- Venue
- Gagosian Gallery
- Location
- London
While Tate Liverpool’s show of the iconic cubist’s anti-war paintings and exploring his commitment to communism was massive in scale, the Gagosian has gone far more intimate. Curated by biographer John Richardson, and Picasso’s grandson Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, whose previous team effort Picasso: Mosqueteros, was acclaimed by the New York Times as one of the city’s greatest shows of the twenty-first century, this exhibit is smaller in scale but strong. The core of the show is Picasso’s paintings loaned by the artist’s relatives created in the south of France when he was surrounded by friends like Jean Cocteau, lovers and family. Among the artworks, there are portraits of his children, his final wife Jacqueline and sculptures and drawings featuring ‘Sylvette’, his legendary young muse, Lydia Corbett.
The exhibition, so named due to Picasso’s return to art influenced by the Mediterranean scenery and heritage, has displayed his trademarked Cubist style as well as the odd water glossed ceramic pottery, a few sculptures and prints. Perhaps just as unusual, there are cardboard cut-outs of Picasso Cubist figures, replacing the notion of three-dimensional sculpture occupying space and Greek influenced tile pieces, a conventional Mediterranean art practice.
A more relaxed mood is appreciated here as there is little to no war or political subject matter replacing themes of Tate Liverpool’s Peace + Freedom exhibit with a simple glance at the work of a modern Master and his peace. The artist pitted himself against the likes of Delacroix, Manet and Velázquez at this time, revolutionising sculpture in the processes of lithography, linocuts and other graphic techniques creating the two-dimensional sculptures mentioned. It was Picasso’s love of the area and its poetry and bullfights that further developed his interest in other cultures and their arts and crafts, most noticeable in last year’s Picasso: Challenging The Past at the National Portrait Gallery.
His painting’s bold lines and boundaries are still in their rightful places alongside his gentle warm colours and these have worked particularly well with his important portraits of Françoise, Claude, Paloma and his last great muse Jacqueline. Some of his famed Primitivism work has faded away temporarily, but perhaps there was a boldness in that art he produced which even thought to be rather thick for his palette. The sculptures are certainly fascinating as we might find the hint of African inspired form in some of the clay pieces, coupled with South American styled linocuts and a single owl, reminding us of his interest in using owls to symbolise death (remember Tate Liverpool?).
For the large portion of the audience, Picasso’s black-n-white photographic-styled cubist paintings would have to be recognised as centre-pieces for this exhibit as they remind us of the torture and pain that his Master must have felt during and after wars which brought the world his masterpiece: Guernica. By that basis, the exhibit becomes another political Picasso exhibit but with the many more cherished, deeply personal artworks outweighing the darker colours, this promises to paint an accurate portrait of the Master at concord.
Speaking on behalf of Picasso fans, you will find enough work to satisfy a craving for the Master’s work which even utilises a door for a canvas… or is it a sculpture? Whilst we’re on the topic, the wooden sculptures will not frighten you if you stare really hard at their influences. A final touch on this exhibit is the wide range of mediums that Picasso experimented with to create these Picasso’s Picassos.
