Pierre Daix

{{Short description|French journalist and writer}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Pierre Georges Daix

| image = File:Pierre Daix -femmes francaises 29Juillet1950.jpg

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| caption = Pierre Daix on the cover of the magazine Femmes françaises, July 1950.

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| birth_date = 24 May 1922

| birth_place = Ivry-sur-Seine, Paris, France

| death_date = {{Death date and age|2014|11|2|1922|5|24|df=y}}

| death_place = 14th arrondissement of Paris, France

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| resting_place = Ivry Cemetery, Ivry-sur-Seine

}}

Pierre Georges Daix (24 May 1922 – 2 November 2014) was a French journalist, writer and art historian. He was a friend and biographer of Pablo Picasso.[http://www.dictionaryofarthistorians.org/daixp.htm Daix, Pierre] at the Dictionary of Art Historians. Accessed 14 February 2013.

As a young man, Daix was an ardent Stalinist.{{Cite journal|last=SOBANET|first=ANDREW|date=2015|title=L'Homme que nous aimons le plus: French Intellectuals Celebrate Stalin's 70 th Birthday|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/43954161|journal=French Forum|volume=40|issue=2/3|pages=47–66|jstor=43954161|issn=0098-9355}} He joined the French Communist Party at the age of 17 in 1939 when the Communist Party was banned for supporting the German-Soviet pact.{{Cite news|date=2014-11-04|title=Pierre Daix (1922-2014), écrivain et historien de l'art|language=fr|work=Le Monde.fr|url=https://www.lemonde.fr/disparitions/article/2014/11/04/pierre-daix-1922-2014-ecrivain-et-historien-de-l-art_4518022_3382.html|access-date=2022-02-01|quote=Elève au lycée Henri-IV, il devient communiste l’année de son baccalauréat.}} In July 1940, he created a student club, the Centre laïque des auberges de la jeunesse (Claj), which served as a legal screen for the clandestine Union of Communist Students.{{Cite book|last=Daix|first=Pierre|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/468864607|title=Tout mon temps : révisions de ma mémoire|date=2001|publisher=Le Grand livre du mois|isbn=978-2-7028-6362-6|location=Paris|language=French|oclc=468864607}}

When David Rousset (1912-1997) spoke out about Stalin's vast system of prison camps,{{Cite web|last=GAUDEMAR|first=Antoine de|title=David Rousset, mort d'un témoinPremier à décrire «l'Univers concentrationnaire», il avait 85 ans.|url=https://www.liberation.fr/culture/1997/12/15/david-rousset-mort-d-un-temoinpremier-a-decrire-l-univers-concentrationnaire-il-avait-85-ans_224723/|access-date=2022-02-01|website=Libération|language=fr}} Daix attacked him as a liar, denying that the GULAG system existed in the Soviet Union, in a 16 page article in Les Lettres Françaises, entitled "Pourquoi M. David Rousset a-t-il inventé les camps soviétiques?".{{Cite book|last=Daix|first=Pierre|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bvQitwAACAAJ|title=Pourquoi M. David Rousset a-t-il inventé les camps soviétiques ?|date=1949|publisher=Les lettres françaises|language=fr}} Rousset brought libel charges against Daix and there was a public trial in France, which Rousset, who had told the truth about the camps, won in 1950.{{Cite web|last=admin|date=2018-02-21|title=Daix, Pierre|url=https://arthistorians.info/daixp|access-date=2022-02-01|website=Rousset, David. Le procès concentrationnaire pour la vérité sur les camps: extraits des débats. Déclarations de David Rousset, plaidoirie de Théo Bernard, plaidoirie de Gérard Rosenthal. Paris: Éditions du Pavois, 1951; "Acknowledgements" and "Introduction." Daix, Pierre. Picasso: Life and Art. New York: Icon Editions, 1993, pp. vii-xiii; Krauss, Rosalind "In the Name of Picasso." October 16, no. 102 (Spring, 1981): 11, 14; Who's Who in France (online); Daix, Pierre. Tout mon temps (mémoires, 2001).|language=en}} {{Cite journal|last=Rousset|first=David|date=2000|title=Procès contre les Lettres françaises. Première déclaration|journal=Lignes|volume=2|issue=2|pages=161|doi=10.3917/lignes1.002.0161|issn=0988-5226|doi-access=free}}{{Cite news|date=1950-02-23|title=LE PROCÈS DAVID ROUSSET-" LETTRES FRANÇAISES " aura lieu malgré l'absence de MM. Pierre Daix et Claude Morgan|language=fr|work=Le Monde.fr|url=https://www.lemonde.fr/archives/article/1950/02/23/le-proces-david-rousset-lettres-francaises-aura-lieu-malgre-l-absence-de-mm-pierre-daix-et-claude-morgan_2039771_1819218.html|access-date=2022-02-01}} As a French communist, Daix continued his uncritical support for the Soviet Union for many years, though late in life he admitted he had been wrong.{{Cite book|url=https://www.fayard.fr/documents-temoignages/tout-mon-temps-9782213608594|title="Tout mon temps", Pierre Daix|date=2022-01-02|language=fr}}

From 1980 to 1985, he was a journalist for Le Quotidien de Paris.{{Cite web|url=http://www.europe1.fr/culture/pierre-daix-ecrivain-et-ancien-resistant-est-mort-2277455|title=Pierre Daix, écrivain et ancien résistant, est mort}}