Why a French Artist Censored the Title of his Painting?

A man is plucking a fig from a branch of a fig tree. 

A mother tantalizing offers fig to her infant.

Two men play a game of boules, a French version of outdoor bowling.

A man is engrossed in a book.

Another man is painting near the seashore.

The background of the image features a group of people dancing near a tractor.

 A couple is dancing and romantically involved in the center of the image.

And the rooster at the lower right of the image, which has been long a symbol of France, depicts a kind of announcement - the crowing of new dawn arising.

This is Paul Signac's world - a pastoral image of a utopian community.

Paul Signac created the painting In the Time of Harmony: The Golden Age Has Not Passed, It Is Still to Come in 1896. But this was not the initial title of the painting.

'In the Time of Anarchy' was censored and renamed 'In the Time of Harmony.'

What could have prompted Signac to change the name of the painting?

Signac's artistic career

Paul Signac was a French artist and one of the prominent artists of Neo-Impressionism. Along with another French post-impressionist Georges Seurat, he co-developed a technique of Pointillism: distinct dots of color applied in patterns to form an image.

The painting In the Time of Harmony was created using the Pointillism technique.

Throughout his artistic life, Signac was quite open about his political views. He subtly incorporated his political ideology, which was anarchism, in his artworks. His paintings were a blend of Neo-Impressionism, science, and anarchism.

His work, as said by Signac himself, "includes a general harmony and a moral harmony" due to its "constant observation of contrast, its rational composition, and its aesthetic language of colors."

In order to understand why Signac renamed the painting, let's briefly delve into the definition of anarchism and the political dynamics in 1870s France.

What is anarchism?

Etymologically, anarchism is primarily derived from the negation of the Greek term arché which means first principle foundation or ruling power. Thus ruled by no one. Anarchism is a political ideology that believes in the abolition of the state and rejects coercive forms of hierarchy.

The anarchist precursors can be traced back to Chinese Taoism and Lao Tzu, who embraced anti-authoritarian movements. The only irony is that China is now not even a democratic country, forget anarchism!

For a long time, the anarchists have been associated with violence and mayhem on the streets. In reality, they condemn extreme violence but don't believe in the non-resistance of Tolstoy. Their motto is - a self-managed society without the absence of authority or ministry.

Signac created the painting In the Time of Harmony in 1896 just two years after the Trial of the Thirty and a couple of years after the 1871 Paris Commune.

The political dynamics of France in the 1870s

Paris Commune was a revolutionary movement initiated by the anarchists in March 1871 and lasted for two months. The anarchists tried to establish policies inclined towards a progressive and anti-religious system of social democracy and self-policing. But the Commune was eventually defeated by the national French Army and more than 6000 Communards were killed or executed.

Trial of the Thirty began in October 1894 when 30 French and foreign alleged anarchists were charged with "criminal association" and detained by Police.

Signac used art to support anarchism

Signac made sure to advocate anarchism through his art. Even when Signac's comrade, Félix_Fénéon, an anarchist, was detained in the Trial of the Thirty - felt that bomb-throwing might advance the cause of anarchism - Signac saw the painting as a kind of alternative propaganda tool.

Le Démolisseur (The Demolisher) created by Signac in 1899 exhibited a worker demolishing the capitalist state.

This piece of art exemplifies Signac's rhetorical turn of phrase that was said in an article for La Révolte about giving a "solid blow of the pick to the old social edifice."

Anarchy was censored and renamed Harmony

The political heat in France during that era and the misinterpretation of anarchist beliefs by the government forced Signac to censor 'anarchy' from the art piece and replace it with 'harmony'.

In fact, In the Time of Harmony: The Golden Age Has Not Passed, It Is Still to Come exuded hopes for a utopian society where anarchism would thrive surrounded by aesthetic harmony. Signac echoed "anarchy with harmony."

Signac wrote in one of the journals in 1902 and believed - Justice in sociology. Harmony in art

References-

1. The Politics of Pointillism - Paul Signac's In the Time of Harmony

2. Chapter 10 – Paul Signac

3. A Politicized Pastoral: Signac and the Cultural Geography of Mediterranean France

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