Chaim Soutine’s life was a fairy tale but the happy ending came in the middle. Before it lay a tragic beginning in a Lithuanian shtetl, where Soutine was beaten for daring to draw. Afterwards, in a viciously appropriate conclusion, this painter of carcases and bloody entrails died of a ruptured stomach ulcer, untreated because he was on the run in Nazi-occupied France.
His single stroke of good fortune took place one afternoon in Paris in 1922. Albert Barnes, a wealthy American collector, had glimpsed at dealer Paul Guillaume’s a portrait of a pâtissier in a corner. Barnes described the little pastry-cook in white cap and apron as “outrageous, fascinating, real, truculent, afflicted with an immense ear, superb, unexpected, and right: a masterpiece”. He demanded an immediate introduction. Soutine, languishing on a bench in Montparnasse with a pair of fellow down-and-outs, was found, washed, and marched to the gallery.
