Pablo Picasso

Picasso was a consummate draftsman, drawing throughout his career to resolve artistic problems: how to show volume, mass and weight; how to convey movement, and how to establish monumentality and scale. At critical moments in his development he drew with increased fervor. This was the case in 1907, while he was working on the breakthrough composition, Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (The Museum of Modern Art, New York). His numerous sketchbooks and drawings illustrate the evolution of his figural compositional ideas, some of which found their way into Les Demoiselles, while others became the basis for independent works.

Nu - étude pour Les Demoiselles d'Avignon was created in watercolor and gouache on a standard-size, large sheet of paper - 63 by 48 cm - which Picasso used for many figural studies in 1907. Some were done primarily in gouache: Tête de femme (Zervos, vol. 26, no.15), Etude pou le marin: homme roulant une cigarette (Zervos, vol. 2*, no. 7), Femme nue aux bras levés (Zervos, vol. 6, no. 906), Femme nue au pied (Daix, 42), Femme nue aux bras levés ( Zervos, vol. 2*, no.13), Etude pour la demoiselle accroupie: tête de femme, le menton dans la main (Zervos, vol. 26, no. 276) and Portrait of Max Jacob, (Zervos, vol. 2*, no 9). In these drawings Picasso combined bold strokes of gouache or sometimes ink with areas of loosely applied wash, leaving much of the surrounding space untouched. In several of them he mixed wash, oil or ink with gouache, and in all distilled the human figure down to its geometric essentials. Perhaps the closest in technique and, also related in form, is the full-length nude Femme nue au pied. Her torso is reduced to a dominant curve, which is echoed by the curve of her legs, and wash extends beyond the contour of the figure at various points. The head is rendered as if it were a mask, and strokes of paint to the right function both as shadow and as hair. The present work relates to Femme nue au pied through the bold lines Picasso used to simplify and to define the body. Both sketches deploy watercolor not only to indicate the color of the body but also to suggest the surrounding space.

Picasso presented the figure of the present work from multiple perspectives. The lower body is seen from behind, while her curved right arm is shown from the front. The head has been obscured so its angle is now unknown. This idea of combining back and frontal views in a single figure is directly connected to other studies for the Demoiselles as well as the final work. In a Picasso sketchbook of March 1907, several studies for a squatting woman seen from multiple perspectives appear alongside sketches for some standing figures from Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. The squatting figure, seen from the back, but with mask-like head facing outwards, occupies the right-hand side of the final painting. However, the sketchbook reveals that Picasso first envisaged the squatting figure seen entirely from the back, head turned away from the viewer. In the drawing in question, her long hair runs down her back. The drawing shows her left leg and foot, while the right leg is incomplete. The position of the right arm (also incomplete) and leg relates to the corresponding arm and leg in the present work. However in the present work the figure balances on the left foot, as indicated by the twisting bend of the left leg. The figure is in motion.
 
Among Picasso's early drawings and paintings, there are few studies of figures in motion; most are static. The present subject is exceptional for its dynamism which suggests this is a dancing figure. Picasso depicted related figures, thought to be dancers, later that year, including Femme nue (Zervos, vol.2*, no. 35), in which the foot is bent back to support the kneeling figure. But apparently he decided not to pursue further the particular movement seen in the present work.

A final small composition, Nu assis tenant son pied gauche, (Zervos, vol. 26, no. 262) can be directly related to the present work. The circular position of the arms in this little painting is echoed by the exaggerated right arm in the present work. In both cases the legs are spread wide, although the little painting affords an intimate view of a woman examining her foot while in the drawing, the figure seems to be performing a Saint Vitus dance.