Les Demoiselles d'Avignon

Les Demoiselles d'Avignon is a famous painting made in 1907 by the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso. It is now in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The painting shows five women in a special house on a street called Carrer d'Avinyó in Barcelona, Spain. The women look strong and unusual, with sharp shapes and mixed styles from many cultures.

Picasso was inspired by masks and art from many parts of the world. He wanted to create something new and powerful. This painting helped change modern art and led Picasso and his friend Georges Braque to develop a new style called cubism.

When the painting was first shown in 1916, many people were surprised and did not like it. It was very different from what people were used to. A poet named André Salmon changed its title to make it less shocking. This artwork is still one of the most important pieces in modern art history.

Background and development

Picasso became a well-known artist in the early 1900s. He moved to Paris from Spain and lived in Barcelona, Madrid, and the Spanish countryside before settling in Paris.

Between 1901 and 1904, Picasso created paintings called his Blue Period. These showed sad moments he saw in Spain and Paris, like families in need and blind people.

From 1904 to 1907, Picasso entered his Rose Period. His paintings used warmer colors and showed happy scenes of circus performers and actors. Two important paintings from this time are Family of Saltimbanques and Boy Leading a Horse. Picasso also painted large pictures of women and showed his work in Paris galleries, becoming popular with art lovers. El Greco, Saint Martin and the Beggar, c. 1597–1600, Art Institute of Chicago

Pablo Picasso, Boy Leading a Horse 1905–06, Museum of Modern Art

Picasso's Rose Period work Boy Leading a Horse, recalls the paintings of Paul Cézanne and El Greco, who influenced Les Demoiselles d'Avignon.

Rivalry with Matisse

In 1905, the Salon d'Automne showed the works of Henri Matisse and the Les Fauves group. A critic named Louis Vauxcelles called them "wild beasts," which made them famous. Some people liked their paintings, while others did not.

Matisse became more famous, but Picasso was also gaining attention after his Blue Period and Rose Period. In 1907, Picasso finished Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, a very surprising painting. This work made Picasso a major artist, and he joined a gallery run by Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, who supported his art. Soon, Picasso was seen as one of the leading modern artists, along with Matisse and others like Georges Braque and André Derain.

Influences

Picasso made many drawings before finishing his famous painting. He liked Spanish art and sculptures from Iberia a lot. Some experts think the painting was also inspired by masks from Africa and the art of Oceania, but Picasso did not agree. One night in 1906, Picasso looked at a figure from Congo owned by Matisse, and that same night he began his first sketches for Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. Some believe Picasso visited the Musée d'Ethnographie du Trocadéro, later called the Musée de l'Homme, in spring 1907, where he saw African and other artworks that inspired him.

One artist Picasso admired was El Greco. In 1907, Picasso started work on Les Demoiselles while respecting El Greco, even though El Greco was not well-known then. Picasso’s friend Ignacio Zuloaga owned one of El Greco’s famous paintings, The Opening of the Fifth Seal, which Picasso studied often. This painting influenced the size, style, and strong feeling of Les Demoiselles.

Another big influence was Paul Cézanne. Cézanne’s artwork was shown in Paris between 1903 and 1907, and his ideas helped shape the beginning of Cubism, which Picasso later explored. Cézanne suggested looking at the world as simple shapes like cubes and spheres, which inspired Picasso and other artists.

Paul Gauguin also influenced Picasso. Gauguin’s strong and simple style, shown in his paintings and sculptures, inspired Picasso’s bold figures in Les Demoiselles. In 1906, Gauguin’s artwork was displayed in Paris, leaving a strong impression on Picasso.

Picasso was also interested in African art and Iberian sculptures. During this time, Europe was learning about African masks and sculptures, which fascinated many artists. Some think Picasso saw these artworks in museums or books, which helped shape the style of the women in Les Demoiselles.

Lastly, Picasso was introduced to ideas about mathematics and geometry by a friend, Maurice Princet. Princet talked about complex shapes and dimensions, which Picasso used in his sketches for the painting.

