Picasso's disease. Illness and recovery
Pablo Picasso was a particularly talented artist and a rather eccentric person.
2. Picasso’s full name consists of 24 names of the heavenly patrons of numerous relatives.
3. Pablo’s father was also an artist, so the boy took his mother’s surname, as if he had a presentiment of his great future.
4. Pablo began to get interested in drawing from early childhood. He received his first painting lessons from his father, Jose Ruiz Blasco, who was an art teacher.
5. The father has been drawing with his son since he was 7 years old. But at 13 he decided to stop studying because he began to notice that he was superior to his own father.
6. At the age of 9, Picasso drew his first completed drawing - “The Picador” (Le picador), depicting a rider on a horse participating in a bullfight.
7. Already at the age of 13, the first exhibition of works by Pablo Picasso took place.
8.Like a lot talented people, Picasso was left-handed. After all left hemisphere the brain is responsible for creative processes, and therefore more developed among them.
9. Picasso was accepted into the School fine arts La Lonja when he was 14 years old. He was too young to enter, but at the insistence of his father he was allowed to take the exam. entrance exams. While most students passed their exams in a month, Pablo passed his entrance exams in just a week.
10. Picasso’s first word was “piz, piz,” short for lápis, which means “pencil” in Spanish.
11. Pablo finished his first “academic”, that is, a completely adult picture, at the age of 15. It is called “First Communion”, and depicts his father, mother and sister near the altar.
12. Although Pablo was baptized as a child catholic church, later he became an atheist.
13. From 1917 to 1924, Picasso created curtains, sets and costumes for several ballets. His works were poorly received at the time, but are now considered symbols of the progress in art of the time.
14. The artist was eccentric in all aspects of his life. Even his car was customized specifically for his personality. It was a small Citroen, the design of which completely repeated the cubic style of the artist’s paintings. This car was simply impossible not to notice.
16.Picasso loved animals. He had a boxer, Ian, and a goat, Esmeralda, but he had no sentimental feelings towards them. The dachshund Lump occupied a special place in his life: he loved her more than all his women.
17. Especially for his pet, the artist painted a porcelain plate, depicting his pet on it, from which Lump ate from the same table as his owner.
Pablo Picasso's favorite dachshund Lump
18. The dachshund accompanied Pablo everywhere - when the artist worked in the workshop, only Lump had the right to be with the creator at that moment.
Pablo Picasso in his youth
19. Picasso became addicted to opium in his youth, but abruptly quit this activity when his neighbor, an artist from Germany, committed suicide due to the withdrawal symptoms. Picasso himself lived long life– 92 years old.
20. Pablo said: “If I went into the army, I would become a general. But I became an artist and became Picasso.”
21. Reason for creation famous painting"Guernica" was the bombing of the Spanish city of Guernica by the Luftwaffe Air Force, part of Nazi Germany. In 3 hours, several thousand bombs were dropped on Guernica, as a result of which the city of 6,000 people was destroyed. Picasso was so amazed by what happened that he expressed his emotions on canvas. Guernica was written in just a month.
22. After a Nazi officer saw a photograph of Pablo Picasso's painting Guernica, he asked the artist if he had done it. Picasso replied: “No, you did it.”
23. Books published on Picasso are dedicated to different languages, treatises and poems were created.
24. Picasso was talented in many areas of art. Despite the fact that everyone remembers Pablo Picasso as talented artist However, he created beautiful sculptures and tried his hand at working with graphics and ceramics. He was also a stage designer, poet, playwright, writer and designer.
25. Pablo Picasso performed some graphic works non-traditional materials: nail polish, lipstick, ballpoint pen.
26. The paintings painted by Picasso belong to the “cubism” style, which, by the way, was invented by the artist himself together with his friend. In fact, the term "Cubism" was invented by the French critic Vaucel, who noticed that almost all the images in the artist's canvases consisted of small cubes. However, without Picasso there would be no cubism in painting.
27. It is difficult to find another artist whose work would cause so much controversy. The name Pablo Picasso is pronounced by some people with delight, by others with irony and mockery.
28. Pablo Picasso had three illegitimate children: daughter Maya with Marie-Therese Walter; son Claude and daughter Paloma from Françoise Gilot.
29. Based on data on stolen paintings by the London-based Art Loss Register, Pablo Picasso tops the list of artists whose paintings are most popular among thieves.
30. As of 2012, the world's largest lost art registry, ALR, lists 1,147 works by Pablo Picasso as stolen.
Perfume Pablo Picasso
31. Picasso's name was used on several commercial products, including a car (Citroen Xsara Picasso), perfume (Cognac Hennessy Picasso) and lighters (ST Dupont Picasso).
