Girl before a Mirror , one the most extraordinary works among MoMA's vast collection of Pablo Picasso's paintings and sculptures, takes the traditional artistic theme of a woman before her mirror and reinvents it in radically modern terms. The girl's profile and blonde hair identify her as Marie-Thérèse Walter, the artist's lover, muse, and a profoundly transformative presence in both his life and art, but the painting is far from a conventional portrait. Its dazzling jewel-like colors, boldly contoured shapes, and surface patterning transform the girl and her shadowy reflection into an image both captivating and strange.
In this volume of the One on One series, an essay by curator Anne Umland explores the painting in depth and describes the circumstances of its creation: the artist's private life, his practice as a sculptor, his rivalry with other artists both living and dead, and his concern, at age fifty-one, about his contemporary relevance and artistic legacy.
Girl before a Mirror , one the most extraordinary works among MoMA's vast collection of Pablo Picasso's paintings and sculptures, takes the traditional artistic theme of a woman before her mirror and reinvents it in radically modern terms. The girl's profile and blonde hair identify her as Marie-Thérèse Walter, the artist's lover, muse, and a profoundly transformative presence in both his life and art, but the painting is far from a conventional portrait. Its dazzling jewel-like colors, boldly contoured shapes, and surface patterning transform the girl and her shadowy reflection into an image both captivating and strange.
In this volume of the One on One series, an essay by curator Anne Umland explores the painting in depth and describes the circumstances of its creation: the artist's private life, his practice as a sculptor, his rivalry with other artists both living and dead, and his concern, at age fifty-one, about his contemporary relevance and artistic legacy.