier), and his mother Elisabeth
Dorothea Spiro (known as Baladine Klossowska) were
part of cultural elite in Paris. Balthus' older
brother, Pierre Klossowski, was a philosopher
influenced by Marquis de Sade writings. Jean
Cocteau, who was friend of the Klossowskis, found
some inspiration for his novel Les Enfants
Terribles (1929) on his visits to the family.  

As he matured in the early 1930s, Balthus'
paintings often depicted pubescent young girls in
erotic and voyeuristic poses. One of his most
notorious works was The Guitar Lesson (1934),
which caused controversy in Paris due to its
depiction of a sexually explicit lesbian scene
featuring a young girl and her teacher. 

In 1937 he married Antoinette de Watteville, whom
he met as early as in 1924. She was the model for
a series of portraits. 

Early on his work was admired by writers and
fellow painters, especially by André Breton and
Pablo Picasso. His circle of friends in Paris
included the novelist Pierre-Jean Jouve, the
photographers Josef Breitenbach and Man Ray,
Antonin Artaud, and the painters André Derain,
Joan Miro and Alberto Giacometti (one of the most
faithful of his friends). In 1948, another friend,
Albert Camus, asked him to design the sets and
costumes for his play L'Etat de Siège (The State
of Siege, directed by Jean-Louis Barrault).

Balthus spent most of his life in France, and as
international fame grew he cultivated himself and
his past as an enigma. In 1953 he moved into the
Chateau de Chassy, were he finished his
masterpieces 'The Room' (1952, influenced by
Pierre Klossowski's novels) and 'The Street'
(1954). In 1964 he moved to Rome, were he presided
over Villa de Medici director of the French
Academy in Rome, and made friends with the
filmmaker Frederico Fellini and the painter Renato
Guttuso. 

In 1977 he moved to Rossinière, Switzerland. That
he had a second, Japanese wife Setsuko thirty-five
years his junior simply added to the air of
mystery around him (he met her in Japan, during a
diplomatic mission initiated by André Malraux).
The photographers and friends Henri
Cartier-Bresson and Martine Franck
(Cartier-Bresson's wife), both portrayed the
painter and his wife and their daughter Harumi in
his Grand Chalet in Rossinière in 1999. 

Balthus was the only living artist who had his
artwork in the Louvre's collection (it came from
Pablo Picasso|Picasso's private collection when it
was donated to that museum). 

Prime Ministers and rock stars alike attended the
funeral of Balthus. Bono, lead-singer of U2
(band)|U2, sang for the hundreds of mourners at
the funeral. Biographers rushed into print shortly
after his death, and their work has since been
severely and widely criticised as being
unreasonable and confused.

==Influence and legacy==

The work of Balthus shows numerous influences,
including Tommaso Masaccio|Masaccio, Piero della
Francesca, Nicolas Poussin|Poussin, Jean-Étienne
Liotard, Joseph Reinhardt, Théodore
Géricault|Géricault, Jean Auguste Dominique
Ingres|Ingres, Francisco Goya|Goya, Gustave
Courbet|Courbet, Felix Vallotton and Paul Cezanne.
His favourite composer was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
(he designed the stage for one of the composer's
operas, Così fan tutte, in Aix-en-Provence,
together with Adolphe Mouron Cassandre). 

His work influenced several artists, among them
the filmmaker Jacques Rivette of the French New
Wave. His film Hurlevent (1985) was inspired by
Balthus' drawings made at the beginning of the
1930s. As his says in an
http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/03/29/hurle
vent.html interview with Valerie Hazette:  
"Seeing as he's a bit of an eccentric and all
that, I am very fond of Balthus (...) I was struck
by the fact that Balthus enormously simplified the
costumes and stripped away the imagery trappings
(...)".

Another artist influenced by Balthus is the
photographer Duane Michals.

The novel Hannibal (movie)|Hannibal by Thomas
Harris refers to the fictional Hannibal Lecter as
a cousin of Balthus.

==References==

* Stanislas Klossowski de Rola, Balthus (Harry N
Abrams, 1996)
* Claude Roy, Balthus. (1996)
* Gero Von Boehm, The Painter's House. With
photographs by Kishin Shinoyama (2000)
* Jean Clair and Virginie Monnier, Balthus:
Catalogue Raisonne of the Complete Works.
(Editions Gallimard, 2000)
* Jean Clair, Balthus (Thames and Hudson, 2001)
* Balthus. Correspondance amoureuse avec
Antoinette de Watteville 1928-1937 (Buchet
Chastel, 2001)
* Gilles Neret, Balthus. The King of Cats.
(Taschen, 2003)

==External links==
*http://www.fondation-balthus.com/ La Fondation
Balthus
*http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/w/weber-balthu
s.html/ An excerpt from the biography by Nicholas
Fox Weber
*http://www.nytimes.com/books/99/11/28/reviews/991
128.28boxert.html A review by Sarah Boxer of Fox
Weber's Biography, New York Times, November 28,
1999
*http://www.newcriterion.com/archive/12/oct93/perl
.htm/ Balthus presents Balthus, an article by Jed
Perl
*http://www.yalereviewofbooks.com/archive/spring03
/review14.shtml.htm  Jacqueline Ko on Balthus'
memoirs Vanished Splendours, as told to Alain
Vircondelet, Yale Review of Books, Winter 2005
*
http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/03/29/hurle
vent.html Valerie Hazette. Hurlevent: Jacques
Rivette's Adaptation of Wuthering Heights, Senses
of Cinema, October 2003)