32. Thanks to his extraordinary talent, Picasso was able to become the richest artist during his lifetime. His paintings were valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars.
33. In 2015, Christie's set a new all-time record for works of art sold at open bidding- Pablo Picasso’s painting “Algerian Women (Version O)” went for a record 179 thousand dollars.
34. Picasso preferred to live lavishly; he denied himself little. After his death, he left not only a rich legacy of paintings, but also real estate worth more than $1.5 billion.
35. According to the 1998 Guinness Book of World Records, Picasso is one of the most prolific artists in the world. During his 78-year career, he created more than 13,500 paintings, 100,000 prints, 34,000 book illustrations, 300 ceramic and sculptural works - more than 147,800 works of art in total.
Illness and recovery
Throughout cold winter In 1938, a prolonged attack of radiculitis left Picasso bedridden. Sabartes will leave memories of this painful period in the artist’s life, sleepless nights, an endless string of sympathetic visitors, each of whom offered some kind of miraculous remedy, and the appearance of a doctor who, as if by magic, magic wand, managed to immediately put the patient on his feet after cauterization of the nerve.
In July, the usual wanderlust prompts Picasso to leave Paris and go to the Mediterranean coast. This time he rented an apartment in Antibes. Before he had time to properly settle down in it, he received a message about Vollard’s unexpected death. The next day he returns to Paris, but does not stay there for long.
The first few days of our stay in Antibes were devoted to the sights of other places on the coast - Monte Carlo, Nice, Cannes and Mougins. Following this, Picasso plunges into work. The rented apartment was filled with all sorts of tables and decorated with trinkets that irritated him. When this situation became unbearable for him, he, with the help of Sabartes and Marcel, piled up the antiques, trinkets and ersatz paintings that were hanging on the walls, thus turning the apartment into a studio, where the usual chaos of an artist’s studio soon arose. The huge walls, on which there was nothing left except colorful wallpaper, gave him the idea of creating another painting large sizes. He acquired a huge canvas and with extraordinary speed transferred onto it the images of the people who surrounded him at that time. During one of the evening walks with Dora Maar, they came across a small bay where fishing boats were moored, preparing for night fishing, during which the fishermen used acetylene lamps. Their light attracted fish, which became the victim of a fisherman standing in a boat, armed with a spear. Bright light snatched shining ones from the night sea creatures amazing color and bizarre shape, while bugs and moths danced in the powerful rays of the stream of light created by the lamp. It was this scene that Picasso chose for his large picture, on which he now worked tirelessly every day.
However, this job did not stop him from going to the beach every morning. During our stay in Antibes we met daily on the shore and exchanged news of the political situation. The fall of Barcelona and the disappearance of the last faint hopes of a Republican victory have deeply disappointed us. Some consolation was brought by the arrival of two of Picasso's nephews, Fin and Javier Vilato, who managed to escape internment in France after crossing the Pyrenees defeated Republican army. The joy of meeting them and the fun they indulged in on the beach temporarily dispelled the artist’s gloomy mood.
Although everyone hoped for a successful outcome, reports of ultimatums from Nazi Germany and mobilization in France plunged everyone into a state of shock. Every evening Picasso came to the cafe for main square Antibes, to exchange views with friends and, enjoying the coolness, spend an hour or two with them over a cup of tea or a glass of mineral water. If earlier conversations were conducted on a variety of topics, now they revolved around one issue - everyone discussed departure plans. After a few days, most of the friends left, and the city began to fill with soldiers. In the mountains near luxury hotels and swimming pools, Senegalese soldiers installed machine guns.
Picasso did not know what to do. He was upset that his work was interrupted just at the moment when he began to see more clearly the new forms that his quest was taking on in Lately. He told his friends jokingly that preparations for war began specifically to prevent the emergence of a new direction in painting. In this regard, Sabartes noted: “He hated war more than anything else because it threatened his creativity. Peace was necessary for his nature, which was fueled by internal struggle.”
In the evening, after the announcement on the radio about Hitler’s attack on Poland, I went to his apartment. New picture, where the night hunt was depicted, seemed complete. Other canvases leaning against the walls remained untouched. I looked out the window. The towers of Grimaldi Castle stood out indistinctly against the muted blues, scarlets and grays of the sky. From the balcony you could see Old city, whose streets were already dimly lit for camouflage purposes. Rectangular brick walls, illuminated street lamps on the corners, strikingly resembled Cubist paintings. It seemed that the architecture of these ancient buildings began to look like paintings created by Picasso.
