From the foremost Picasso scholar, the first volume of his Life of Picasso draws on Richardson's close friendship with Picasso, his own diaries, the collaboration of Picasso's widow Jacqueline, and unprecedented access to Picasso's studio and papers to arrive at a profound understanding of the artist and his work. Combining meticulous scholarship with irresistible narrative appeal, this definitive biography of one of the greatest artists of the twentieth century details the years 1881-1906, from Picasso's beginnings in Spain to age twenty-five in Paris. With more than 800 extraordinary black-and-white illustrations.
At the height of his powers, Pablo Picasso was the artist as revolutionary, breaking through the niceties of form in order to mount a direct challenge to the values of his time. At the height of his fame, he was the artist as royalty: incalculably wealthy, universally idolized−and wholly isolated. In this stunning critical assessment, John Berger−one of this century's most insightful cultural historians−trains his penetrating gaze upon this most prodigious and enigmatic painter and on the Spanish landscape and very particular culture that shpaed his life and work. Writing with a novelist's sensuous evocation of character and detail, and drawing on an erudition that embraces history, politics, and art, Berger follows Picasso from his childhood in Malaga to the Blue Period and Cubism, from the creation of Guernica to the pained etchings of his final years. He gives us the full measure of Picasso's triumphs and an unsparing reckoning of their cost−in exile, in loneliness, and in a desolation that drove him, in his last works, into an old man's furious and desperate frenzy at the beauty of what he could no longer create.
Drawing on exhaustive research from interviews and unpublished archival material, John Richardson has produced the long-awaited third volume of the definitive biography, full of original, groundbreaking new insights into Picasso's life and work. His lively and incisive analysis of the work meshes seamlessly with the rich and detailed narrative of this complex and sensual life. The Triumphant Years reveals Picasso at the height of his powers, producing not only the costumes and sets for such Diaghilev Ballets Russes productions as Parade and Tricorne but some of his most important sculpture and paintings. These are tumultuous years, Picasso torn between marital respectability with Olga, the Russian ballerina who was his first wife, and the erotic passion of his mistress, Marie-Therese. This extraordinary biography ends with the completion of a dramatic series of drawings of the crucifixion. From then on the horrors of war would replace any private horrors, leading ultimately to Picasso's masterpiece, Guernica.
A three-volume study of the life and work of Pablo Picasso captures the artist from his early life in Mâalaga and Barcelona, through his revolutionary Cubist period, to the height of his talent in prewar Europe.
From 1950 to 1962, John Richardson lived near Picasso in France and was a friend of the artist. With a view to writing a biography, the acclaimed art historian kept a diary of their meetings. After Picasso's death, his widow Jacqueline collaborated in the preparation of this work, giving Richardson access to Picasso's studio and papers. Volume one of this extraordinary biography establishes the complexity of Picasso's Spanish roots; his aversion to his native Malaga and his passion for Barcelona and Catalan "modernisme". Richardson introduces new material on the artist's early training in religious art; re-examines old legends to provide fresh insights into the artistic failures of Picasso's father as an impetus to his sons's triumphs; and includes portraits of Apollinaire, Max Jacob and Gertrude Stein, who made up "The Picasso Gang" in Paris during the "Blue" and "Rose" periods.
Discover the remarkable life of Pablo Picasso...Pablo Picasso, born on October 25, 1881, in Málaga, Spain, was one of the twentieth century's most prolific and successful artists. A natural-born prodigy, he began painting at the age of two and never stopped until his death at the age of ninety-one. From a young age, Picasso oozed defiance against formal authority. This was reflected not only in his personal life, which was a tangle of mistresses and wives, but especially in his art. His aim was to recreate reality and change the viewers' preconceived thinking. In his own words, Pablo Picasso painted "objects as I think them, not as I see them." Discover a plethora of topics such as The Birth of a Rebel Picasso's Cubism Picasso during World War I Guernica and the Spanish Civil War Picasso and the Nazis Death and Legacy And much more! So if you want a concise and informative book on Pablo Picasso, simply scroll up and click the "Buy now" button for instant access!
Fernande Olivier was the first real love in the life of Picasso, and the years she spent with the great artist, 1904 to 1912, coincide with some of his most revolutionary work. "Loving Picasso" brings Oliver's memoirs to life with archival photos, reproductions of her own artwork, and a selection of superb portraits of her by Picasso himself. 82 illustrations, 10 in full color.
