The Success and Failure of Picasso (2 page)

  
46
Gris:
The Violin
, 1915 (Kunstmuseum, Basle)

  
47
Picasso:
Olga Picasso in an Arm-chair
, 1917 (private collection)

  
48
Picasso:
Bathers
, 1921

  
49
Picasso as a matador, 1924 (photo: Man Ray)

  
50
Ingres: Drawing, 1828

  
51
Picasso:
Madame Wildenstein
, 1918 (Daniel Wildenstein collection)

  
52
Picasso:
Women at the Fountain
, 1921

  
53
Poussin:
Eliezer and Rebecca
(detail), 1648

  
54
Picasso:
Bull’s Head
, 1943

  
55
Picasso:
Bull, Horse, and Female Matador
, 1934

  
56
Picasso:
Sitting Girl and Sleeping Minotaur
, 1933

  
57
Schiele:
Seated Male Nude
(self-portrait), 1910

  
58
Picasso:
Nude on a Black Couch
, 1932 (Mrs Meric Gallery, Paris)

  
59
Poussin:
The Triumph of Pan
, 1638–9 (Louvre, Paris)

  
60
Picasso:
Bacchanale
, 1944 (private collection)

  
61
Picasso:
The Mirror
, 1932 (private collection)

  
62
Picasso:
Weeping Head
, 1937 (on extended loan to the Museum of Modern Art, New York, from the artist)

  
63
Picasso:
Figure
, 1939 (Othmar Huber collection, Glarus, Switzerland)

  
64
Picasso:
Triptych
, 1946 (Musée Grimaldi, Antibes)

  
65
Picasso:
Joie de vivre
, 1946 (Musée Grimaldi, Antibes)

  
66
Giovanni Bellini:
The Feast of the Gods
, 1514 (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Widener collection)