We said goodbye, promising to write to each other, and Picasso immediately began packing his things. He decided to go to Paris by train (they were crowded at that time). Marcel had to return by car, taking suitcases, boxes and the painting “Night Fishing in Antibes”, rolled up and lying on the back seat. It would be six years before Picasso could return to Mediterranean Sea.
Pablo Picasso became, perhaps, the most famous artist 20th century. The master's productivity was so comprehensive that at the time of his death, April 8, 1973, the great Spaniard had tens of thousands of paintings to his credit, including groundbreaking abstract works such as Guernica. To this day, the artist is so popular that the exhibits of some museums in Barcelona, Paris and other cities of the world consist of only works by Picasso. And just one painting by the master goes for more than $100 million at auction. Let's turn to interesting facts from the life of a recognized genius.
Picasso was known as a child prodigy
The future artist was born on South coast Spain in sunny Malaga in 1881. They say that the boy began to draw before he could speak, and he asked his father to give him a brush. By the age of 13, the boy had already formed his own unique handwriting, and his works could safely be considered among the works of mature masters. However, Picasso would not have become a famous artist if his father, an art teacher, had not taught the boy the basics of drawing. Despite the fact that Pablo had difficulty reading and made a lot of spelling mistakes when writing, he passed the exams at the Barcelona Art School in one day, while other young artists took a whole month. 
Picasso constantly changed his painting style
IN adolescence Picasso did well realistic portraits and landscapes. Then the maestro's work goes through the so-called blue and pink periods, when he preferred to paint images from the lives of poor children and circus scenes. The painting "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon" is considered one of the most revolutionary works author, who laid the foundation for cubism and abstractionism, styles that prefer to distort natural images to geometric shapes. In 1912, Picasso decided on another experiment and began decorating the surfaces of his works with a collage of oilcloth, newspaper clippings and other scrap materials. 
The master also likes to place increased emphasis on color, ignoring smooth transitions between lines, working in the genres of analytical and synthetic cubism. Well, later, in mature age, Picasso was inspired by classicism, recreating the works of Monet, Velazquez and Delacroix. It is safe to say that the history of art can be traced throughout creative path the great Spaniard. Yes, on different stages The artist was no stranger to surrealism, symbolism, expressionism and post-impressionism. 
Picasso helped create the movement of cubism
The famous Spaniard constantly moved in bohemian circles and was familiar with many famous artists, writers and sculptors of his time. Fruitful collaboration with Georges Braque gives rise to a new movement called “Cubism” in 1909. The works of that time clearly show the influence of ancient Iberian sculptures, African masks, as well as the works of such a famous post-impressionist as Paul Cézanne. The Picasso-Brac relationship worked until 1914 and was broken only after the young Frenchman enlisted in the army.
Picasso was not only an artist
Despite the fact that among the most famous works masters are listed primarily as paintings; Picasso experimented with sculptures, ceramics, engravings and drawings. He has also designed curtains, sets and costumes for several ballets. In 1935, the great Spaniard began writing poetry, and in 1940, two plays came out from his pen. 
The artist actively opposed the dictator Franco
In 1936, civil war began in Spain. Picasso, being a supporter of the Republicans, produced several etchings ( metal engravings) against the activities of the Spanish dictator Franco. At that time, the master makes his first political statement, saying that the military caste plunged Spain into the abyss of suffering and death.
Mine famous masterpiece Picasso wrote “Guernica” for a fair in Paris, which took place in 1937. The artist was so amazed by the incident when fascist planes bombed civilians in the city of Guernica that he reflected in his work his own vision of the war in black and white. The huge canvas, which is more than 25 feet long, waited out the years of dictator Franco's reign in the Museum contemporary art in NYC. And only when the military regime fell did the painting finally return to its homeland. Currently, the painting "Guernica" is on public display at the Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid. 
Pablo Picasso spent most of his life in immigration
The artist first left Spain in 1900, taking an extended trip to Paris. The master felt so comfortable in the French capital that in 1904 he decided to move. It must be said that the master did not plan to return to Spain. However, he did spend a short period of time in his homeland shortly before the start of the civil war. During World War II, Picasso also remained in France and survived the occupation of Nazi troops. Subsequently, the master settled in a quiet place in the south of France, where he remained an extremely prolific author until the end of his days. 
