AIC Temporary Exhibition: Picasso and Chicago [The Old Guitarist - by Pablo Picasso]

The Old Guitarist - by Pablo Picasso

 

 

 

AIC Temporary Exhibition: Picasso and Chicago [Double Flute Player and Reclining Nude - by Pablo Picasso

 

 

 

Artist and Model - by Pablo Picasso

Cannes/ 1933

 

 

Double Flute Player and Reclining Nude - by Pablo Picasso

 October 22, 1932
Pen and black ink, with brush and gray wash and scraping, on cream wove paper

AIC Temporary Exhibition: Picasso and Chicago

 

Abstraction, Background with Blue Cloudy Sky - by Pablo Picasso

Paris, Jan 4, 1930.

From the Exhibition: Picasso and Chicago

 

 

The above painting immediately reminded me of a Picasso painting

 I had seen at MOMA, seen below..

 

 

Seated Bather, 1930..

[Picasso's first wife Olga Koklova]

At MOMA, New York City

 

 

See the comparison...

If I just take the top portion of the painting "Seated Bather",

the similarities are even more obvious..

as seen in the below comparison..
[And they are both from the same year, 1930!]



 

 



 

 

 

AIC Temporary Exhibition: Picasso and Chicago [Cubism]

Cubism [1909-1919]..
Picasso met Georges Braque in 1908. Both artists began breaking up the composition into geometric shapes. Braque and Picasso, invented a revolutionary art style Cubism [1909-1919].. Paintings are broken into geometric forms and showing subjects from more than one angle ..
Even the phase of Cubism is divided into phases...
Analytical Cubism [1908-1912], began by reducing natural forms into geometric elements and representing three-dimensional objects in two-dimensional planes..
Synthetic Cubism [1912-1919] when Braque and Picasso began attaching physical objects in their paintings, using materials as newspaper, wood, sand and so forth..

 

Daniel Henry Kahnweiler

Paris, Fall 1910

Oil on canvas

 

The subject of this portrait is the dealer, writer and publisher Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, who opened his gallery in Paris in 1907, and began representing Picasso the following year. Picasso worked directly from his model, as well as  possible from a photograph he took of the dealer. The latter provides clues of some of the elements in the composition, especially the Mukuyi mask [Punu, Gabon], which hangs to the left of Kahnweiler's head in the painting. Picasso then added some other elements to the composition, because he said, " it looked as though it were about to go up in a smoke - and so I added the attributes - a suggestion of eyes, the wave in the hair, an ear-lobe, the clasped hands - and now you can".



Fan - by Pablo Picasso

[Ceret, summer/ 1911]

Pen and Brown Ink, brush and brown wash on paper

 

In early July of 1911, Picasso travelled with Fernande to the French Pyrenean town of Ceret, where they shared a villa with Braque, max Jacob and the sculptor Manolo. Picasso made this at Ceret.

 

 

 

Man with Clarinet - by Pablo Picasso

[Ceret, summer 1911]

Fabricated Black chalk on paper

 

During the summer of 1911, while Picasso was at Ceret, he made a number of drawings of musicians, including this image of a member of Cobla, a traditional Catalan musical group.

 

 

The Glass - by Pablo Picasso

Paris 1911/12

Oil on canvas

 

 

 

AIC Temporary Exhibition: Picasso and Chicago [ Picasso: Early Period/ Blue Period]

 

 

The Old Guitarist

1903

 

 

THE EARLY YEARS /  BLUE PERIOD
also early printmaking
 

Pablo Picasso was born in 1881, in the southern Spanish city of Malaga. While he would live most of his life in France, his early work were made in Spain. In October 1900, at the age of 19, Picasso arrived to Paris. It was during his early years that he made his first major artistic breakthrough, the paintings of his so called Blue Period, named after monochromatic palette he used to depict the downtrodden of society. Spurred in 1901 suicide of Carles Casagemas a close friend and fellow artist. Picasso adopted a blue-coloration for his depiction of human suffering and alienation that enhanced melancholy and psychological intensity. It is not surprising then, given the powerful quality of these works that the first acquisition of this work by Chicago collectors and the Art institute date to this fertile moment of artistic production.

