Pablo Picasso pink period painting. "Pink" period

Acrobat and young Harlequin 1905

The "blue" and "pink" periods in the work of the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso are the time of the formation of the artist's individual style. At this time, there is a departure from impressionism, the inheritance of the styles of Toulouse-Lautrec, Degas and other famous artists.

"Blue" period (1901-1904)

Self-portrait. 1901

It got its name because of the general tonality of the paintings, made in blue and blue colors, united by the mood of despair and loneliness. One of the first works of this period were "Self-Portrait" (1901) and "Absinthe Drinker" (1901). Most of the heroes of Picasso's paintings are representatives of the lower strata of society, destitute, sick or vicious people. Among the later "blue" works, it is worth noting the paintings "Head of a Woman" (1902-1903), "Breakfast of a Blind Man" (1903), "An Old Jew with a Boy" (1903), "Ironer" (1904). From an aesthetic point of view, it is important to move to new ways of depicting, excluding unnecessary details from the composition, and a number of other decisions that allow the viewer to focus on the emotions caused by the picture. At the same time, these works by Picasso cannot be fully considered original, because. they partially use motifs and techniques characteristic of Spanish painting. The formation of such an emotional mood of the paintings was strongly influenced by life realities. The beginning of the "blue" period is associated with the suicide of a close friend of the artist Carlos Casagemas in 1901. The proximity of death, loneliness, forced return to Barcelona in 1903 due to lack of funds influenced the depressiveness of the paintings.

"Girl on the ball" - the balance between life and death

Girl on the Ball. 1905

This painting, painted in 1905, is a characteristic work of the transitional period. The time when pain, despair and suffering in the artist's paintings are gradually disappearing, they are replaced by an interest in living human joys, embodied by circus performers and artists. The content of this work, built on contrasts (movement and static, girl and athlete, lightness and heaviness, etc.), fully corresponds to the symbolism of the transition between the bitterness of death and the joys of life.

"Pink" period (1904 - 1906)

A gradual transition to the “pink” period in his work was outlined as early as 1904, when positive changes began to occur in the artist’s life: moving to the seething center of avant-garde life - to the hostel of artists in Montmartre, falling in love with Fernande Olivier, meeting many interesting people, among whom were Matisse and Gertrude Stein. The main theme of the works of this period, made in pink, red, pearl tones, are the comedians of the Medrano circus. The paintings are distinguished by a variety of subjects, dynamics and movement. At the same time, the artist continues to develop an individual style, formed back in the "blue" period. The works “Acrobat and Young Harlequin” (1905), “Family of Comedians” (1905), “Jester” (1905), etc. belong to this time. At the end of the “pink” period, images inspired by ancient myths appear in Picasso’s paintings: “Girl with a goat "(1906)," A boy leading a horse "(1906), there is an interest in the image of the nude" Combing "(1906), A naked boy (1906).

In the spring of 1904, Picasso finally settled in Paris on Montmartre. With the move to Paris, the "blue period" ends. Various shadows invade the monochrome blueness of Picasso's paintings, becoming dominant. This new period is called "pink". But the meaning of the artist's new quest was, of course, by no means in changing its texture. Sometimes it is called "circus", and this more accurately conveys its content. There is a completely new world on the canvases - the world of comedians, circus actors. The reasons for Picasso's new turn in artistic concepts are far from unambiguous. They - and in the features of his restless talent, and in the influences of the environment. Barcelona no longer gave artistic impulses, the theme of the "bottom" of life was exhausted. He was now drawn to moral values ​​of a different order. It should be noted that Picasso already in those years knew French and Spanish very well and was even interested in Russian literature (Turgenev, Gorky).