At the age of 62, the artist became a communist
Immediately after the liberation of Paris from the Nazis, in 1944, Pablo Picasso joined the ranks of the French Communist Party. The master said that he found in the new idea everything that he respects: the greatest thinkers, poets and resistance fighters. In the next decade, the artist’s brush came out with the painting “Massacre in Korea,” which depicted American soldiers in the form of futuristic knights who were going to attack pregnant women and children. Picasso also painted a portrait of Joseph Stalin, which caused some indignation among the French communists, who were struck by the lack of veneration for the Soviet dictator. 
Picasso is more sought after by art thieves than any other artist.
According to experts, as of 2014, paintings by Pablo Picasso were stolen twice as often as paintings by any other master. 1147 works in different time were or are wanted, disputed or missing. The most recent thefts of the master's works occurred in the Dutch and Greek museums, as well as in the Museum of Modern Art in Paris.
Pablo Picasso was a particularly talented artist and a rather eccentric person. His life was filled with incredible events that still amaze admirers of the artist’s talent. Below are ten facts that reveal a completely different perspective on Picasso's life.
Uncle's bad habit saved Picasso's life
Pablo was born very weak and did not make a single cry when he was born. The midwife who delivered the baby thought that the baby was dead and left him on the table in order to convey the sad news to the family and document it this fact. At this time, the uncle of the future artist, who looked into the room, saw a baby lying on the table and approached him. At the same time, the man was smoking a cigar and accidentally blew smoke into the baby’s face, causing him to first cough and then cry. This is how the smoking uncle saved the life of his little nephew.
"Pencil" - little Pablo's first word
If for ordinary children the first word is “mom” or “dad,” then for little Pablo it became “ pencil" It was this object that the baby learned to hold in his hands, earlier than a spoon. In addition, young Picasso began drawing from the cradle, which was encouraged by his father, a professional artist.
It is worth noting that Father Pablo, having seen the progress in the work little son, was so amazed that he promised to quit painting if his son surpassed him in skill. After some time it happened. Young artist surpassed his parent in many ways, which aroused genuine pride in him.
Picasso was a naughty child
The artist often recalled that as a student, he was constantly punished. There was a special room at school where they put the guilty children and left them there for a while so that they could carefully consider their behavior.
During punishments, Pablo drew, and admitted that this time of his training was the most enjoyable. Moreover, sometimes he deliberately provoked scandals with teachers in order to end up in the punishment room. The artist's talent grew along with his eccentricity, the more unpredictable his behavior became. young master, the more successful works he was able to create.
"Picador" - the artist's first masterpiece
Pablo Picasso painted his first painting at the age of 9. It was a painting depicting a rider riding a horse. The artist’s first “real” or academic painting was “First Communion,” a painting so unlike the well-known “cubic” style, depicting his relatives during a church ceremony.
Picasso beats Casanova in breaking women's hearts
Not a single artist, or any ordinary man in general, had as many mistresses as Picasso had. In most cases, these were beautiful and stormy, but not long-lasting romances.
Picasso always left his wives himself as soon as the wave of feelings faded. Françoise Gilot became the only woman to leave Pablo first. The artist said that communication with the fair sex requires more oxygen; it is from this that he draws his inspiration and ideas for paintings. His first official wife was Russian ballerina Olga Khokhlova, and his last, with whom he lived until his death, was Jacqueline Rock. Subsequently, she could not survive the death of her husband and committed suicide.
Picasso was talented in many areas of art
Despite the fact that everyone remembers Pablo Picasso as a talented artist, nevertheless, he created beautiful sculptures and tried his hand at working with graphics and ceramics. In addition, he became the author of several plays, for which he personally designed the curtain.
Picasso had a car made in his style
The artist was eccentric in all aspects of his life. Even his car was customized specifically for his personality. It was a small Citroen, the design of which completely repeated the cubic style of the artist’s paintings. This car was simply impossible not to notice.
How Picasso invented Cubism
The paintings painted by Picasso belong to the “cubism” style, which, by the way, was invented by the artist himself together with his friend. In fact, the term "Cubism" was invented by the French critic Vaucel, who noticed that almost all the images in the artist's canvases consisted of small cubes. However, without Picasso there would be no cubism in painting.
Picasso was the richest artist in the history of painting
Thanks to his extraordinary talent, Picasso was able to become the richest artist during his lifetime. His paintings were valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars. At the same time, the artist preferred to live “largely”; he denied himself little. After his death, he left not only a rich heritage consisting of paintings, but also real estate worth a total of more than $1.5 billion.
