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Lot Essay
In 1904, the young Pablo Picasso moved to Paris. Although Barcelona had previously proved an inspiring place to work, he was determined to make it in the French capital. In April that year, he formally publicized his departure from Spain with an announcement printed in El Liberal and hopped the express train across the border. Once in Paris, he moved into the Bateau Lavoir studio in Montmartre, a location Max Jacob would later refer to as “the Acropolis of cubism” (quoted in J. Richardson, A Life of Picasso, vol. I, London, 1991, p. 296). It was here that Picasso’s art would undergo a radical transformation as he grappled with the representation of space and perspective in two dimensions—and thus change the trajectory of art.
In Paris, Picasso moved away from depictions of the urban poor that had dominated his Spanish canvases, casting his eye instead towards the saltimbanques, the acrobatic performers that filled the city’s streets. Ever experimental, he worked across different media, a tendency that would continue throughout his entire career. Most likely encouraged by his close friend Ricard Canals, he turned to printmaking shortly after his arrival, though this was not Picasso’s first stab at the medium—in 1899, he had executed El Zurdo, a somewhat clumsy and hesitant composition of a man, hand on hip, with a wide-legged stance. Only a few impressions were ever printed, of which a single example survives.
At some point in these first few months at the Bateau Lavoir, Picasso, with Canals’ guidance, began a new print, a technical masterpiece that demonstrated the dramatic evolution of his technique during the interim years, Le repas frugal, now an icon of the artist’s Blue Period. Fernande Oliver recalled seeing the work during her first visit to the studio: “Picasso was working at the time on an etching, which has become famous since: it is of a man and a woman sitting at a table in a wine-shop. There is the most intense feeling of poverty and alcoholism and a startling realism in the figures of this wretched, starving couple” (F. Olivier, Picasso and his friends, London, 1964, pp. 27-28).
The first print-run of Le repas frugal was small and produced by the master printer Auguste Delâtre between September 1904 and March 1905. Picasso was evidently proud of his work, sending examples of the small number of impressions he had pulled to his father, and a few select friends and prospective buyers. He also included Le repas frugal in his 1905 exhibition at the Galeries Serrurier in Paris, where it was shown alongside a group of etchings depicting street performers, which he had produced in the meantime. This group, including Le repas frugal, was later purchased by Ambrose Vollard who, in 1913, printed an edition of 250. Together, these works came to be known as La suite des saltimbanques.
The couple depicted in the present composition are Madeleine, Picasso’s lover at the time, known to scholars only by her first name, and a nameless man who first appeared in several sketches and a gouache by the artist in Barcelona, before making his formal debut in the painting Le repas de l’aveugle (Zervos, vol. 1, no. 168; The Metropolitan Museum of Art). In Le repas frugal, their bodies are elongated and lithe, an effect emphasized by the linear quality of the etching, inspired, in part, by Picasso’s close study of El Greco. This refined treatment of the figures represents a departure from the softer, more painterly bodies of his Barcelona works and signals the aesthetic shift his practice was undergoing at this time.
While Le repas frugal dates from 1904, the seeds of the composition first emerged the year prior, while Picasso was still living in Barcelona. Two related sketches from October 1903—one of crockery, the other a woman in profile—appear directly linked to the final scene in Le repas frugal, while the figures feature in several works, including Le repas de l’avegule: “The allegory of the blinded man,” noted Roland Penrose, “has pursued Picasso throughout his life like a shadow as though reproaching him for his unique gift of vision” (Picasso: His Life and Work, London, 1981, p. 89). This specter as well as that of Madeleine would follow the artist for another two years, their gaunt bodies and faces reappearing in different guises until 1905. As such, Le repas frugal serves as a bridge, linking “Picasso’s Spanish past with his French future” (A Life of Picasso, vol. I, London, 1991, p. 300). The work, therefore, played a defining role in articulating Picasso’s artistic legacy. Not only does it mark the transition between Picasso’s Blue and Rose Periods, as well as his native country and adopted home, it also captures the artist’s earliest steps towards Cubism. Indeed, the arrangement of Carafon, pot et compotier (Zervos, vol. 2a, no. 164; The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum), painted in 1909, with its crumpled tablecloth and assortment of glassware, can be traced back to Le repas frugal.
