Pablo Picasso’s unconventional life was filled with female companions who nourished his rich and prolific artistic career. The portraits of the women in his life convey a wide range of emotions, but Picasso painted one woman repeatedly in the final years of his life: his last lover, wife, and muse Jacqueline Roque. Despite a significant age difference, their romance began in 1952, when Picasso was living in Vallauris, a small town on the southern coast of France known for its pottery. At the time, Picasso was fascinated by ceramics and the two met while Jacqueline was working at Madoura Pottery, the studio where Picasso spent significant time. The next year, Picasso’s relationship with his lover Françoise Gilot ended, and Jacqueline became a formal part of Picasso’s life. They would be together for the next twenty years, and particularly after their marriage in 1961, she carried the artist through the final chapter of his impressive life. Jacqueline’s legendary face first appeared in Picasso’s work in 1954. She was the only muse in Picasso’s late paintings, and she became the most frequent and longest-running subject in his career, featuring in more paintings than any of his previous lovers. These golden years, which art historian John Richardson called “l'epoque Jacqueline,” show that Jacqueline played a decisive role in Picasso’s late artistic career.

This season, Sotheby’s Hong Kong is proud to offer Picasso’s Femme Accroupie (1954) (Lot 1017), a joyful, loving portrait and one of the first works he painted of Jacqueline. The piece bears witness to the beginning of the relationship between artist and muse, but it also laid a foundation for the outstanding portraits that Jacqueline would inspire. While he was painting Femme Accroupie, Picasso, in love once again, embarked upon a brand-new stage in his life and discovered an untapped source of confidence and creativity. That same year, Picasso painted the fifteen works in the Les Femmes d'Alger series, a homage to the odalisques of Eugène Delacroix and Henri Matisse. Les Femmes d'Alger (Version “O”) has long held the record–a staggering US$179.4 million – for a Picasso painting at auction. Femme Accroupie is the beginning of the conception of that series. This painting stands as Picasso’s personal defense of representational art at a transitional time in the post-war art world, but it was also the final realization of an idea that he had been contemplating for the last 50 years. In this work, he engages with his predecessors and contemporaries, showcasing his boundless creativity.

Femme Acccroupie comes directly from the esteemed collection of Kate and Allan Emil and has been with the family since its acquisition in 1957. Allan Emil was a prominent American philanthropist and patron of the arts, who served vital roles on the boards of Federation of Jewish Philanthropies, Whitney Museum of American Art, American Federation of Arts, and Bennington College. Part of his distinguished art collection was donated to world-class museums, including The Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; most notably, he donated the colossal Buste of Sylvette sculpture to New York University in 1968, a New York City landmark that stands till this day. Through his benevolent contribution to arts and education, Mr. Emil demonstrated the noble sentiment of giving back to the society and continued to inspire generations to come.

Since its creation, Femme Accroupie was exhibited widely in Picasso's solo shows at several significant galleries in the United States, such as the Saidenberg Gallery, for which Allan Emil had financed the acquisition of Picasso paintings. Femme Accroupie was also presented as the cover in the catalogue of "Picasso: His Later Works 1938-1961" exhibition at Worcester Art Museum in 1962 and featured prominently in the "Picasso Since 1945" exhibition at The Washington Gallery of Modern Art in 1966. Moreover, the work appeared in the documentary filmstrip "Picasso: The Later Years", produced by Miller-Brody Productions in 1968. The splendid and rich history fully manifested the historical, cultural and artistic values embodied in Femme Accroupie, which finds no parallel among Picasso's oeuvre.

Following the success of Buste de Matador, which sold for HK$139.9 million earlier this year at Sotheby’s Spring Sale achieving the highest ever price for Picasso in Asia. Femme Accroupie is poised to eclipse this record in its first appearance at auction in October, an indicator of bidders’ appetite for the master’s epoch-defining contribution to art.

