Exhibition Facts

Duration 17. March – 18. June 2023

Venue Column Hall | ALBERTINA

Curators Klaus Albrecht Schröder

Constanze Malissa
Works ca. 60
Catalogue Available English & German onsite at the Museum Shop as well as
via www.albertina.at

Contact Albertinaplatz 1 | 1010 Vienna

T +43 (0)1 534 83 0
info@albertina.at
www.albertina.at

Opening Hours Daily 10 am – 6 pm

Except Wednesday and Friday open until 9 pm

Press contact Daniel Benyes

T +43 (0)1 534 83 511 | M +43 (0)699 12178720
d.benyes@albertina.at

Nina Eisterer
T +43 (0)1 534 83 512 | M +43 (0)699 10981743
n.eisterer@albertina.at

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Picasso
MARKING THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF HIS DEATH
17.03.2023 – 18.06.2023

With Pablo Picasso’s death 50 years ago, the 20th century had lost its artist.

Picasso’s oeuvre encompasses 50,000 works that reflect the enormous political upheavals of
the times through which he lived: turbulent war years, the ban on his works’ exhibition by
German occupiers, the Spanish Civil War. Through all of it, he championed freedom with his
brush and pen. And his fascination with bullfighting, his relationships with women, his
longing for bacchanalian pleasures and love of eroticism captivated him throughout his life.

This is the ALBERTINA Museum’s third Picasso exhibition: following the presentation of his
late oeuvre in Painting Against Time (2006) and the focus on the political Picasso in Peace
and Freedom (2010), the ALBERTINA Museum now presents works by Pablo Picasso from its
own collection. This exhibition shows once again why Picasso has been called a “continent”:
he truly was the artist of his century.

Every phase, every period of his creative activity touched off a broad international movement
that the Spanish genius himself would disclaim the very next moment, only to then usher in
yet another new period, another new style. He reinvented himself every decade: his
melancholy Blue Period brought symbolism into the 20th century, he overcame the crisis of
painting—together with his friend Georges Braque—as the inventor of cubism, and ceramic
objects were elevated to sculptures, to canvases, to art in his hands.

The present ALBERTINA Museum exhibition follows this motor of 20th century art’s
transformation from the central Blue Period masterpiece of The Sleepy Drinker, an image of
lonely melancholy with which Picasso processed the suicide of his friend Casagemas, to the
1911 analytic cubist pièce de résistance of the Étagère in which Picasso approaches
abstraction and on to the 1929 surrealist masterpiece Femme, sculpture et vase de fleurs, in
which he deals with the separation from his wife Olga and his relationship with Marie-
Thérèse Walter.

The ALBERTINA Museum is also showing Picasso’s lament upon the defeat of Republican
Spain at the hands of Franco’s fascist dictatorship in Still Life with Broken Mirror, while other

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works address the many separations from the women who played such an important role in
his life—thereby also centrally influencing his art.

This exhibition surveys the entire oeuvre of the Spanish artistic genius, including around 60
masterpieces of painting, drawing, etching, lithography, and ceramics.

Picasso’s art does not distinguish between painting with a brush, drawing with a pencil, lining
with a pen, cutting into linoleum, scratching a copper plate, or shaping a mass with one’s bare
hands. His touch could elevate anything to the status of art, and his oeuvre defies all logic
and predictability. With Picasso, the history of art’s development disintegrates. The
parameters that define art are cast aside with him and through his work. And the entire world
agrees: without him, the course taken by art would have been a different one.

Picasso continued creating works of immeasurable power at a very advanced age. The final
part of this exhibition hence not only features the hymn to life embodied by Picasso’s
dionysian fantasies and arcadian utopias but also documents his attempts to paint and create
against the passage of time: every single work is dated right down to the very day, as if to
bear witness to living for the moment. In 1973, the artist—after years of battling life’s
transience—himself passed into the realm of immortality, whereupon he was mourned the
world over … and 50 years after his death, our world still celebrates the man who had become
the archetype of the modern artist even during his own lifetime.

This exhibition focuses on the great Spanish artist upon the anniversary of his death with its
selection of 60 paintings, drawings, prints, and ceramics drawn from a total of nearly 150
works owned by the ALBERTINA Museum.

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Exhibition Texts

INTRODUCTION

“It took me four years to draw like Raphael, but a lifetime to draw like a child.” Pablo Picasso

Picasso was born in Málaga in 1881.

Being of clearly exceptional talent, he was admitted to Barcelona’s Academy of Art at age 14.

Picasso first set foot in Paris in 1900. One year later, he was devastated by the suicide of his
friend Carlos Casagemas: The Blue Period following that event saw Picasso produce paintings
of infinite sadness that show lonely, forlorn figures living at the margins of society.

From 1903 to 1909, Picasso lived in Montmartre subject to conditions of sever e poverty.
Fernande Olivier (1881 to 1966) became his intimate partner and frequent model until 1912.

