Pablo Picasso

Estate of the artist
Marina Picasso Collection
Private Collection (acquired from the above)

Venice, 1981, illustrated in the catalogue
Munich & travelling, 1981-82, illustrated in the catalogue
Tokyo & Kyoto, 1983, illustrated in the catalogue
London, 1988, illustrated in the catalogue
Barcelona & Bern, 1992, illustrated in colour in the catalogue
Berlin, 1999, illustrated in the catalogue
New York & Geneva, 2001-02

Glimcher & Glimcher (ed.), no. 2, illustrated in colour p. 21

“The theme of the figure seated on the stone cube, and occasionally the representation of just the cube itself, appears throughout this period. Its most fully realised form is in the sizable painting Young Acrobat on a Ball…” (Glimcher & Glimcher et al., op cit., p. 13)

The present work is probably a study for the painting described above (fig. 1) and is one of six drawings in the sketchbook depicting a seated figure. The elegant, waspish man in the present work, though not similar to the muscleman in the canvas was probably drawn from an actual model in the artist’s studio, rather than from Picasso’s imagination. The six drawings were executed in Picasso’s studio using the same model depicted from different angles (also see lots 125, 127, 130, 135, 139). The present work is a tremendous document of the stringent and methodical studies Picasso’s made before approaching a major canvas in this period.  There is also a striking similarity to the pose of Garçon à la pipe of 1905, sold Sotheby's New York in May 2004 (see p. 41).


Fig. 1 Pablo Picasso, Acrobate à la boule, 1905, oil on canvas, Pushkin Museum, Moscow