Pablo Picasso

Galerie René Drouet, Paris
Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc., New York (acquired from the above in 1965)
John T. Dorrance, Jr., USA (acquired from the above in 1968. Sale: Sotheby’s, New York, The Collection of John T. Dorrance, Jr., 18^th October 1989, lot 36)
Purchased at the above sale by the previous owner

Princeton, The Art Museum, Princeton University, Princeton Alumni Collections, Works on Paper, 1981, illustrated in the catalogue (titled The Café, Angel Fernandez de Soto and Friend)
Valencia, Fundación Bancaja, Creación y Figura. Figuración en el siglo XX, 1999, no. 15
Balingen, Stadthalle, Pablo Picasso, Metamorphosen des Menschen, Arbeiten auf Papier, 2000, no. 13, illustrated in the catalogue
Liège, Salle Saint Georges, Pablo Picasso, 2000-01, no. 18
Chemnitz, Kunstsammlungen, Picasso et les femmes, 2002-03, illustrated in colour in the catalogue
Tübingen, Kunsthalle, Bordell und Boudoir, Schauplätze der Moderne, 2005, no. 119, illustrated in colour in the catalogue (titled Junges Paar an einem Tisch)

Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso. Supplément aux années 1903-1906, Paris, 1970, vol. 22, no. 1, illustrated pl. 1
Roland Doschka (ed.), Pablo Picasso. Metamorphoses of the Human Form. Graphic Works, 1895-1972, Munich, London & New York, 2000, no. 13, illustrated in colour

Homme et femme à table: Angel Fernández de Soto et son amie explores one of the most iconic themes of Picasso's celebrated Blue period, that of people drinking in a bar. The figures are Angel Fernández de Soto, whom Picasso met in Barcelona in 1899, when he socialised with the group of artists and writers who gathered at the café Els Quatre Gats, and his female companion.

Founded in 1897 by Pedro Romeu and described as 'a Gothic beer-hall for those in love with the North', Els Quatre Gats was an important conduit for new ideas from Northern Europe as well as being a lively bohemian haunt for the younger generation. Picasso made many friends there, including Angel who was to become one of his closest allies during the next four years while he was dividing his time between Barcelona, Madrid and Paris. In 1902 and 1903, Picasso and Angel shared a studio at 17 Calle de la Riera de San Juan in Barcelona, and during those years Picasso executed a number of works depicting his friend, from small sketches and caricatures to highly accomplished portraits, culminating in Portrait de Angel Fernández de Soto (fig. 1). Shortly afterwards Picasso moved out and finally settled in Paris, but the two friends remained close until 1938 when Angel was killed in the Spanish Civil War.

Discussing Picasso's portraiture from this period, John Richardson commented: 'The portraits that Picasso did of his closest friends, Angel de Soto and Sabartès [fig. 2], in the course of his last months in Barcelona, delve far more deeply into character and take far greater liberties than the Soler ones [...] By this time Picasso had learned how to exploit his inherent gift for caricature in depth as a means of dramatizing psychological as well as physiognomical traits. Whereas the average caricaturist externalizes things and comes up with an image that is slick and trite - an instant cliché - Picasso internalizes things and comes up with an enhanced characterization of his subject. Picasso enlarges Angel's heavy-lidded eyes out of all proportion and endows them with his own obsidian stare. Among his immediate predecessors, only Van Gogh had this ability to galvanize a portrait with his own psychic energy' (J. Richardson, A Life of Picasso, London, 1991, vol. I, pp. 286-287).

In his choice of a café scene, Picasso draws on a long established tradition that particularly flourished in the fin-de-siècle Paris, and was often treated by artists including Degas (fig. 3) and Toulouse-Lautrec (fig. 4). This theme had a strong resonance for the young Picasso, who frequented Els Quatre Gats in Barcelona with his bohemian circle of friends and fellow artists, while at the same time being under the influence of the nightlife he had witnessed during his stays in Paris. Although the characters depicted in the present work display the same melancholic mood of Picasso's Blue period works, they are rendered with a brighter, more vibrant palette. Unlike his depictions of the demi-monde such as anonymous musicians and beggars he encountered on the streets of Paris, here he paints a more personal portrait of his close friend, focusing not only on his physiognomy, but also on the fashionable clothes that both Angel and his companion are wearing.

John Richardson described Angel and his relationship with Picasso: 'Picasso was so taken with Angel's stylishness and intransigence that they became inseparable. When they wished to make a fashionable impression they would share their one and only pair of gloves, each of them keeping the uncovered hand in a pocket while conspicuously gesticulating with the gloved one. Although sometimes described as a painter, Angel did not take painting at all seriously. Picasso described him as 'an amusing wastrel,' who worked unhappily for a spice merchant. Years later, I asked Picasso why he had depicted this penniless friend as a foppish man-about-town in white tie and tails. Angel was a dandy who sometimes eked out his small salary by hiring out as an extra at small theatres, he explained, and the spectacle of him improbably attired in borrowed finery as an elegant boulevardier, dashing officer or habitué of Maxim's inspired these fanciful portrait drawings. Despite these disguises, Angel is always instantly recognizable, thanks to the lantern jaw and sardonic expression that Picasso catches so affectionately' (ibid., pp. 115-116).