Parisian friends introduce him to the literary clubs of Paris, introduce him to the bohemian life of the artists and poets of Montmartre with its romance of creativity, the atmosphere of life's disorder, but constant readiness for mutual assistance and support. He obviously owes Salmon and Apollinaire, first of all, his passion for the circus. At the beginning of 1905, together with him, he became a regular at the famous Parisian circus Medrano. In 1904, Picasso met the model Fernande Olivier, who inspired him to create many significant works of this period. They lived at the center of bohemian Parisian life and the mecca of Parisian artists, Bateau Lavoir. Here, in perfect poverty on the verge of poverty and indescribable creative disorder, Picasso constantly painted his Fernanda and searched for his own path.

However, it is in vain to look for a circus on his canvases, a circus spectacle. He is interested in the actor himself, a creative, creative person. Moreover, the classic characters of a traveling circus - personality, clowns, harlequins. They are shown outside the game, occasionally during a rehearsal, more often in everyday life, in the family. They must be dressed in the costumes of their characters. It is for them as if a sign of distinction from the general mass. A wandering group of actors for Picasso is a special microcosm of free people, where there are sincere affections, where there is no place for self-interest, deceit. Here they share luck and bitterness of defeat. The artist himself included in this world. Bato Lavoir is a strange dilapidated building with dark staircases and winding corridors that was the home of a very motley company: artists, poets, merchants, janitors...

Picasso acutely and even painfully felt the contradictions of life. He understood how fragile and illusory the world of comedians he created, lost in a vast, unsettled, dusty world. The artist's anxiety is reflected by hidden sadness, wariness on the faces of his heroes. In the large program compositions of the "pink period" - "Wandering comedians", "Comedians at rest" - perhaps the mood of some kind of uncertainty, anxious expectation is especially clearly manifested.

The possibility of happiness and harmony Picasso allows only in a family situation. In a series of works that can only be combined under the general title "The Family of Comedians", he develops his own version of the holy family. Here, his characters are, as it were, protected from the cruel reality by the warmth of love and tenderness for the child.

There is another theme that runs through the early years of Picasso's work and expresses his belief in the goodness of human relationships. In the "pink period" it becomes dominant. This is the theme of friendship, the friendship of two creatures, where the strong, experienced supports, protects the weak, defenseless. They can be an elderly clown who has seen life and a timid boy, a powerful athlete and a fragile acrobat girl, a person and an animal, such as "Boy with a Horse."

A significant canvas of the "pink period" - "Girls on the ball" The huge needle of Picasso's compositional thinking appears here with full brilliance. The compositional and rhythmic structure of the picture is based on the plastic motif of the comparison of contrast and, at the same time, the balance of unity. A powerful athlete and a fragile girl, an array of a cube and an elusive fluctuation of a ball, a monolith of a male figure on a cube and a thin figure of a girl on a ball swaying like a stalk in the wind. Remove one of the components of the picture - a disaster will occur. There will be no athlete - and the girl will immediately lose her balance, and without her unsteady fragility, she will collapse, fall under her own weight.

In The Girl on the Ball, Picasso is especially associative and metamorphic. In the images of a girl and an athlete, their contrasts and connections, associative images of the unity and opposition of various principles in nature, life, and man appear. Another, deeper series of associations arises, leading to medieval symbolism. In the athlete, an allegory of valor is guessed, in the girl on the ball - fortune. In the picture, a new direction in Picasso's artistic thought is already noticeable - an interest in classical clarity, balance, inner harmony. Written at the turn of 1905, "The Girl on the Ball" stands at the origins of the so-called first classical period in the artist's work. The artist's movement towards clear, harmoniously integral, active images was fed by his faith in a good and reasonable beginning in man. Hence, in the works of Picasso in 1906, the images of physically perfect girls and boys. Strong young men are rapidly moving towards the viewer, ready for action. It was an artist's dream world, an ideal world of free and proud people.

Starting to create it, Picasso suddenly stops and throws everything. As if he does not have enough strength, faith weakens, disappointment sets in.

