'Radically Uncolorful Painting': Walter Benjamin and the Problem of Cubism

摘要

In August 1917, Gershom Scholem, at that time a student of mathematics and philosophy, visited the Sturm gallery in Berlin-then the central point for the promotion of international modern art in Germany. There he saw an exhibition of works by Marc Chagall, Alexei von Jawlensky, Wassily Kandinsky, Fernand Leger, August Macke, Franz Marc, and Pablo Picasso, among others, which made an enormous impression on him-Picasso, especially. He wrote a letter about what he had seen to his friend Walter Benjamin, then living in Switzerland. In his reply, Benjamin disagreed sharply with most of what Scholem had said.