Picasso fell in love with Jacqueline’s classic features. Her slender neck, large, spirited eyes, straight nose, and thick eyebrows are strong, identifiable features in his late work. Picasso biographer Antonina Vallentin called her a “modern sphinx” for this unique air of archaic elegance. Jacqueline first appeared in Jacqueline aux Fleurs and Jacqueline aux Bras Croisés (Collection of Musée Picasso Paris), painted on successive days of 2 June and 3 June 1954, respectively. Picasso painted her distinctive profile in clear lines that blended his Cubist style from the 1910s and his Neo-Classical style from the 1920s. These paintings imbue the figure with a sculptural quality reminiscent of an image of an ancient god and show the artist’s reverence for his new muse. Several months later, Jacqueline inspired Picasso once again. In October 1954, he painted seven oil portraits of Jacqueline, with a more spontaneous style that evinced more passion compared with the cool rigor of the June paintings. The relationship between artist and muse had developed by leaps and bounds, moving Picasso to produce a series of portraits with greater depth of feeling. Five works, including this work and Jacqueline Assise (Collection of Museo Picasso Málaga), feature Jacqueline in profile as she sits clasping her knees, which demonstrates Picasso’s particular interest in this pose. Femme Accroupie, painted on 14 October 1954, is likely the last work in the sequence and the culmination of the artist’s work on the series.

Jacqueline’s posture, in addition to conveying the ease of a woman sitting in her lover’s studio, was an artistic allusion for Picasso. When he first met Jacqueline, Picasso’s acute visual memory immediately connected her face to Eugène Delacroix’s famed Femmes d'Alger dans leur appartement (1834). The woman sitting with one knee raised on the right side of the French Romantic artist’s painting has a classic Mediterranean charm very similar to Jacqueline’s. Picasso once tenderly explained this coincidence, “Delacroix had already met Jacqueline.” Before Jacqueline moved to southern France, she was married to a colonial official and lived in Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso). Picasso, who had been captivated by African culture for more than half a century, was fascinated with Jacqueline’s experiences of the continent, declaring, “Jacqueline has an African provenance.” All of this inspired Picasso to transform his muse into one of the odalisques so often found in Orientalist paintings. In addition to Jacqueline’s physical resemblance to a languid, sensual odalisque, she also had the yielding, gentle temperament. The power dynamic in their relationship is fully reflected in the model’s demure seated posture and her gentle gaze meeting that of the artist outside the painting.

Jacqueline’s appearance in Picasso’s life compelled him to paint portraits of her, as well as a series of fifteen works entitled Les Femmes d'Alger between 1954 and 1955. His previous lover, Françoise Gilot, recalled in her memoir: “(Picasso) had often spoken to me of making his own version of the Women of Algiers and had taken me to the Louvre on an average of once a month to study it.” Picasso had long respected Delacroix’s work, and he had been contemplating the women of Algiers as a motif for quite some time: his earliest drawings and sketches on the subject date back to 1940. However, it was only after Jacqueline’s arrival late in his life that Picasso had a sudden rush of inspiration and finally found a way to express his admiration for the Romantic master. In 1954, Picasso began creating one of the most important groups of paintings in his artistic career, with Femme Accroupie as a compositional prototype for the series.

When painting Jacqueline in Femme Accroupie, Picasso purposely introduced elements from the patterned garments that the odalisque wore in Delacroix’s painting. This interest in a mysterious exotic world also evokes the works of another artist – an early rival and later friend to Picasso. Henri Matisse had depicted Turkish odalisques with brilliantly coloured, ornate backgrounds since 1918. The decorative colour effects in those paintings are a distinct hallmark of early 20^th century modernism and inspired many of Matisse’s contemporaries. Not long after he painted Femme Accroupie, Picasso learned of the death of Matisse, with whom he had stood, shoulder to shoulder, at the forefront of modern art for so many years. Picasso said, “When Matisse died, he left his odalisques to me as a legacy.” Several weeks later, Picasso began developing his Les Femmes d'Alger series, inspired by Jacqueline. In composition, the works contain obvious references to Delacroix, but in spirit, they are homages to Matisse. Jacqueline brought to life the character of a mysterious, exotic odalisque who had traveled from Delacroix to Matisse to Picasso, and this version of Femme Accroupie was like a flash of prophetic inspiration, activating Picasso’s imagination and launching an extremely productive creative period.