In 1907, the famous "Girls of Avignon" appeared. The artist worked on them for more than a year - for a long time and carefully, as he had not worked on his other paintings before. The first reaction of the public is shock. Matisse was furious. Even most of my friends didn't accept this job. "It feels like you wanted to feed us tow or drink gasoline," said the artist Georges Braque, Picasso's new friend. The scandalous painting, whose name was given by the poet A. Salmon, was the first step in painting on the path to cubism, and many art critics consider it the starting point of modern art.

During this period, ocher and pink cheerful tones came to the fore in the master's paintings. New stable themes of works appeared: acrobats, itinerant actors, harlequins (“Acrobat and a young Harlequin” (1905), “A family of comedians” (1905), “Jester” (1905)). The artist was fascinated by comedians, whom he enthusiastically painted. Pablo began to frequent the Medrano circus, and the harlequin can be called the artist's favorite character at that time. In 1904, Pablo met Fernanda Olivier, a model. She inspired Picasso to create many famous works of the "pink" period. They settled together in the bohemian district of Paris and the artists' Mecca of Bateau Lavoir. The building of strange architecture, dilapidated, with winding corridors and dark staircases, sheltered a very motley company: merchants, poets, artists, janitors ... Picasso lived in poverty, on the edge of poverty, in an unimaginable creative mess. He painted his beloved Fernanda all the time, finding his way in art.

Large-scale exhibition "Picasso. Blue and pink" opens September 18 in Paris. The early masterpieces of the genius will be collected for her from all over the world, including the Pushkin Museum in Moscow.

Poor youth, acute experiences, trips to Paris, attempts to establish themselves on its art scene, experiments with form and color, continuous search for oneself - six years of personal and creative throwing, which went down in history under the name of "blue" and "pink" periods, will become plot of a grand exhibition. An exposition entirely dedicated to this short but fruitful period of life will be held in France for the first time.

In addition to painting and graphics, the exhibition will show engravings and the first sculptural experiments of Picasso, as well as archival materials. One of the tasks of the curators is to fit the young Spaniard into the context of the Parisian scene, placing him next to, and other contemporaries.

The beginning of the chronological exposition will be the year 1900. Picasso is 19 years old, and for the first time he comes to the capital of France and the entire artistic world, along with his friend Carlos Casagemos, to the World Exhibition. The first works were inspired by walks in taverns and brothels. In the summer of 1901, having noticed the young genius, he arranges the first exhibition of Picasso in his gallery. The sudden death of Casagemos becomes the impetus for sad thoughts about life, loneliness, old age and death, multiplied by their own poverty.

Picasso then returns to Spain, then at the first opportunity rushes back to Paris, infected with the freedom and creative air of Montmartre. He paints melancholic portraits of Spanish friends and the tormented poor. They are being replaced by acrobats, athletes, traveling circus performers and with them a new color scheme.

The finale of the exhibition is half a step before the "Avignon Maidens". In the middle of 1906, Picasso spent several weeks in the mountain village of Gosol in the Spanish Pyrenees, where he experimented with the representation of the body, mixing classical ideals with archaic and primitive ones. The figures are deformed, broken into fragments and already herald the advent of cubism.

The exhibition will bring together more than 300 works from museums and private collections around the world, including Japan, China and Canada, and, of course, leading institutions in Europe and America.

Among the masterpieces are the program for the “blue” period, the painting “Life” from the Cleveland Museum of Art, which will be shown in France for the first time, “Harlequin” from and “Nude on a Red Background”, which belonged to Marchand Paul Guillaume (now in Paris).

Pushkinsky will share "The Girl on the Ball", which was placed on the cover of the catalog, and "The Spanish Woman from the Island of Majorca" from the former collection. The exhibition will also feature the hit of the Rockefeller collection - "Girl with a Basket of Flowers", recently sold for $115 million (according to some sources, it was bought by the Namad family of art dealers, which has the richest collection).

The exhibition has been prepared by Orsay together with the Parisian, who will show the exposition at the same time.

And from Orsay, the exposition in a reduced volume will go to the Beyeler Foundation in Basel, where it will open on February 3 next year.

