The precarious paintings of Pablo Picasso
Picasso is a legendary painter that most everyone has some knowledge of and exposure to his unique style. To say that he was precarious in his presentation of life on canvas and in oils is to say that he was careless about how he captured life in a timeless medium. Being so brilliant and gifted in the art of the interpretation of life and abstraction of things, it is doubtful that he felt that he was being uncertain in anyway, with his brush strokes.
Rather, he most definitely went about his work, placing each and every stroke exactly as he wanted to, making life look rather bizarre to the untrained eye. However, once his attitude caught on, he was heralded and rewarded repeatedly with favorable accolades for producing master piece after master piece in similar abstract form.
He painted Gertrude Stein, one of his most avid collectors, in 1906. The painting is displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and labeled, Portrait of Gertrude Stein. This painting was inspired, not by how she looked at the time she sat for the portrait, but for how she might look in the future. From the report of part of a verbal exchange between a critic of his work and himself, we know this. The critic commented that Gertrude Stein did not look like the portrait. To that, Picasso replied, “She will.”
It is possible to think Picasso was just not capable of painting realism and therefore think of his work as precarious. It is often surmised that he could not paint accurately. However, the painting of Gertrude Stein has hands that are of a true likeness and the clothing is the way a blouse might lay on a chest of a subject with correct perspective and shadows. Hence, Picasso chose to paint the subject carefully but in a futuristic fashion.