By the 1950s, Picasso was a celebrated master of 20^th-century art. He was one of the exceptional few artists who had been written into the history books during his lifetime; he had never been knocked off his pedestal, and he always remained relevant. Even at the age of 70, Picasso continued to challenge himself and the art world, striding boldly into his final chapter. At that point in his life, one question lingered in his mind: on the foundations laid by his predecessors, how would he find his own place in history and make his next breakthrough? His response was Les Femmes d'Alger, a series of homages to Delacroix and Matisse in 1954 and 1955, as well as tributes to Diego Velázquez’s Las Meninas in 1957 and to Édouard Manet’s Le Déjeuner sur l'Herbe from 1959 to 1962. Picasso’s reinterpretations of works by these masters embody his admiration for them. Abstract art rose to prominence in the post-war period, though representational art had changed many times between the Renaissance and the 20^th century, and Picasso had personally pushed it into new territory. He had pioneered a new artistic vocabulary, but his work also presaged the end of representational painting. At that critical moment, Femme Accroupie was the first in a series of paintings that looked back to the work of previous masters, giving it immense historical weight.

Femme Accroupie is a profound homage to Picasso’s artistic forerunners, but it is also a synthesis of his previous styles. Jacqueline’s features in this painting represent a change from the sculptural quality Picasso had given them earlier in the series, depicting her with a surreal double face divided into left and right profiles that interlock to create the contours of a complete visage. The layered, interconnecting planes create endless visual interest, and offer an alternative way to present three-dimensional space in two dimensions. Picasso often used this technique in his paintings of women, so this portrait resonates with his previous portraits of Françoise Gilot and Sylvette David. By the 1950s, Picasso was also applying techniques he had mastered from papercutting and sheet metal sculpture to his paintings, constructing multiple angles that, in addition to subverting classic perspective, enabled him to offer the viewer a complete picture of Jacqueline’s unique charm. The background of the painting is composed of large blocks of pure colour, which are distilled from early Cubism and symbolise the joy that springs from new love and inspiration. Picasso also incorporated elements of Matisse’s late cut-outs, suggesting his affection for the friend with whom he had shaped Modernism.

畢加索一生千般風流，徘徊在眾多女伴之間，長年地滋潤著其豐富多產的創作歷程。觀其畫中女性的風情萬種，如閱歷著生命旅途中變幻無窮的風景，然而讓舉世才子傾盡餘生反覆描繪的，唯數其最後的情人、妻子與繆斯女神——賈桂琳・蘿可。兩人的忘年戀情始於1952年，其時畢加索醉心鑽研陶瓷製作，在以陶藝聞名的法國南部海濱小鎮瓦洛里定居生活，當時賈桂琳在畢翁經常流連的馬杜拉陶器坊工作，二人由此結緣；翌年，畢加索與前任女伴梵思娃・吉洛結束十年情，賈桂琳才正式踏進畢加索的生活裡，展開長達二十年的世紀佳緣，並在1961年與之共結連理，陪伴藝術家走過輝煌生命裡的最終章。賈桂琳那張如神話般脫俗的臉龐，自1954年起開始滲透畢加索的創作中，漸漸成為唯一出現於晚年畢翁筆下的繆斯，成就藝術家畢生最龐大、最長久的主題系列，入畫頻率大幅超越過往的女伴。此段精彩動人的黃金歲月，更被藝術史學者約翰·理查森美譽為「賈桂琳的時代」，引證女方在畢翁晚年藝術生涯裡舉足輕重的角色。

本季，香港蘇富比有幸呈獻畢加索於1954年最早為賈桂琳所創之一的深情甜蜜肖像《抱膝女子》，見證這段舉世才子與繆斯女神的情份伊始，為往後超過400幅以賈桂琳為靈感之人像畫樹立典範。本作誕生之時，畢加索在愛情的呼召下踏上璀璨人生的嶄新階段，觸發前所未見的魄力與創意，同年畢翁即展開十五幅致敬德拉克洛瓦及馬蒂斯筆下大宮女題材之《阿爾及爾女人》系列，其一之《阿爾及爾女人（O版本）》以1億7936萬美元長居藝術家拍賣紀錄首位，而《抱膝女子》即為此系列之構思雛型，別具非凡意義。本作亦象徵著畢翁在戰後藝壇的時代交接期間，以一己之力維護具象藝術的半壁江山，畫面貫徹其經歷半世紀發酵和深化的美學理念，以驍勇之姿與古今大師展開隔空對話，體現源源不竭的創造力。

