Balthus’ THE STREET: Art or Sexualized Teen?

The New York Times declared The Street: Curated by Peter Doig a Critic’s Pick. Doig’s exhibition, located at the Gagosian on 980 Madison Avenue until December 18, was inspired by Balthus’ The Street (1933).

In the New York Times piece, “Peter Doig Finds the Soul and Menace of a Modernist Gem” (Nov. 28, 2024), Arthur Lubow wrote that Doig was captivated The Street, which Doig found “endlessly beguiling”, because the painting made “you feel like you’re witnessing something unfold before your eyes.”

As it relates to The Street, Lubow related that: “It is owned but infrequently displayed by the Museum of Modern Art,” which is related to what one is witnessing “before your eyes.” Per Nicholas Fox Weber’s Balthus: A Biography (Alfred A. Knopf, 1999), The Street, in part, depicts a: “[...] man at the edge of ecstasy reaching over the hem of the girl's hiked-up skirt toward the young girl's genitals."

Balthus’ The Street (Modified)

Weber wrote that James Thrall Soby, a curator and the first American “bold enough” to collect Balthus’ work, purchased The Street in Paris in 1936. Weber related that Soby: "[...] was keyed up by - in his own words - the young girl being seized by the crotch [...]" However, three years after the purchase, due to the salacious nature of the piece, The Street hadn’t sold. Weber wrote:

Soby, whose taste in art was "bold enough to confront the formidable", purchased The Street in Paris in 1936 and promptly placed it on a wall in his Farmington, Connecticut home. Soby admitted that The Street hadn't sold in three years due to "[...] the depiction of the young man at the edge of ecstasy reaching over the hem of the girl's hiked-up skirt toward the young girl's genitals."

And after Soby noticed that his five-year-old step-son and his playmates would: "[...] titter wildly over The Street," Soby placed the painting in a fireproof vault.

Balthus’ The Street (Original)

Weber wrote that in 1955, Reverend James L. McLane: "[...] bawled out [Soby] for three hours for being so cowardly as to hide a great painting away in a darkened vault". (Interestingly, per Weber, the Reverend hung some of Balthus' other "most provocative" paintings of nymphets in his church in Los Angeles.) Consequently, Soby exhibited and bequeathed the painting to the MoMA - after it had been modified by Balthus.

"[...] the Mongolian boy's hand had been moved very slightly to a less committed position on the young girl's body, though his eyes were tense with the same fever."

"The James Thrall Soby Bequest" March 22, 1979–May 9, 1979

Thus, The Street in The Street: Curated by Peter Doig is not the original The Street, but it’s only slightly less salacious. Thus, like Lubow related, the piece is : “[...] infrequently displayed by the Museum of Modern Art.” But, relatedly, it was exhibited in the 1979 exhibition "The James Thrall Soby Bequest".