Together with his friend Georges Braque, Picasso went on to originate cubism – the 20th
century’s most revolutionary art movement. Illusionism, perspective, and lending shape to
the human body were replaced by a crystalline pictorial structure. Motifs portrayed in
monotone ocher hues were broken apart in the interest of formal rhythm. Later on, Picasso
also began “synthetically” recomposing these motifs by combining materials such as
newspaper clippings, wallpaper, and artificial wood veneers in a collage-like fashion.

Following a subsequent phase of classicist output while in Italy, Picasso went on in the 1920s
to become a figure regarded by surrealists as a symbol of modernism.

In 1918, Picasso married the prima ballerina Olga Khokhlova (1891–1955), whose son Paulo was
born in 1921. Picasso then met Marie-Thérèse Walter (1909–1977) in 1927, whose daughter
Maya was born in 1935.

In 1937, Picasso became acquainted with surrealist photographer Dora Maar (1907–1997).

During the 1930s, Picasso threw his artistic support behind the Spanish Republic’s fight
against the fascist dictatorial ambitions of General Franco. After the inception of Franco’s
dictatorship, Picasso never again returned to his Spanish homeland.

During France’s occupation by Nazi German troops, Picasso was forbidden to show his works
in Paris. However, he took the side of peace and against repression and dictatorship in
symbolic still lifes.
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Later on, with his 1949 lithograph of a dove, Picasso created the globally famous symbol of
the World Peace Council.

It was while the Second World War still raged that Picasso became acquainted with Françoise
Gilot (*1921). He and Françoise had two children, Claude and Paloma Picasso, and they
eventually moved from Paris to the French Riviera.

There, in the town of Vallauris, Picasso discovered linocut printmaking and experimented in
a ceramics workshop with clay and glazes. There, he ended up painting 4,000 plates and vases
that were then fired.

Vallauris was also where Picasso got to know Jacqueline Roque (1927–1986), his second and
final wife, who was also to become his most-portrayed model.

Picasso brought copious wit to bear in his late-oeuvre competition with Old Masters such as
Lucas Cranach. He also turned to mythology and the ancient world, to themes arcadian and
bucolic. With this period’s references to his 1920s classicism as well as to his cubist phase and
his tendency toward expressive deformation combined with his newfound love for midnight-
blue, Picasso ultimately became a harbinger of the neo-expressionism of the 1980s and ’90s.

In 1973, Picasso died in Mougins at the age of 91.

With his diversity of styles, his wide variety of expressive possibilities, and his creative power,
Picasso represents the art of the 20th century like no other can.

BLUE MONOCHROMY – AT THE MARGINS OF SOCIETY

On the occasion of the World's Fair in 1900 Picasso is in Paris for the first time. Picasso’s Blue
Period, which lasted from 1901 to 1907, is characterized by monochrome blue hues as well as
by depictions of nocturnal loneliness and melancholia, of outsiders and people who inhabit
society’s margins. This was Picasso’s first period of stylistically independent work and marked
his departure from the academic tradition. The catalyst for this development was the suicide
of his friend Carlos Casagemas, whom lovesickness drove to shoot himself at a Parisian café
in 1901. Picasso, shaken by this turn of events, began producing paintings and etchings that
reflected his deep sadness not just in terms of their colors but also thematically.

One Blue Period masterpiece, the painting The Sleepy Drinker , becomes an allegory of
loneliness and abandonment. The depicted figure’s physiognomy recalls the one of Picasso’s
close friend Carlos Casagemas, whose death he sought to process in this painting. The Frugal
Meal, Picasso’s first etching, was to become an icon of printed graphics. Its figures’ strict

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frontality transforms the original bar scene in this image into a metaphor for poverty and
despair. No gaze is returned, here: the emaciated woman, clung to tightly by her blind
companion, simply stares into the emptiness. The two turn away from each other. Their
angular bodies, sunken facial features, and elongated limbs – oriented on the style of El Greco
– bear witness to hunger and cold, to the fragility of life.

CUBISM

Picasso’s activities from 1906 to 1908, years spent under the impression of African and
Oceanian art, marked a turning point in his career. It was in 1907 that Picasso laid the
cornerstone for cubism, an approach that was to guide his artistic thinking until 1914.

Cubism – 20th-century art’s most revolutionary innovation – takes its name from the angular,
often cube-like shapes that it employs. It is typified by its fragmentation of shapes and motifs
in the interest of creating a formal rhythm that exists independently of the pictorial subject.
The crystalline structure of such images violated centuries-old rules relating to the
illusionism of central perspective and to modeling with light and shadows. Their
unnaturalistic colors likewise broke with the notion of art as an imitation of nature.

Analytic cubism involved an approach in which artists would view their selected objects from
various perspectives, analyze them, split them into multiple facets, and then integrate certain
significant facets into perspectiveless geometric spaces.

Beginning in 1912, this initial analytic approach was reversed to result in synthesis: Picasso
now began synthetically recomposing his motifs by combining various elements such as
pieces of paper, newspaper clippings, and pieces of wallpaper in a collage-like fashion. This
transformation was accompanied by a new degree of chromatic intensity.