  
67
Picasso:
Massacre in Korea
, 1951

  
68
Picasso:
Peace
, 1952 (Temple de la Paix, Vallauris, France)

  
69
Titian:
Shepherd and Nymph, c.
1570 (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna)

  
70
Léger:
Composition aux deux perroquets
, 1935–9 (Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris)

  
71
Delacroix:
Horse Frightened by a Storm
, 1824 (National Museum, Budapest)

  
72
Brancusi:
The Bird
, 1915 (Museum of Modern Art, New York)

  
73
Brancusi in his studio, 1946 (photo: Wayne Miller)

  
74
Picasso: Illustration to Aimé Césaire’s
Corps perdu
, 1950

  
75
Piero di Cosimo:
The Immaculate Conception
(Uffizi, Florence)

  
76
Piero di Cosimo:
The Finding of Vulcan on Lemnos
(Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut)

  
77
Picasso:
The Race
, 1922 (private collection)

  
78
Picasso:
Figure
, 1927 (private collection)

  
79
Picasso:
Woman in an Arm-chair
, 1929 (private collection)

  
80
Picasso:
Girls with a Toy Boat
, 1937 (Peggy Guggenheim collection, Venice)

  
81
Picasso:
Guernica
(detail), 1937 (on extended loan to the Museum of Modern Art, New York, from the artist)

  
82
Picasso:
Nude Dressing Her Hair
, 1940 (Mrs Bertram Smith collection)

  
83
Picasso:
Nude with a Musician
, 1942 (Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris)

  
84
Picasso:
First Steps
, 1943 (Yale University Art Gallery)

  
85
Picasso:
Portrait of Mrs H.P.
, 1952 (private collection)

  
86
Van Gogh:
Portrait of the Chief Superintendent of the Asylum at Saint-Remy
, 1889 (Mrs Dübi-Müller collection)

  
87
Picasso:
Nude on a Black Couch
, 1932 (Mrs Meric Gallery, Paris)

  
88
Picasso:
The Mirror
, 1932 (private collection)

  
89
Picasso:
Woman in a Red Arm-chair
, 1932 (reproduced by courtesy of the Trustees of the Tate Gallery, London)

  
90
Picasso:
Nude
, 1933

  
91
Picasso:
Head of Woman
(bronze), 1931–2 (private collection)

  
92
Picasso:
Sculptor and Model Resting
, 1933

  
93
Picasso: Page of drawings, 1936

  
94
Picasso:
Head of a Woman
, 1943

  
95
Picasso:
Young Girl and Minotaur
, 1934–5

  
96
Picasso:
Guernica
, 1937 (on extended loan to the Museum of Modern Art, New York, from the artist)

  
97
Siqueiros:
Echo of a Scream
, 1937 (Museum of Modern Art, New York gift of Edward M. M. Warburg)

  
98
Picasso:
Bull, Horse, and Female Matador
, 1934

  
99
Picasso:
Crying Woman
, 1937

100
Picasso:
Still-life with Bull’s Skull
, 1942 (the estate of André Lefèvn collection)

101
Picasso:
Dove
(poster)

102
Delacroix:
Les Femmes d’Alger
, 1834 (Louvre, Paris)

103
Picasso:
Les Femmes d’Alger
, 1955

104
Velázquez:
Las Meninas
, 1656 (Museo del Prado, Madrid)

105
Picasso:
Las Meninas
, 1957

106
Picasso:
Bullfight
, 1934 (Victor W. Ganz collection)

107
Picasso:
Nude and Old Clown
, 21 December 1953

108
Picasso:
Young Woman and Old Man with Mask
, 23 December 1953

109
Picasso:
Young Woman and Monkey
, 3 January 1954

110
Picasso:
Young Woman and Cupid with Mask
, 5 January 1954

111
Picasso:
Young Woman with Cupids
, 5 January 1954

112
Picasso:
Girl, Clown, Donkey, and Monkey
, 10 January 1954

113
Picasso:
Old Clown and Couple
, 10 January 1954

114
Picasso:
Couple with Masks
, 24 January 1954

115
Picasso:
Old Man and Young Woman with Masks
, 25 January 1954

116
Picasso:
Girl, Clown, Mask, and Monkey
, 25 January 1954

117
Picasso:
Painter and Model
, 24 December 1953

118
Picasso:
Painter and Model
, 25 December 1953

119
Picasso:
Woman, Apple, Monkey, Man
, 26 January 1954

120
Picasso:
Woman and Monkey Painting
, 10 January 1954

121
Tintoretto:
Woman with Bare Breasts
(Museo del Prado, Madrid)

122
Giorgione:
Old Woman
, c. 1569 (Galleria dell’Accademia, Venice)

123
Titian:
Vanity of the World
, 1515 (Alte Pinakothek, Munich)

124
Picasso:
Nu couché
, 5 October 1972 (Musée Picasso, Paris)

PREFACE

I wrote this book more than twenty years ago. When it first came out, in 1965, it was attacked in many places, if not everywhere, as being insolent, insensitive, doctrinaire and perverse. In England, the land of Gentlemen, it was also dismissed as being in bad taste. Picasso was still alive and at the height of his fame. Hagiographic books and articles came out every year. The critical response to my book somewhat surprised me. I thought I had written an essay informed by sympathy for the artist and the man it concerned. Perhaps now, with the passing of the years, this sympathy for the protagonist of the story I tell is more evident.

For example, the essay begins by discussing Picasso’s wealth, a beginning which was, at the time, considered vulgar and tasteless. To translate the sums of money I mention into current currency, one should multiply by at least ten. Then Picasso died. Soon afterwards, the internecine litigations concerning his estate began. More recently, one has witnessed similarly sordid affairs following the deaths of other artists: Salvador Dali, for instance. So long as works of art are primarily objects of spectacular investment, such situations are bound to occur. The point, however, is that the alienation which this implies is usually first suffered as a solitude (the solitude of the bank vault) by the ageing artist. This solitude was the starting point of my essay, and as I re-read it, I find that time has also confirmed many other points I made.