Pablo Picasso

Galerie Louise Leiris, Paris
Acquired from the above by the family of the present owner in 1972

Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso, oeuvres de 1967 et 1968, Paris, 1973, vol. 27, no. 386, illustrated pl. 166
The Picasso Project, Picasso's Paintings, Watercolors, Drawings and Sculpture. The Sixties III, 1968-1969, San Francisco, 2003, no. 68-241, illustrated p. 80

The canvas is unlined and there is no evidence of retouching under ultra-violet light. This work is in very good original condition. Colours: In comparison with the printed catalogue illustration, the colours are overall fairly accurate, although slightly fresher in the original.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Nu debout belongs to a series of monumental paintings on the theme of the female nude that Picasso executed in the late 1960s, distinguished by their larger-than-life format and stunning display of painterly virtuosity. In some of these paintings the woman is portrayed as a standing or reclining nude occupying the entire canvas, in others accompanied by a man (fig. 1). The artist's creative energy at this time was remarkable and this series bears evidence of the breath-taking flood of invention and fantastic vitality that characterised Picasso's late years.

 

Discussing Picasso's works from the late 1960s, Marie-Laure Bernadac wrote: 'Picasso now chose to work with isolated figures, archetypes, and concentrated on the essential: the nude, the couple, man in disguise or stripped bare: it was his way of dealing with the subject of women, love, and the human comedy. After isolating the painter in a series of portraits, it was logical that Picasso should now paint the model alone: that is to say a nude woman [...] offered up to the painter's eyes and to the man's desire. It is characteristic of Picasso, in contrast to Matisse and many other twentieth-century painters, that he takes as his model – or as his Muse – the woman he loves and who lives with him, not a professional model. So what his paintings show is never a 'model' of a woman, but woman as model. This has its consequences for his emotional as well as his artistic life: for the beloved woman stands for 'painting', and the painted woman is the beloved: detachment is an impossibility. Picasso never paints from life: Jacqueline never poses for him; but she is there always, everywhere' (M.-L. Bernadac, 'Picasso 1953-1972: Painting as Model', in Late Picasso (exhibition catalogue), The Tate Gallery, London, 1988, p. 78).

 

Picasso married Jacqueline, the final love of his life, in 1961. Although she did not pose for this or other works, features such as her almond-shaped eyes and strong nose are clearly distinguishable in Nu debout. With her voluptuous curves and long dark hair, the model represents the object of the artist's desire, the picture's erotic undertone emphasised by the gap between art and reality, between the eighty-seven year old painter and his young muse. Picasso's waning sexual potency is countered by his power of vision and creativity, by the swift, confident application of paint, and the remarkably bold free-flowing treatment of colour. The love that Picasso felt for his wife is reflected in the passionate vitality and excitement radiating from the present work. Her monumentality and her frontal pose confronting the viewer convey a universality and eternal presence, identifying Jacqueline as the ultimate feminine representation.

 

In his discussion of Picasso's late works, David Sylvester links them to his early masterpiece, Demoiselles d'Avignon: 'The resemblance of figures in the Demoiselles and in late Picasso to masked tribal dancers is as crucial as their scale in giving them a threatening force. It is irrelevant whether or not particular faces or bodies are based on particular tribal models: what matters is the air these personages have of coming from a world more primitive, possibly more cannibalistic and certainly more elemental than ours. Despite the rich assortment of allusions to paintings in the Renaissance tradition, the treatment of space rejects that tradition in favour of an earlier one, the flat unperspectival space of, say, medieval Catalan frescoes... At twenty five, Picasso's raw vitality was already being enriched by the beginnings of an encyclopaedic awareness of art; at ninety, his encyclopaedic awareness of art was still being enlivened by a raw vitality' (D. Sylvester, 'End Game', in ibid., p. 144). Indeed, the present work is a striking example of this vitality and passion Picasso maintained into his later years.

 

 

 

Fig. 1, Pablo Picasso, Le Couple, 1969, oil on canvas, Private Collection, Museo Picasso, Málaga