 

 

 

 

 

 Young Woman with A hat

Paris/ 1900

 

 

 

At the Cabaret / 1901

Black, orange, and blue crayons on cream wove paper, discolored to buff

 

 

 

Crazy Woman with Cats / Early summer 1901 

The Frugal Meal,

from The Saltimbanques, September 1904

 

 



 

 

Woman with a Helmet of Hair, 1904

Gouache on tan wood pulp board

 

 

Beggar with Crutch, 1904

Pen and brown ink and colored crayons on tan wove paper

 

 

Woman in Profile, c. 1904

Pen and brown ink and watercolor, with blotting, on cream laid paper

AIC Temporary Exhibition: Picasso and Chicago [Vollard Suite]

Produced between 1930 and 1937,  the 100 etchings known collectively as the Vollard Suite were named after their publisher, Ambroise Vollard. The Vollard Suite  [22 of which are shown here]  contain many themes, but the most prominent subjects were derived from classical literature: Pygmalion, the artist who fell in love with his own sculpture; and the man-beast known as the Minotaur.

The theme of the sculptor in his studio, often in the presence of female model, likely originated with the 1927 commission for "The Unknown Masterpiece", but it also paralleled Picasso's 1931 purchase of chateau Boisgeloup in Gisors, France. there he devoted himself primarily to making sculptures, but he also had an etching press installed, and the plates in the Vollard Suite on this theme [40 of them date between march and May 1933] read like entries in a diary.

Characters from Classical mythology are also prominent in the suite and Picasso inserted himself as the mythical Minotaur into the scenes of bacchanalian feasts with fauns and nymphs, freely interpreting ancient myths and creating a new world of his own. In 1932, Vollard acquired the plates to produce the suite but he died two years later with the work incomplete. Picasso's prints languished in storage, and it was only during World War II that the print dealer Georges Petit bought the greater part of the edition of the Vollard Suite, finally releasing the first series of signed prints in 1950.

 



Marie-Thérèse as Female Bullfighter 

[Plate 22 from the Suite Vollard, June 20, 1934

Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

 

 

Faun Uncovering a Sleeping Woman

[Jupiter and Antiope after Rembrandt]

 

[Plate 27 from the Suite Vollard, June 12, 1936

Aquatint and sugar lift etching with scraping and engraving on copper in black on ivory laid paper]

 

 

  

Harpy with a Head of a Bull and Four Young Girls

on a Tower Surmounted with a Black Flag 

[Plate 13 from the Suite Vollard, December 1934

Etching on copper in black on ivory laid paper].

 

 

 

 

 

Bullfight. Wounded Female Bullfighter III

[Plate 71 from the Suite Vollard, November 8, 1933, printed and published 1939

Drypoint and etching with engraving on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

 

  

 

 

Bacchic Scene with Minotaur 

[Plate 85 from the Suite Vollard, May 18, 1933, printed 1939

Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

 

Pensive Boy Watching a Sleeping Woman by Candlelight
[Plate 26 from the Suite Vollard, November 18, 1934, printed and published 1939
Etching, aquatint and engraving with scraping
and burnishing on copper in black on ivory laid paper]

Amorous Minotaur with a Female Centaur
[Plate 87 from the Suite Vollard, May 23, 1933, printed 1939]

The Tavern: Young Catalan Fisherman Recounting His Life to an Old Bearded Fisherman
[Plate twelve from the Suite Vollard, November 29, 1934, printed and published 1939
Etching on copper in black on parchment]

 

Model and Sculptor with His Sculpture
[Plate 38 from Suite Vollard, March 17, 1933, printed 1939
Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

Marie-Thérèse Kneeling, Contemplating a Sculpted Group
[Plate 66 from the Suite Vollard, April 5, 1933; printed 1939
Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

The Embrace. III
[Plate 49 from the Suite Vollard, April 23, 1933, printed and published 1939
Drypoint on copper in black on ivory laid paper]

Minotaur Caressing Sleeping Woman,
[Plate 93 from the Suite Vollard, June 18, 1933, printed 1939
Drypoint on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

Blind Minotaur Led by A Young Girl
[Plate 97 from the Suite Vollard, 1934,  printed in 1939 ]

Blind Minotaur Led by Little Girl with Flowers
[Plate 94 from the Suite Vollard, September 22, 1934, printed 1939
Drypoint with scraping and engraving on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