Impact

Les Demoiselles had a big influence on modern art, but it didn’t become famous right away. The painting stayed in Picasso’s studio for many years. Only Picasso’s close friends and some art experts knew about it at first.

A photo of Les Demoiselles appeared in a magazine in 1910. The painting wasn’t shown to the public until 1916 and didn’t become widely known until the early 1920s.

Picasso’s friends had mixed feelings about the painting. Some liked it, while others found it troubling. One art expert thought the painting helped start a new art style called Cubism.

Public view and title

From July 16 to July 31, 1916, Les Demoiselles was shown to the public for the first time at the Salon d'Antin. This exhibition was organized by André Salmon and took place at 26 rue d'Antin, thanks to the famous couturier and art collector Paul Poiret. The larger Salon d'Automne and Salon des Indépendants were closed because of World War I, making this the only show for Cubist artists in France since 1914.

Picasso called his painting Le Bordel d'Avignon, but André Salmon changed the title to Les Demoiselles d'Avignon to make it less shocking. Picasso did not like this new title, but it became the one everyone used. The painting was stored and kept with Picasso until 1924 when he sold it to a designer named Jacques Doucet.

Later, between September 1984 and January 1985, the painting was displayed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in an exhibition called "Primitivism" in 20th Century Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the Modern. The show aimed to show how modern artists were inspired by tribal art from Africa, Oceania, and North America. However, some people criticized the exhibition.

Interpretation

Pablo Picasso painted each of the women in Les Demoiselles in a unique way. One woman has thick layers of paint, and her head looks very different from the others because Picasso used a style called Cubism. The women look strong and not like typical pictures of women.

Many people have talked about why Picasso painted the women so differently. Some think it shows a change in Picasso’s art style, leading to Cubism. Others believe Picasso chose different styles to show where each woman came from.

Art critic John Berger thought the painting was very surprising when people first saw it. He believed it helped start Cubism. Another expert, Leo Steinberg, thought the different styles were meant to make the viewer feel like the women in the painting were watching them.

The painting was very important in Picasso’s career and helped change modern art. It showed a new way to see and paint the world.

Purchase

Jacques Doucet saw the painting and bought it from Picasso without looking again. Picasso agreed to sell it for 25,000 francs. Doucet offered to pay 2,000 francs each month until the full amount was paid.

Later, Doucet actually paid 30,000 francs. A few months later, he had the painting valued between 250,000 and 300,000 francs. Some believe Picasso sold the painting for less because Doucet promised to leave it to the Louvre after he died. However, when Doucet passed away in 1929, he did not leave the painting to the Louvre, and it was sold with the rest of his collection.

In November 1937, the Jacques Seligman & Co. art gallery in New York City displayed the painting in an exhibition. The Museum of Modern Art bought the painting for $24,000. The museum helped raise $18,000 by selling a Degas painting, and the rest of the money came from donations by the gallery owners Germain Seligman and Cesar de Hauke.

The Museum of Modern Art held a big Picasso exhibition on 15 November 1939. The exhibition was called Picasso: 40 Years of His Art and was organized by Alfred H. Barr together with the Art Institute of Chicago. It featured many works, including the famous painting Guernica and Les Demoiselles.

Legacy

In July 2007, Newsweek called Les Demoiselles d'Avignon the "most influential work of art of the last 100 years." An art critic said that Picasso changed art history with this painting. He showed new and strong figures instead of the usual gentle ones.

The painting appeared in a 1993 play by Steve Martin called Picasso at the Lapin Agile. In this play, the young Picasso meets Albert Einstein in a Paris cafe. The painting was also in the 2018 season of the TV series Genius. This series tells stories about Picasso's life and art.

Painting materials

In 2003, experts at the Museum of Modern Art studied the painting. They found it was made using special paints. The colors include white from lead, black from bone, bright red called vermilion, yellow from cadmium, blue from cobalt, green from emerald, and brown earth colors with iron in them.