巴布羅·畢加索

Estate of the artist

Marina Picasso (the artist's grandaughter; by descent from the above)

Acquired from the above by the late owner

Venice, Centro di Cultura di Palazzo Grassi, Picasso, Opere dal 1895 al 1971 dalla Collezione Marina Picasso, 1981, no. 316, illustrated in the catalogue

Munich, Haus der Kunst; Cologne, Josef-Haubrich-Kunsthalle; Frankfurt, Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut & Zurich, Kunsthaus Zürich, Eine Ausstellung zum hundertsten Geburtstag. Werke aus der Sammlung Marina Picasso, 1981-82, no. 261, illustrated in the catalogue

Berlin, Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz & Düsseldorf, Kunsthalle, Picasso Plastiken, 1983-84, no. 168

Lausanne, Musée d'Art Contemporain, Picasso Contemporain, 1994, no. 49, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

Otterlo, Kröller-Müller Museum, Experiment en ruimte. 4 Spaanse beeldhouwers: Picasso, González, Miró en Chillida, 1997-98, no. 12, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

Geneva, Musée Barbier-Mueller, Picasso L'Africain, 1998, no. 42, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

Schwerin, Staatliches Museum,  Pablo Picasso. Der Reiz der Fläche / The Appeal of Surface, 1999, no. 45, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

Paris, Centre Georges Pompidou, Picasso Sculpteur, 2000, no. 248

Geneva, Galerie Jan Krugier, Ditesheim & Cie., Pablo Picasso Metamorphoses. Œuvres de 1898 à 1973 de la collection Marina Picasso, 2001, no. 93, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

Bern, Kunstmuseum Bern, Picasso und die Schweiz, 2001-02, no. 152, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

New York, Jan Krugier Gallery, Pablo Picasso Metamorphoses. Works from 1898 to 1973 from the Marina Picasso Collection, 2002, no. 93, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

Barcelona, Museu Picasso, Picasso de la caricatura a las metamorfosis de estilo, 2003, no. 266, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

New York, Jan Krugier Gallery, The Fire under the Ashes: From Picasso to Basquiat, 2003-04, illustrated in the catalogue

Stuttgart, Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, Picasso Badende, 2005, no. 124, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

The Picasso Project (ed.), Picasso's Paintings, Watercolors, Drawings and Sculpture. The Fifties II, 1956-1959, San Francisco, 2000, no. 58-314, illustrated p. 267 (with incorrect medium)

Werner Spies, Picasso. The Sculptures, Catalogue Raisonné of the Sculptures, Ostfildern & Stuttgart, 2000, no. 509.I, illustrated in colour p. 316 (illustration reversed)

Picasso. The Mediterranean Years 1945-1962 (exhibition catalogue), Gagosian Gallery, London, 2010, illustrated in a photograph p. 246

The surface of the sculpture has been varnished. There is some surface dirt held in the crevices. Apart from some minor chips to the base plate, this work is in very good condition.
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Created from the wooden detritus of his sprawling studios at La Californie, Le jeune homme is a wonderful example of Picasso’s transformative touch and inventiveness. This charmingly naïve - almost puerile - figure, was assembled using the simplest materials and decorated with minimal carving. Drawing inspiration from watching his family playing on the beach of La Garoupe, Picasso portrayed bathers in a variety of media throughout the late 1950s. In August 1956 he started work on a series of wooden sculptures that now belong to the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart. As Werner Spies recounts: ‘He used pieces of wood from crates, wooden sofa feet, and broomsticks; canvas stretchers also appear. […] the appearance of these constructions and assemblages was anticipated in and largely determined by the materials used’ (W. Spies, op. cit., p. 312). Photographs from this period show that Picasso relied on the sculptures as 'models' while painting the canvas versions of his bathers, often propping up the large wooden figures against a blank canvas to preview the effect of his painting. One painted version depicts all six of these sculptures (fig. 1), and belonged in Marina Picasso’s collection alongside the present work until 1984 when she donated the painting to the Musée de l’Art et d’Histoire de la Ville de Genève.

Bathers were a recurring theme in Picasso's œuvre, and one which lent itself to every permutation of his changing styles and concerns. Starting in the early Cubist period, through the Neo-Classical bathers of the early 1920s and the Surrealist figures of the late 1920s and early 1930s, and continuing to La Joie de vivre (Musée Picasso, Antibes) of 1946, figures cavorting, washing and playing on the seashore populate every facet of his remarkable career. From 1918 onward, Picasso spent many summers on the Mediterranean, staying at various places along the coast, before eventually buying La Californie in 1955. This large and ornate nineteenth century villa overlooked the beaches of Cannes and had views of the Golfe Juan and Antibes. This move coincided with a change in the artist's outlook, when he began to respond directly to the visual stimuli of his Mediterranean surroundings, replacing the erotic encounters and mythical figures of the 1920s and 1930s with contemporary bathers and water-sport practitioners.

The primitive appearance of Le jeune homme reflects the powerful influence of the African sculptures Picasso collected assiduously throughout his life. These extraordinary figures and masks made a profound impact on his work. As early as 1907, when in creating his earliest Cubist works, such as the Demoiselles d’Avignon, the ‘primitive’ features of African sculpture are evident. Picasso’s enthusiasm for the aesthetic of the African tribes from Burkina Faso and Gabon remained undimmed and traces of it are found in works from every period of his œuvre. Sculptures such as the standing male figure carved by a member of the Galoan people (fig. 3), which Picasso owned possess a correspondingly hieratic quality to the sculptures he created in the late 1950s.

Picasso also executed a bronze version of Le jeune homme, which was cast by the Valsuani foundry in an edition of 2.