*Includes pictures of more than 25 of Picasso's most famous works, including an explanation of his techniques and influences. *Includes pictures of Picasso and important people in his life. *Explains the artistic influences and legacy of Picasso's life and art. *Includes a Bibliography for further reading. "Everyone wants to understand painting. Why don't they try to understand the song of the birds? Why do they love a night, a flower, everything which surrounds man, without attempting to understand them? Whereas where painting is concerned, they want to understand. Let them understand above all that the artist works from necessity; that he, too, is a minute element of the world to whom one should ascribe no more importance than so many things in nature which charm us but which we do not explain to ourselves. Those who attempt to explain a picture are on the wrong track most of the time." - Pablo Picasso, 1934 In their biography of Pablo Picasso, Hans Ludwig and Chris Jaffe note that "for him, art was always adventure: 'To find is the thing.'" Indeed, there is perhaps no artist who produced more art than Picasso, whose enormous oeuvre (which spanned most of his 91-year life) contained a countless number of paintings and drawings. Picasso also worked in other mediums as well, notably sculpture and lithography, and his constant experimentation with form makes him a useful case study through which to chart the growth of Modernism as an artistic movement and many of the artistic trends that would dominate the 20th century. At the same time, one of the challenges involved in examining Picasso's body of work is the sheer breadth of it all. In addition to the many different mediums involved, Picasso's works within each medium also vastly differed. For example, placing the paintings of Picasso's Blue Period (1901-1904) against his analytic cubist compositions reveals little similarities, and in many ways, he also anticipated artistic movements such as Abstract Expressionism and Neo-Expressionism. And though he is most famous for his contributions to the Cubist genre, there is a wide disparity between his early analytic cubist works and the later synthetic cubist style. Picasso is one of the world's most famous artists, which adds to the challenge of examining his career, but it's necessary to examine his entire career because of the way art was intertwined with his life. Even from an early age, it was clear that he subordinated any external concerns relating to his life in the interest of making art, which may have been the cause of the spirit of melancholy that can be found in his artwork. At the same time, the somber tone of some of his work can be directly contrasted against his playful formal experimentation. History's Greatest Artists: The Life and Legacy of Pablo Picasso examines Picasso's life and career, while analyzing his painting style, artistic themes, and his legacy. Along with pictures of some of his most famous work, a bibliography, and a Table of Contents, you will learn about one of history's greatest painters like you never have before, in no time at all.
One of The Christian Science Monitor’s Best Nonfiction Books of 2018 “An engrossing read…a historically and psychologically rich account of the young Picasso and his coteries in Barcelona and Paris” (The Washington Post) and how he achieved his breakthrough and revolutionized modern art through his masterpiece, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. In 1900, eighteen-year-old Pablo Picasso journeyed from Barcelona to Paris, the glittering capital of the art world. For the next several years he endured poverty and neglect before emerging as the leader of a bohemian band of painters, sculptors, and poets. Here he met his first true love and enjoyed his first taste of fame. Decades later Picasso would look back on these years as the happiest of his long life. Recognition came first from the avant-garde, then from daring collectors like Leo and Gertrude Stein. In 1907, Picasso began the vast, disturbing masterpiece known as Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Inspired by the painting of Paul Cézanne and the inventions of African and tribal sculpture, Picasso created a work that captured the disorienting experience of modernity itself. The painting proved so shocking that even his friends assumed he’d gone mad, but over the months and years it exerted an ever greater fascination on the most advanced painters and sculptors, ultimately laying the foundation for the most innovative century in the history of art. In Picasso and the Painting That Shocked the World, Miles J. Unger “combines the personal story of Picasso’s early years in Paris—his friendships, his romances, his great ambition, his fears—with the larger story of modernism and the avant-garde” (The Christian Science Monitor). This is the story of an artistic genius with a singular creative gift. It is “riveting…This engrossing book chronicles with precision and enthusiasm a painting with lasting impact in today’s art world” (Publishers Weekly, starred review), all of it played out against the backdrop of the world’s most captivating city.
The story of Picasso's life and work with 100 full-color illustrations of his paintings -- from the evocative images of his Blue and Rose periods to his forays into Cubism, and on to the prolific, diverse, and unique output of his later years.
