Michael Savage
posted 9 August 2006

The title of this exhibition is false. It isn't really about his models at all; it's just a pretext for a fairly traditional chronological retrospective. There have been a few Modigliani exhibitions recently, and this well-organised display shows why. Modiglianis look best alongside other Modiglianis.

It's easy to understand Modigliani's popularity. His classical nudes and portraits are easily understood and immediately appealing. He lived a Bohemian life in Paris alongside Picasso and the other great moderns, drinking and womanising to the end. And he was an abundantly talented artist. But he is really hard to display, because despite his obvious borrowing from his contemporaries, his art stands alone, hard to fit into a conventional art historical narrative.

I don't care for the early work, when he first switched from sculpture to painting. But when you get to the second room you are confronted with a long wall festooned with gorgeous nudes. The paint has a physical force, the texture playing an increasingly independent role. It's not Van Gogh's lusciously thick impasto; the effect is more subtle and muted. In some of the earlier nudes the paint is visibly applied in the same direction, irrespective of the contours that it describes. It is a quirky reminder of the physicality of the paint itself, asserting itself against the image.

In later nudes the impasto is more anecdotal, working as an independent decorative element. Modigliani is known for his serene classicism, but the detail and decoration is particularly striking. The austere white of the Royal Academy seems wrong; they need the rich materials of contemporary art deco masters like Ruhlmann. And if Tracy Emin's bed deserves a place anywhere, it is here. Modigliani's nudes cry out for the detritus of the boudoir.

The first thing that strikes you about these nudes is not the technique, but the sex. These are not traditional reclining nudes, modestly posed and unaware of the viewer. The faces are sometimes masks, their eyes are sometimes closed, but these women always demand your attention, their contorted bodies contrived to capture your gaze. It was controversial enough in its day, the frank depiction of pubic hair scandalising the conservative authorities. But this is an elegant and refined sexuality, different from the raw sex of Schiele's watercolours, or Picasso's erotic (to be honest, pornographic) sketches.

In the next room we see the move to the south of France, where Cezanne's influence is pervasive and insistent. Some of the models even look like Cezanne's son ('The Boy (Youth in Blue Jacket)', 1919). But the influence is never fully synthesised. Modigliani died young, and I yearn for the late works that never came. The individual portraits are often successes in their own terms, and the sense of creative experimentation is itself rewarding, struggling to forge a new style that is never quite resolved.

The final room shows Modigliani's last works, which are among his most celebrated. A few are masterpieces, but sometimes he over-reaches himself. The star of the show is a terribly expensive portrait of his partner, Jeanne Hébuterne. Jeanne is depicted in rich, warm colour that contrasts with elegantly economical line, all set off against cooler colours of a fashionably distorted room. It is a large painting and a great grand statement of his art, but I found it rather disappointing. She looks as if she's about to fall out of the picture. He adds rich colour and line to Cezanne's mastery of form, but in his most ambitious paintings he sometimes seems to have lost control. Modigliani works better on a smaller scale. Next to the blustering masterpiece is a less ambitious little study of Jeanne's bust, which is more to my taste.

These portraits sometimes bring to mind a fashion shoot. It is easy to see why many critics have disparaged Modigliani, seeing him as a bit of a trickster, refined and elegant but not particularly talented. 'Decorative' is generally a term of gentle derision in the context of 'high' art, but it ought not to be so. This is high decorative art, and to hell with the snobs that don't like it. They are not consistently masterpieces, but the melding of Cezannesque forms, classical lines and exuberantly luxurious colour can be splendidly effective.

This exhibition works, although it struggles irrelevantly to fit its putative theme of Modigliani's models. The RA puts on some of the more challenging and interesting exhibitions and its catalogues are often of lasting value, adding real intellectual and moral substance to the spectacle. But this catalogue is a disappointment. The essays are unilluminating and sometimes irritating, and the reproductions are disappointing. It is inevitably very busy, and the final room, with the greatest late portraits, is far too cramped. But it is worth persevering. Not only do you get to see some great paintings, you get to see them in the best context.

Until 15 October 2006