The artist's favorite dachshund
Picasso loved animals. He had a boxer, Ian, and a goat, Esmeralda, but he had no sentimental feelings towards them. The dachshund Lump occupied a special place in his life: he loved her more than all his women. Especially for the pet, the artist painted a porcelain plate, depicting his pet on it, from which Lump ate from the same table as his owner. The dachshund accompanied Pablo everywhere - when the artist worked in the workshop, only Lump had the right to be with the creator at that moment.
Despite the fact that Picasso was an eccentric artist, nevertheless, he was not devoid of ordinary human weaknesses. He lived a very long time and rich life, filled with a variety of events and emotions. In the master's biography one can find many very interesting stories, which speak eloquently about what Pablo was like during his lifetime.
The most productive painter in the history of humanity.
He also became the most successful artist, earning more than a billion dollars in his life.
He became the founder of modern avant-garde art, starting his journey with realistic painting, discovering cubism and paying tribute to surrealism.
Great spanish painter, founder of Cubism. During his long life (92 years), the artist created so much great amount paintings, engravings, sculptures, ceramic miniatures, that it cannot be accurately counted. According to different sources, Picasso's legacy ranges from 14 to 80 thousand works of art.
Picasso is unique. He is fundamentally alone, for the lot of a genius is loneliness.
On October 25, 1881, a joyful event occurred in the family of Jose Ruiz Blasco and Maria Picasso Lopez. Their first child was born, a boy named after spanish tradition long and ornate - Pablo Diego Jose Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno Maria de los Remedios Crispignano de la Santisima Trinidad Ruiz and Picasso. Or simply Pablo.
The pregnancy was difficult - thin Maria could barely bear the baby. And the birth was completely difficult. The boy was born dead...
That's what the doctor, Jose Salvador Ruiz's older brother, thought. He accepted the baby, examined him and immediately realized that it was a failure. The boy was not breathing. The doctor spanked him and turned him upside down. Nothing helped. Doctor Salvador hinted with his eyes to the obstetrician to take away the dead child and lit a cigarette. A cloud of gray cigar smoke enveloped the baby's blue face. He tensed convulsively and screamed.
It happened small miracle. The stillborn child turned out to be alive.
The house in Malaga's Merced Square, where Picasso was born, now houses the artist's house-museum and a foundation bearing his name.
His father was an art teacher at the Malaga art school and was also the curator of the local Art Museum.
After Malaga, Jose moved with his family to the town of La Coruña and got a place at the school of fine arts, teaching children painting. He became the first and, perhaps, main teacher of his brilliant son, giving humanity the most outstanding artist of the 20th century.
We know little about Picasso's mother.
An interesting fact is that Mother Maria lived to see her son’s triumph.
Three years after the birth of her first child, Maria gave birth to a girl, Lola, and three years later, the youngest, Conchita.
Picasso was a very spoiled boy.
He was allowed to do everything positively, but he almost died in the first minutes of his life.
At the age of seven, the boy was sent to a regular high school, but he studied disgustingly. Of course, he learned to read and count, but he wrote poorly and with errors (this remained for the rest of his life). But he was not interested in anything other than drawing. He was kept at school only out of respect for his father.
Even before school, his father began to let him into his workshop. Gave me pencils and paper.
José was pleased to note that his son had an innate sense of form. He had a fantastic memory.
At the age of eight, the child began to draw on his own. What the father took weeks to complete, the son managed to complete in two hours.
The first painting painted by Pablo has survived to this day. Picasso never parted with this canvas, painted on a small wooden board with his father’s paints. This is a Picador from 1889.
Pablo Picasso – “Picador” 1889
In 1894, his father took Pablo from school and transferred the boy to his lyceum - a school of fine arts in the same La Coruña.
If Pablo did not have a single good grade at a regular school, then at his father’s school he did not have a single bad one. He studied not just well, but brilliantly.
Barcelona… Catalonia
In the summer of 1895, the Ruiz family moved to the capital of Catalonia. Pablo was only 13 years old. The father wanted his son to study at the Barcelona Academy of Arts. Pablo, still just a boy, submitted documents as an applicant. And immediately received a refusal. Pablo was four years younger than the first-year students. My father had to look for old acquaintances. Out of respect for this distinguished man selection committee The Barcelona Academy decided to allow the boy to participate in the entrance exams.
In just a week, Pablo painted several paintings and completed the commission’s task - he drew several graphic works in classic style. When he took out and unfolded these sheets in front of the painting professors, the members of the commission were speechless with surprise. The decision was unanimous. The boy was accepted into the Academy. And immediately to the senior year. He did not need to learn to draw - a fully formed professional artist sat in front of the commission.
