Pablo Picasso

Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso, Supplément aux Volumes 1 à 5, Paris, 1954, vol. 6, no. 1468, illustrated pl. 175
Wilhelm Boeck, Picasso, Paris, 1955, no. 44, illustrated p. 461 (and dated circa 1908-09)
Maurice Jardot, Pablo Picasso: Drawings, New York, 1959, illustrated pl. 26

Looking backwards over his left shoulder, the male figure in the present work is noteworthy for the radical dislocation of his features. It belongs to a group of powerful studies of the male figure that occupied Picasso in the winter and spring of 1908-1909, between his return from La Rue des Bois and his departure for Horta da Ebro. Foremost in the group is the monumental Homme nu assis in the Musée d’Art Moderne du Nord, Villeneuve d’Ascq. The present work can also be compared with a series of studies related to the Famille d’harlequin painted in spring 1909, notably Arlequin (Zervos, vol. 2, no. 149) and Buste d’homme (Zervos, vol. 2*, no. 141). By this time, the overt references to African sculpture that had characterised much of Picasso's work since Les Demoiselles d’Avignon had greatly diminished.  What remained from this experience was a firm commitment to the clearest possible statement of three dimensional forms on a flat surface. The example of Cézanne was also never very far from his mind

Fig.I. Pablo Picasso, Homme nu assis, 1908, oil on canvas, Musée d'Art Moderne du Nord, Villeneuve d'Ascq