《抱膝女子》自1957年一直隱身私人珍藏中，前藏家凱特與艾倫・愛美爾伉儷是美國知名慈善家暨藝術贊助人，曾為紐約猶太人慈善聯合會、惠特尼美國藝術館、美國藝術聯合會和本寧頓學院等擔任公職，其部分藝術珍藏捐贈多間世界級館藏，包括紐約現代美術館、紐約大都會美術館、紐約古根漢美術館，更曾在1968年將畢加索的《西爾維特頭像》巨型雕塑捐贈紐約大學，透過藝術與教育貢獻體現回饋社會之高尚情操。

《抱膝女子》誕生以來，曾多次展出於畢加索的美國個人展覽，包括多間紐約重要畫廊，博物館的足跡則有伍斯特藝術館及華盛頓現代藝術館，而從1962年伍斯特藝術館〈畢加索：後期作品1938-1961〉的展冊可見本作不僅擔當圖錄封面，更與《阿爾及爾女人（J版本）》版本同場展出，彰顯兩者在創作上密切聯繫；本作亦曾亮相於1968年由米勒-布羅迪製作公司出品之《畢加索：晚年》紀錄片中；精彩豐富的早年展歷，反映其所蘊藏的歷史、文化與藝術價值均舉世無雙，堪稱美術館級別之大師鉅獻。如今《抱膝女子》首釋於市並登陸亞洲，繼本年春季以1億3994萬港幣於蘇富比成交之《鬥牛士》後，再次衝擊亞洲紀錄，讓藏家一同見證這位天才大師之劃時代貢獻。

賈桂琳一副饒富古典韻味的容貌，惹得畢加索對她一見傾心，其修長的脖子、精靈的大眼、筆直的鼻子、濃密的眉毛，成為畢翁晚期畫中最強的特徵識別，傳記作者安東尼娜・瓦倫丁更曾以「現代的獅身人面像」比喻其復古典雅的獨有氣質。賈桂琳的形象首次出現於1954年6月2日及3日所創的《賈桂琳與玫瑰》和《雙手交叉的賈桂琳》（巴黎國立畢加索博物館藏）中，畫中以深刻的線條勾勒其鮮明的側面輪廓，風格上糅合畢翁始於一〇年代的立體主義以及二〇年代的新古典主義，賦予畫中人如遠古神像般的雕塑感，盡顯藝術家對於這位新任繆斯女神的尊崇敬仰之情。沉澱數月後，畢加索於同年10月再次以賈桂琳為靈感，創作了七幅賈桂琳肖像油畫，不但畫風更見純熟，情感內蘊亦更顯熾熱，去卻前作所呈現的冰冷質感，反映藝術家與繆斯的感情發展一日千里，才誕下如此深情真摯的人像系列；當中包括本作及《坐姿的賈桂琳》（馬拉加畢加索博物館藏）在內之五幅作品，均以抱膝側像為型，足證藝術家對此一構圖尤感興趣，而創於1954年10月14日之《抱膝女子》在時序上屬最後一幅，堪稱此系列之終極呈現。

賈桂琳的抱膝姿態，除了是愛人在畫室舒坦愜意的肢體語言，對於畢加索而言，亦另有一番典故。在初遇賈桂琳時，擁有超强視覺記憶的畢翁，馬上從其面容聯想到法國浪漫主義殿堂級大師德拉克洛瓦創於1834年之驚世名作《閨房中阿爾及爾女人》，畫中右下方抱膝盤腿而坐的女人，擁有地中海地區典型風韻的長相，與賈桂琳的神情酷似；如此巧合，讓畢加索憐愛地驚嘆：「德拉克洛瓦早已遇見賈桂琳。」事實上，賈桂琳移居南法前，曾與任職殖民官員的前夫居住西非內陸國家上沃爾特，對非洲文化著迷逾半世紀的畢翁，被賈桂琳此段親身經歷深深地吸引著，並曾戲稱：「賈桂琳擁有非洲的血統」，因而將眼前繆斯化身為東方主義（Orientalism）繪畫中常見的閨房宮女。賈桂琳不僅在外貌上神似慵懶而性感的宮女，其順從溫和的本性亦然；兩人精神上的主僕關係，亦全然展示於模特兒抱膝安坐、嬌弱可人的姿態，以及其溫柔眼神與框外畫者互動的隱喻當中。