The name “Pablo Picasso” appeared precisely during his studies at the Barcelona Academy. Pablo signed his first works own name– Ruiz Blesko. But then a problem arose - the young man did not want his paintings to be confused with the paintings of his father José Ruiz Blasco. And he took his mother’s last name – Picasso. And this was also a tribute to respect and love for Mother Mary.
Picasso never spoke about his mother. But he loved and respected his mother very much. He painted his father as a doctor in the painting “Knowledge and Mercy.” Portrait of Mother – painting “portrait of the artist’s mother”, 1896.
But also more interest presents the painting “Lola, Picasso’s sister.” It was painted in 1899, when Pablo was under the influence of the Impressionists.
In the summer of 1897, changes came to the family of José Ruiz Blasco. It came from Malaga important letter- The authorities again decided to open the Art Museum and invited the authoritative person Jose Ruiz to the position of its director. In 1897 in June. Pablo completed his studies at the Academy and received a diploma professional artist. And after that the family set off.
Picasso did not like Malaga. For him, Malaga was like a provincial horror hole. He wanted to study. Then on family council, in which his uncle also participated, it was decided that Pablo would go to Madrid to try to enter the most prestigious art school countries - to the Academy of San Fernando. Uncle Salvador volunteered to finance his nephew’s education.
He entered the San Fernando Academy without much difficulty. Picasso was simply beyond competition. At first, he received good money from his uncle. The reluctance to learn what Pablo already knew without lessons from professors led to the fact that after a few months, he dropped out of school. The receipt of money from his uncle immediately stopped, and for Pablo it was time to hard times. He was 17 years old at the time, and by the spring of 1898 he decided to go to Paris.
Paris amazed him. It became clear that we had to live here. But without money he could not stay in Paris for long and in June 1898 Pablo returned to Barcelona.
Here he managed to rent a small workshop in old Barcelona, painted several paintings and was even able to sell them. But this could not continue for long. And again I wanted to return to Paris. and even convinced his friends, the artists Carlos Casagemas and Jaime Sabartes, to go with him.
In Barcelona, Pablo often visited the Santa Creu hospital for the poor, where prostitutes were treated. His friend worked here. Putting on a white robe. Picasso sat for hours during examinations, quickly making pencil sketches in a notebook. These sketches will later turn into paintings.
Eventually Picasso moved to Paris.
His father saw him off at the Barcelona train station. As a farewell, the son gave his father his self-portrait, on which he wrote “I am the king!” on top.
Life in Paris was poor and hungry. But all the museums of Paris were at Picasso’s service. Then he became interested in the work of the impressionists - Delacroix, Toulouse-Lautrec, Van Gogh, Gauguin.
He became interested in the art of the Phoenicians and ancient Egyptians, Japanese engraving and Gothic sculpture.
In Paris, he and his friends had a different life. Available women, drunken conversations with friends past midnight, weeks without bread and most importantly OPIUM.
The sobering happened in one moment. One morning he went into the next room where his friend Casagemas lived. Carlos was lying on the bed with his arms spread out to his sides. A revolver lay nearby. Carlos was dead. It later turned out that the cause of suicide was drug withdrawal.
Picasso's shock was so great that he immediately abandoned his passion for opium and never returned to drugs. The death of a friend turned Picasso's life upside down. After living in Paris for two years, he returned to Barcelona.
Cheerful, temperamental, seething with cheerful energy, Pablo suddenly turned into a thoughtful melancholic. The death of a friend made him think about the meaning of life. In a self-portrait from 1901, a pale man looks at us with tired eyes. Pictures of this period - depression, loss of strength are everywhere, you see these tired eyes everywhere.
Picasso himself called this period blue - “the color of all colors.” On the blue background of death bright colors Picasso paints life. For two years spent in Barcelona, he worked at an easel. I almost forgot my youthful trips to brothels.
“The Ironer” was painted by Picasso in 1904. A tired, fragile woman bent over an ironing board. Weak thin arms. This picture is a hymn to the hopelessness of life.
He reached the pinnacle of excellence in very early age. But he continued to search and experiment. At 25, he was still an aspiring artist.
One of the striking paintings of the “Blue Period” is “Life” of 1903. Picasso himself did not like this painting, considered it unfinished and found it too similar to the works of El Greco - but Pablo did not recognize secondary art. The picture shows three times, three periods of life - past, present and future.
In January 1904, Picasso again went to Paris. This time I am determined to gain a foothold here by any means necessary. And under no circumstances should he return to Spain until he achieves success in the capital of France.
He was close to his “Rose Period”.