Pablo Picasso
"Self-portrait"
1901

Photo © RMN-Grand Palais (Musée national Picasso-Paris)/Mathieu Rabeau

Pablo Picasso
"Harlequin"
1901
© Succession Picasso/2018, ProLitteris, Zurich
Photo ©The Metropolitan Museum of Art/ Art Resource/Scala, Florence

Pablo Picasso
"Acrobat and Young Harlequin"
1905
private collection
© Succession Picasso/2018, ProLitteris, Zurich

Pablo Picasso
"Girl in a Shirt"
1905
© Succession Picasso / 2018, ProLitteris, Zurich
© Tate London 2017

Pablo Picasso
« Nude on a red background»
around 1906
Photo © RMN-Grand Palais (Musée d'Orsay) / Hervé Lewandowski
© Succession Picasso 2018

"Pink" period

The "pink" period in the work of Picasso did not last long - from the autumn of 1904 until the end of 1906. Most of the paintings are sustained in light colors, pearl-gray, ocher and pink-red tones appear. There were also new images - actors, acrobats, athletes. At the foot of the Montmartre hill was the Medrano circus, here Picasso found themes for his works. Theatricality, a variety of human types, beauty and ugliness, youth and maturity - all this returned the artist to a multi-colored world full of various emotions. Accordingly, his palette changed, blue-green cold and sad tones no longer dominated on it. A kind of bridge between the "blue" and "pink" periods was the work "Woman in a Shirt".

From February 25 to March 6, 1905, an exhibition was held at the Serurier Gallery, at which Picasso showed his new works. During this period, "Actor", "Acrobats. Mother and Son”, “Family of Comedians” – a huge canvas 2x2 m. Picasso painted naked women, young people, and their beauty and plasticity perfectly conveyed the serenity that reigned in his soul.

A recognized masterpiece of the "pink" period was the famous painting "Girl on a ball", written in delicate pearl, pink, blue tones, with a new sense of air and space. The light, flexible figure of an acrobat girl balancing on a ball contrasts with the massiveness of the stable cube on which the athlete-hero sits.

The joyful feeling of life was also facilitated by the ongoing relationship with the beautiful Fernanda Olivier, who, in addition to unearthly beauty, turned out to be a great hostess. With tiny money, she managed to cook a delicious, hearty dinner and feed not only Pablo, but also his friends who wandered into the light. When some extra money appeared, the artist visited the Agile Donkey cafe. At the same time, he made acquaintance with several junk dealers who bought his paintings for next to nothing.

In February 1905, several works by Picasso were exhibited at the Serurier Gallery on Boulevard Haussmann. Apollinaire wrote an article about him, where he predicted a great future for the painter. A personal philanthropist also appeared, the official Olivier Senser, thanks to whom the artist received a residence permit in France and some money for drawings. At the same time, Picasso met collectors from different countries - the Russian merchant Sergei Shchukin, the German esthete without much work Wilhelm Uhde and the Americans Gertrude and Leo Stein, a writer and pianist. Brother and sister Styna helped Pablo get out of poverty by generously paying for his work. The Steins also introduced Picasso to Henri Matisse, which turned out to be extremely important for the young master. True, communication was somewhat traumatic for Pablo: a free and self-confident Matisse uttered lengthy monologues, and Picasso, who spoke French poorly, could only agree unanimously. He also had an eccentric friend, playwright Alfred Jarry, a lover of absinthe, ether and shooting. He always carried a pistol in his pocket and in cafes he shot at friends whom he considered too sober. Once the weapon was taken away from him and ... given to Picasso. He, however, did not justify the trust, because he used the pistol with the same extravagance as the previous owner. Thank God, there were no incidents.

Thanks to the generosity of the Steins, on May 20, 1906, Picasso, along with Fernanda Olivier, set off on a trip to Spain and stopped in the small village of Gosol in the Catalan Pyrenees. A new period of his creative search began.

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