賈桂琳的出現，不僅促成了一系列女像畫，更啓發畢翁於1954至1955年間創作了十五幅《阿爾及爾女人》之同名系列；其前任女友吉洛曾在回憶錄中提到：「他（畢加索）經常對我說，想要創造屬於自己的《阿爾及爾女人》，並至少每個月都帶我去一次羅浮宮，親炙德拉克洛瓦的真跡 」，引證畢翁對德拉克洛瓦的敬意已醞釀多年，而「阿爾及爾女人」此一題材亦是經歷長久發酵，最早在1940年已有相關題材的速寫素描。直至賈桂琳在其晚年的生命裡華麗登場，畢翁才頓然思如泉湧，終於領悟致敬大師的表達方式，由此開展其藝術生涯中至關重要的繪畫系列之一，而《抱膝女子》正是此系列之構思原型。

為賈桂琳塑型時，畢加索亦特意引入德拉克洛瓦畫中宮女所穿著的民族紋樣服飾，此番對東方神秘世界的情結，同時讓人聯想到畢翁早年競敵暨晚年摯友馬蒂斯，以及其筆下著名之宮女題材。自1918年起，馬蒂斯即常以土耳其宮女爲題作畫，背景常襯以鮮艷斑斕的圖案裝飾，畫中具裝飾性的色彩表現，無疑是二十世紀初最鮮明的現代圖騰，給予同代人極大啓發。在《抱膝女子》創作後不久，畢翁得知與之並肩膀多年的現代先鋒馬蒂斯已離開人世，曾感性地明言：「當馬蒂斯離開了，他的宮女留下給我作遺產。」數星期後，畢翁即開展以賈桂琳為靈感之《阿爾及爾女人》系列，構圖上或明顯參照德拉克洛瓦之作，精神上卻飽含向馬蒂斯致敬之情。從德拉克洛瓦、到馬蒂斯、再到畢加索，賈桂琳演活了畫中散發著神秘異國情調的宮女角色，而本作的誕生，則如獲得了先知性的啟示，觸發畢加索靈感迭現，迎來又一段極具生產力的創作時期。

五〇年代，畢加索已然是二十世紀藝壇上享負盛名的殿堂級大師，向來罕有藝術家如他一般，在世之時已被寫進經典，名聲持久不墜而不為時代巨輪所淘汰。畢翁一生輝煌，即使已屆古稀之年，仍不斷挑戰自我、挑戰藝壇，精彩而奮力地走過人生的最終章。此時，最縈繞其思緒的，是如何在前人的貢獻上，尋找自己在歷史中的定位，並再創現代里程碑，因而誕生1954至1955年致敬德拉克洛瓦及馬蒂斯之《阿爾及爾女人》系列，還有1957年致敬委拉斯開茲的《宮女》系列、1959至1962年致敬愛德華・馬奈的《草地上的午餐》系列等，以重新演繹大師傑作之方式，體現藝術家對前朝巨匠之敬慕。戰後時代，抽象風格蔚成風氣，具象藝術從文藝復興時期以來，經歷多番蛻變而走到了二十世紀，畢翁親手將之推往新境地，不僅開創了一種嶄新的藝術語言，同時亦預示了具象繪畫的終結，面對此空前絕後的盛況，《抱膝女子》是一系列回顧大師作品之首篇，其歷史重量不言而喻。

《抱膝女子》除了蘊含致敬前人的深厚寓意，同時亦是畢加索回顧自身風格的綜合性作品。在本作中，賈桂琳的五官表現一改此系列初期所展現的立體雕塑感，並以超現實的雙重面目示人，左右兩邊分別呈現半張側相，拼湊而成完整的正面輪廓，在平面之上探索三維空間的另類呈現方式；如此畫法，在畢加索的女像中蔚為經典，與稍早前的吉洛肖像、西爾維特肖像等均有共鳴之處，在塊面的堆積與交錯間，構成了無窮無盡的視覺趣味。與此同時，畢翁亦應用到五〇年代從剪紙工藝及金屬薄版雕塑製作所掌握的技術，在畫中築起多重角度與視點，不僅顛覆傳統的透視法，亦供觀者全方位欣賞賈桂琳的獨特媚態。畫中背景以大塊的純淨色面所構成，除了象徵此刻藝術家在愛情與靈感滋潤下的滿心喜悅，亦代表其將早年的立體主義精萃，融匯馬蒂斯晚年所嗜好的剪紙藝術，隱然種下與摯友並肩創造現代主義之懷緬與期盼。