One of his Parisian friends was Ambroise Vollard. Having organized the first exhibition of Pablo’s works in 1901, this man soon became a “guardian angel” for Picasso. Vollard was a collector of paintings and, very significantly, a successful art dealer.
Having managed to charm Voller. Picasso provided himself with a sure source of income.
In 1904, Picasso met and became friends with Guillaume Apollinaire.
Also in 1904, Picasso met his first true love of his life - Fernand Olivier.
It is unknown what attracted Fernanda to this short, compact Spaniard (Picasso was only 158 centimeters tall - he was one of the “great shorties”). Their love blossomed quickly and magnificently. Tall Fernanda was crazy about her Pablo.
Fernande Olivier became Picasso's first permanent model. Since 1904, he simply could not work unless there was feminine nature. Both were 23 years old. They lived easily, cheerfully and very poorly. Fernanda turned out to be a useless housewife. And Picasso could not stand this in his women, and their civil marriage went downhill.
“Girl on a Ball” - this painting, painted by Picasso in 1905, is considered by painting experts to be a transitional period in the artist’s work - between “blue” and “pink”.
During these years, Picasso's favorite place in Paris was the Medrano Circus. He loved the circus. because they are circus performers, people of unfortunate fate, professional wanderers, homeless vagabonds, forced to pretend to have fun all their lives.
The nude figures in Picasso's 1906 canvases are calm and even peaceful. They no longer look lonely - the theme of loneliness. anxiety about the future faded into the background.
Several works of 1907, including “Self-Portrait,” were made in a special “African” technique. And the very time of the fascination with masks will be called the “African period” by specialists in the field of painting. Step by step, Picasso moved towards cubism.
“Les Demoiselles d'Avignon” – Picaso worked especially intently on this painting. Whole year he kept the canvas under a thick cape, not allowing even Fernanda to look at it.
The painting depicted a brothel. In 1907, when everyone saw the picture, a serious scandal broke out. Everyone looked at the picture. The reviewers unanimously declared that Picasso’s picture was nothing more than a publishing house over art.
At the beginning of 1907, at the height of the scandal surrounding “ Maidens of Avignon”, the artist Georges Braque came to his gallery. Braque and Picasso immediately became friends and began the theoretical development of Cubism. The main idea was to achieve the effect of a three-dimensional image using intersecting planes and construction using geometric shapes.
This period occurred in 1908-1909. The paintings painted by Picasso during this period were still not much different from the same “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon”. The very first paintings in the cubist style found buyers and admirers.
The period of so-called “analytical” cubism occurred in 1909-1910. Picasso moved away from Cezanne's softness of colors. Geometric figures decreased in size, the images became chaotic, and the paintings themselves became more complex.
The final period of the formation of Cubism is called “synthetic”. It occurred in 1911-1917.
By the summer of 1909, Pablo, who was in his thirties, had become rich. It was in 1909 that he accumulated so much money that he opened his own bank account, and by the fall he was able to afford both new housing and a new workshop.
Eva-Marcel became the first woman in Picasso’s life who left him on her own, without waiting for the artist himself to leave her. In 1915 she died of consumption. With the death of his beloved Eva, Picasso lost the ability to work for a long time. The depression lasted for several months.
In 1917, Picasso's social circle expanded - he met amazing person poet and artist Jean Cocteau.
Then Cocteau convinced Picasso to go with him to Italy, Rome, to unwind and forget his sadness.
In Rome, Picasso saw a girl and instantly fell in love. It was Russian ballet dancer Olga Khokhlova.
“Portrait of Olga in an Armchair” – 1917
In 1918, Picasso proposed. They went together to Malaga so that Olga could meet Picasso’s parents. The parents gave the go-ahead. At the beginning of February, Pablo and Olga went to Paris. Here on February 12, 1918 they became husband and wife.
Their marriage lasted just over a year and began to crack. This time there was most likely a reason. in differences in temperament. Having become convinced of her husband’s infidelity, they no longer lived together, but still Picasso did not divorce. Olga remained the artist’s wife, albeit formally, until her death in 1955.
In 1921, Olga gave birth to a son, who was named Paulo or simply Paul.
Pablo Picasso devoted 12 years to surrealism creative life, periodically returning to Cubism.
Following the principles of surrealism formulated by Andre Breton, Picasso, however, always followed his own path.
“Dance” – 1925
A strong impression is left by Picasso's very first painting, painted in a surrealist style in 1925 under the influence of artistic creativity Breton and his supporters. This is the painting “Dance”. In the work that Picasso designated new period in my creative life, there is a lot of aggression and pain.
