True disappointment! Everything is schematic! Balthus's first solo exhibition (at the Pierre gallery in Paris) must have caused real shock to its visitors. In 1934, Abstract art and Surrealism had reached their peak and, within this context, Balthus's attempt to "embody painting" (according to the poet Pierre-Jean Jouve) made him an inherently marginal figure. At the age of 26, Balthus was going against the tide.

His art was equally articulated through imagination and a kind of realism between Renaissance painting, particularly of the 15th century, and Classicism in its most extreme form. Antonin Artaud, in a text published in the Nouvelle Revue Francaise in May 1934, defended Balthus's "unorthodox" endeavor for that time, writing: "Painting, it seems, has grown tired of depicting monsters and abominations. It wants to return to a kind of organic realism, which, instead of despising poetry, wonders, and myths, draws more inspiration from all of them than ever before."

However, he now possesses the necessary means of expression. For it is indeed quite easy to experiment with imperfect or evolving forms to create the unexpected, the unusual, the marvelous. One should paint actual things, not mere forms; nature’s work should not be placed under the microscope merely to yield something nonsensical. The painter who trusts in his means and abilities deliberately projects the outside world, possesses the objects, bodies, and forms that exist there, and experiments with them.