Adventures in France

Picasso Museum

The Picasso Museum in Paris is located in the so-called Hôtel Salé located on Thorigny Street in Paris, France. It contains works by Picasso from all periods and all techniques, although its collection of sculptures is particularly rich.

Let’s start the French adventure by talking about Picasso Museum, I always wondered why “Picasso’s main museum” was in Paris if he was a Spanish artist.

To my surprise, Pablo Ruiz Picasso was part of both Spanish and French communist parties, and he lived for a long period in Paris as you must be all well aware, between Paris and Barcelona he had two of his most important periods, “Blue period” with the death of his friend Carlos Casagemas, Casagemas, after having tried to murder his lover Germaine, a Moulin Rouge dancer who frequented the circle of Spanish artists, committed suicide in Paris. Picasso, motivated and sensitized by the death of his friend, painted a painting that he named El Entierro de Casagemas, an allegorical painting that began to show his transition to the Blue period.

The influencers of this period were Van Gogh y Gauguin, the first above all on a psychological level, as reflected in the emotional intensity of the paintings from this period, although there is also a simplification of defined volumes and contours that makes one think of Gauguin, from whom he would also take a universal conception of sentimentality. Picasso manifested the loneliness of the characters by isolating them in an imprecise environment, with almost exclusive use of blue for a period of more than two years, a fact that was practically unprecedented in the history of art. Also, the elongation of the figures that were being introduced in his works was once again reminiscent of the style of El Greco.

At the end of April 1901, he returned to Barcelona, where he exhibited Woman in Blue (Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid) at the General Exhibition of Fine Arts and then in May he returned to Paris, where he settled at number 130 Clichy Boulevard, in the place where Casagemas had had his studio.

And then he settled at Bateau Lavoir, during his “Pink period”, the pink season is distinguished by its pastel colours and warm tones, with soft and delicate lines; With a special emphasis on line and drawing, rather than colour, he continued to work on figures with elongated proportions that recall his admiration for El Greco, as in El actor.

Just a bit of history…

Picasso is famous for being one of the creators of cubism altogether Georges Braque, even though, he’s got African influences as well, abandoned realism in most of his paintings and sculptures, giving an engaging perspective and spatial depth, introducing another way to look at paintings, the surrealism.

On the other hand, most of his portraits were inspiring in his children, especially Maya, her daughter with Marie-Thérèse Walter, he seriously had several partners, 5 if I recall correctly, but his daughter Maya was really special to him, and he painted her in different moods and activities during her childhood, as well as he made for her homemade dolls and origamis, and the woman herself had founded memories of her dad teaching her art lessons and posing for him.

Unfortunately, after she decided to go to Spain with him and her other siblings, studied art and get married, he got angry and closed all contact with her, even though, she saved all his paintings and sculptures and expose them in France after his death, all the hidden work he made during his disappearance and lonely years.

Nevertheless, he still remains a great artist, who leaves us without breath with his abstract yet expressive work, and we are all grateful to enjoy his legacy and work.

I leave you some of the paintings and sculptures I like most 🙂