It was January 1927. Pablo was already very rich and famous. One day on the embankment of the Seine, he saw a girl and fell in love. The girl's name was Maria-Therese Walter. They were separated by a huge age difference - nineteen years. He rented her an apartment not far from his house. And soon he wrote only Maria Teresa.
Maria-Therese Walter
In the summer, when Pablo took his family to the Mediterranean Sea, Maria Teresa followed. Pablo settled her next to the house. Picasso asked Olga for a divorce. But Olga refused, because day after day Picasso became even richer.
Picasso managed to buy Boisgeloux Castle for Marie-Therese, where he actually moved himself.
In the fall of 1935, Maria Teresa gave birth to his daughter, whom she named Maya.
The girl was registered under the name of an unknown father. Picasso swore that he would recognize his daughter immediately after the divorce, but when Olga died, he never kept his promise.
“Maya with a Doll” – 1938
Marie-Therese Walter became the main inspiration. Picasso for several years. It was to her that he dedicated his first sculptures, on which he worked at the Château de Boisgelou during 1930-1934.
“Maria-Therese Walter”, 1937
Fascinated by surrealism, Picasso completed his first sculptural compositions in the same surreal vein.
For Picasso, the Spanish War coincided with a personal tragedy - Mother Maria died two weeks before it began. Having buried her, Picasso lost the main thread connecting him with his homeland.
There is a tiny town in the Basque country in northern Spain called Guernica. On May 1, 1937, German aircraft raided this city and practically wiped it off the face of the earth. The news of the death of Guernica shocked the Planet. And soon this shock was repeated when a Picasso painting called “Guernica” appeared at the World Exhibition in Paris.
“Guernica”, 1937
In terms of the power of impact on the viewer, no painting can compare with “Guernica”.
In the fall of 1935, Picasso was sitting at a table in a street cafe in Montmartre. Here he saw Dora Maar. And …
Quite a bit of time passed and they found themselves in a shared bed. Dora was Serbian. They were separated by the war.
When the Germans began to invade France, a great exodus occurred. Artists, writers, and poets moved from Paris to Spain, Portugal, Algeria and America. Not everyone managed to escape, many died... Picasso did not go anywhere. He was at home and didn’t give a damn about Hitler and his Nazis. It's surprising that they didn't touch him. It is also surprising that Adolf Hitler himself was a fan of his work.
In 1943, Picasso became close to the communists, and in 1944 he announced that he was joining the French Communist Party. Picasso was awarded the Stalinist Award (in 1950). and then Lenin Prize(in 1962).
At the end of 1944, Picasso went to the sea, to the south of France. It was found by Dora Maar in 1945. It turned out she was looking for him throughout the war. Picasso bought her cozy house here in the south of France. And he announced that it was all over between them. The disappointment was so great that Dora perceived Pablo's words as a tragedy. Soon she suffered from mental illness and ended up in psychiatric clinic. There she lived the rest of her days.
In the summer of 1945, Pablo returned briefly to Paris, where he saw Françoise Gilot and immediately fell in love. In 1947, Pablo and Françoise moved to the south of France to Valoris. Soon Pablo learned the good news - Françoise was expecting a child. In 1949, Picasso's son Claude was born. A year later, Françoise gave birth to a girl, who was given the name Paloma.
But Picasso was not Picasso if family relationships lasted a long time. They were already starting to quarrel. And suddenly Françoise quietly left, it was the summer of 1953. Because of her departure, Picasso began to feel like an old man.
In 1954, Fate brought Pablo Picasso together with his last companion, who in the end of the great painter would become his wife. It was Jacqueline Rock. Picasso was older than Jacqueline by as much as... 47 years. At the time they met, she was only 26 years old. He is 73.
Three years after Olga's death, Picasso decided to buy a large castle in which he could spend the rest of his days with Jacqueline. He chose Vauvereng Castle on the slope of Mount Saint Victoria in the south of France.
In 1970, an event took place that became his main award in these last years. The city authorities of Barcelona turned to the artist with a request to give permission to open his museum paintings. This was Picasso's first museum. The second - in Paris - opened after his death. In 1985, the Parisian Hotel Salé was converted into a Picasso museum.
In the last years of his life, he suddenly began to rapidly lose his hearing and vision. Then my memory began to weaken. Then my legs gave out. By the end of 1972, he was completely blind. Jacqueline was always there. She loved him very much. No moaning, no complaining, no tears.
April 8, 1973 - on this day he died. According to Picasso's will, his ashes were buried next to Voverang Castle...
Source – Wikipedia and Informal biographies (Nikolai Nadezhdin).