Blind Minotaur Led by a Little Girl with a Pigeon
[Plate 95 from the Suite Vollard, November 4, 1934
Etching with engraving and scraping on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

Blind Minotaur Led in the Night by a Little Girl with a Pigeon,
[Plate 96 from the Suite Vollard, October 23, 1934
Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

Coupling I
[Plate 29 from the Suite Vollard, November 2, 1933, printed 1939
Drypoint with sugar lift etching and aquatint on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

 

 

Wounded Minotaur VI
[Plate 88 from the Suite Vollard, May 26, 1933, printed 1939
Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

 

 

Three Comedians with a Bust of Marie-Thérèse
[Plate 77 from the Suite Vollard, March 14, 1933, printed 1939
Drypoint on copper in black on parchment]

 

Sculptor Working on a Motif with Marie-Thérèse Posing
[Plate 59 from the Suite Vollard, March 31, 1933, printed 1939
Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

Sculptures Representing Marie-Thérese and the Head of a Sculptor, with a Vase of Three Flowers
[Plate 76 from the Suite Vollard, May 5, 1933, printed 1939
Etching on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

An interesting link

 Daily mail UK.. click here..

 

AIC Temporary Exhibition :Picasso and Chicago [Mythical Creatures: Minotaur, Centaur and Faun]

 

Minotaur Caressing Sleeping Woman,
[Plate 93 from the Suite Vollard, June 18, 1933, printed 1939
Drypoint on copper in black on off-white laid paper]

 

 Throughout his life Picasso inserted mythological characters in his works..

Minotaur, Centaur and Faun 

 

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MINOTAUR 

 

 

 

The Minotaur - by Pablo Picasso

Boisgeloup/ 1933.

 

Picasso made this drawing on blue paper in his Boiseloup studio, where he was often joined by Marie Therese Walter, who served as a model  for the female figure in the composition.

Blind Minotaur Led by a Little Girl in the Night - by Pablo Picasso 

[Plate 97 from Suite Vollard / 1934, Printed in 1939]

 



Minotauromachia

Paris/ May 1935

 

In early 1935, Picasso stopped painting and devoted himself for a period of nearly two years to graphic art and poetry. His most remarkable composition is those first months was one of his most important prints, the large Minotauromachia, a densely etched and inked image of great personal significance. At the center of the mythological Minotaur, who appears in a Spanish corrida, or bullfight and walks towards a child holding a candle. Between them a disemboweled horse struggles to carry a collapsed female matador. Overlooking the scene are two woman with doves and a man on a ladder. The symbolism of this image was so deeply personal that Picasso himself would not explain it; over the years , however, many observers have concluded that the image points to a great personal and spiritual struggle for the artist at this time.

 

 

 

Minotaur and Wounded Horse - by Pablo Picasso

Boisgeloup / 1935

 

In 1935, the theme of bullfight, with it's drama and turmoil, had personal appeal to the artist; as it reflected both his struggles with Olga and marie-Threse as well as the unrest brewing in Spain. In this work, the terrified horse is the victim, while the Monotaur, half beast and half-man,  is the naked aggressor.

 

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CENTAUR

 

 

Nessus and Deianira - by Pablo Picasso

Sep 22, 1920 

 

Combat of Centaurs - by Pablo Picasso
Cannes, Dec 6, 1959

This drawing represents the battle between two Centaurs, characters from Greek mythology., that Picasso explored over a number of years. His first work on this theme came in 1920, when he produced the elegant neoclassical Nessus... and was inspired to return to the theme while in South France. In this work, Picasso merged the subject of the Centaurs with the bullfight, another favorite theme at this time. Even with simple contours, the drawing has sensous quality, the result of Picasso working on pastel to achieve rich, velvety texture.

 

 

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FAUN

 

 

 

The Faun Musician - by Pablo Picasso

Paris, 1947

Brush and Black ink and gouche on paper

 

The pipe-playing faun was one of the mythological creatures that Picasso drew and painted frequently. This drawing was done on the back of a prospectus for "Five Sonnets by Petrarch" a 1947 publication translated by Louis Aragon, with illustrations by Picasso. Conservation examination of the work reveals that the artist covered an earlier composition of flowers..

 

 

 

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Man Holding a Sheep, Flutist and Heads
Jan, 1967
Colored crayon and colored pencils with smudging on wove paper