BULLFIGHTING: PICASSO AT THE ARENA

In Picasso’s oeuvre, the bull with whose power, strength and impulsiveness Picasso identifies
plays a recurring role both in countless bullfighting depictions and as a motif unto itself.

The corrida had captivated him ever since he first attended one together with his father in
his hometown of Málaga at age nine. His fascination is continuing all the way to his death.

Following Franco’s victory in Spain, Picasso lived in voluntary exile in France. For him, the
bullfight and its protagonists become the symbol of his homeland. To the artist, the bullfight
embodies a sacrificial ritual that he perceives as a continuation of the Cult of Mithras.

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THE BACCHANAL

Depictions of Arcadia, Greek mythology’s paradisiacal utopian landscape based on a pastoral

idyll, make repeated appearances in Picasso’s oeuvre. The Arcadian myth is the idea of
peaceful human coexistence in harmony with nature and liberated from all societal
compulsions. In his works, the artist repeatedly associated this theme with depictions of
bacchanals – orgiastic festivals in honor of the ancient wine-god Bacchus. These Arcadian
scenes are populated by dancing and music-making figures.

THE LINOLCUT

It was in Vallauris that Picasso discovered the genre of linocut printmaking. The editor of the
leading communist daily paper in the south of France runs a small linocut printing shop in
Vallauris, where Picasso is allowed to work. The employment of linoleum, a robust modern
flooring material, permits larger print runs. Cutting into its soft surface requires less physical
effort than cutting into wood.
However, what Picasso loved above all was the fact that printing with linoleum plates results
in uniformly opaque layers of color. In contrast to lithography, which produces colors of a
generally duller appearance due to the ink’s absorption by the wet paper, Picasso stated that
he viewed linocut as predestined for the creation of vividly colored images. Picasso's linocuts
are masterpieces of this printing technique.

PICTURES IN CERAMIC: PICASSO IN VALLAURIS

Following the liberation of Paris by the Allies in 1944 and the end of the Second World War,
Picasso felt increasingly drawn to the south of France. 1946 saw him become acquainted with
the family, who owned the Madoura Pottery. One year later, Picasso star ted working in the
Madoura workshop. Jacqueline Roque, a saleswoman at the pottery, became Picasso’s final
companion. In 1961 the painter marries the thirty-three-year-old woman. Jacqueline became
his most portrayed model.
By the time of his death, and in parallel with his paintings, drawings, prints, and sculptures,
the artist had also created 4,000 ceramic works in Vallauris. Picasso was fascinated with
ceramic materials and by experimentation with technical processes, with oxides and glazes.

The Madoura Pottery was also a place where he renewed his artistic dialogue with the
classical antiquity: bacchanal scenes with mythical creatures as well as animals such as bulls,
fish, owls and Picasso’s pet, the goat Esmeralda, occupy central positions in his expressively
painted ceramic plates.

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Press images
The following images are available free of charge in the Press section of www.albertina.at:

Pablo Picasso Pablo Picasso

Still Life with Guitar, 1942 The Sleepy Drinker, 1902
Oil on canvas Oil on canvas
100,5 × 81 cm 80 × 60,5 cm
The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – The Batliner ALBERTINA, Wien – Permanent Loan Collection
Collection Stiftung Othmar Huber
© Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023 © Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Wien 2023

Pablo Picasso Pablo Picasso

Woman with Green Hat , 1947 The Frug al Meal, 1904
Oil on canvas Etching
92 × 73 cm 63 × 48 cm
The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – The Batliner The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna
Collection © Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023
© Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023

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Pablo Picasso Pablo Picasso
Pots and Lemon, 1907 Nude Woman with Bird and Flute Player, 1967
Oil on canvas Oil on canvas
55 × 46 cm 130 × 162 cm
The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – The Batliner The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – The Batliner
Collection Collection
© Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023 © Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023

Pablo Picasso Pablo Picasso

The Flying Dove, 1950 Mediterranean Landscape, 1952
Lithog raph Oil on wood
56,4 × 76,5 cm 81 × 125 cm
The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – The Batliner
© Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023 Collection
© Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Wien 2023

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Pablo Picasso Pablo Picasso
The Playing Cards, 1912 Sylvette, 1954
Oil on canvas Oil on canvas
33 × 19 cm 81 × 65 cm
The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – The Batliner The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – The Batliner
Collection Collection
© Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023 © Succession Picasso/ Bildrecht, Vienna 2023

Pablo Picasso Pablo Picasso

Woman, sculpture and flower vase, 1929 L'étag ère, 1911-1912
Oil on canvas Oil on canvas
195 × 130 cm 63 × 49,5 cm
The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – Private The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna – Private
collection, in memory of Monique Barbier-Mueller, collection, in memory of Josef Müller, Switzerland
Switzerland © Succession Picasso / Bildrecht, Vienna 2023
© Succession Picasso / Bildrecht, Vienna 2023

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