It is not known how many impressions were printed by Auguste Delâtre in 1904 and 1905. Bernhard Geiser and Brigitte Baer record one impression of the first state (Musée Picasso, Paris); and approximately 35 impressions of the second state, including three printed in Prussian blue. Of these, the following nine examples are in public collections: The Museum of Modern Art, New York (signed, dedicated to Junyent); the Art Institute of Chicago (two impressions: one in blue, signed; one unsigned); Musée Picasso, Paris (signed, numbered no. 1); Museo Picasso, Barcelona (signed, numbered no. 2); National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (signed, numbered no. 3); Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Mass. (signed, numbered no. 4); Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (signed, dedicated to Mlle. Gatte); and Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid (signed, dedicated to Canudo).
Once Vollard acquired the plates of Picasso’s earliest prints, he had them steel-faced, a process in which the copper plates were electroplated with a thin layer of steel. Although this meant the matrix could withstand a much larger print-run, it also eroded the definition, depth and clarity of the etched lines. Only impressions of Le repas frugal printed by Delâtre in 1904-05 prior to the steel-plating, possess the strong contrasts, rich plate tone, and graphic intensity as seen in the present lot.
In Paris, Picasso moved away from depictions of the urban poor that had dominated his Spanish canvases, casting his eye instead towards the saltimbanques, the acrobatic performers that filled the city’s streets. Ever experimental, he worked across different media, a tendency that would continue throughout his entire career. Most likely encouraged by his close friend Ricard Canals, he turned to printmaking shortly after his arrival, though this was not Picasso’s first stab at the medium—in 1899, he had executed El Zurdo, a somewhat clumsy and hesitant composition of a man, hand on hip, with a wide-legged stance. Only a few impressions were ever printed, of which a single example survives.
At some point in these first few months at the Bateau Lavoir, Picasso, with Canals’ guidance, began a new print, a technical masterpiece that demonstrated the dramatic evolution of his technique during the interim years, Le repas frugal, now an icon of the artist’s Blue Period. Fernande Oliver recalled seeing the work during her first visit to the studio: “Picasso was working at the time on an etching, which has become famous since: it is of a man and a woman sitting at a table in a wine-shop. There is the most intense feeling of poverty and alcoholism and a startling realism in the figures of this wretched, starving couple” (F. Olivier, Picasso and his friends, London, 1964, pp. 27-28).
The first print-run of Le repas frugal was small and produced by the master printer Auguste Delâtre between September 1904 and March 1905. Picasso was evidently proud of his work, sending examples of the small number of impressions he had pulled to his father, and a few select friends and prospective buyers. He also included Le repas frugal in his 1905 exhibition at the Galeries Serrurier in Paris, where it was shown alongside a group of etchings depicting street performers, which he had produced in the meantime. This group, including Le repas frugal, was later purchased by Ambrose Vollard who, in 1913, printed an edition of 250. Together, these works came to be known as La suite des saltimbanques.
The couple depicted in the present composition are Madeleine, Picasso’s lover at the time, known to scholars only by her first name, and a nameless man who first appeared in several sketches and a gouache by the artist in Barcelona, before making his formal debut in the painting Le repas de l’aveugle (Zervos, vol. 1, no. 168; The Metropolitan Museum of Art). In Le repas frugal, their bodies are elongated and lithe, an effect emphasized by the linear quality of the etching, inspired, in part, by Picasso’s close study of El Greco. This refined treatment of the figures represents a departure from the softer, more painterly bodies of his Barcelona works and signals the aesthetic shift his practice was undergoing at this time.
While Le repas frugal dates from 1904, the seeds of the composition first emerged the year prior, while Picasso was still living in Barcelona. Two related sketches from October 1903—one of crockery, the other a woman in profile—appear directly linked to the final scene in Le repas frugal, while the figures feature in several works, including Le repas de l’avegule: “The allegory of the blinded man,” noted Roland Penrose, “has pursued Picasso throughout his life like a shadow as though reproaching him for his unique gift of vision” (Picasso: His Life and Work, London, 1981, p. 89). This specter as well as that of Madeleine would follow the artist for another two years, their gaunt bodies and faces reappearing in different guises until 1905. As such, Le repas frugal serves as a bridge, linking “Picasso’s Spanish past with his French future” (A Life of Picasso, vol. I, London, 1991, p. 300). The work, therefore, played a defining role in articulating Picasso’s artistic legacy. Not only does it mark the transition between Picasso’s Blue and Rose Periods, as well as his native country and adopted home, it also captures the artist’s earliest steps towards Cubism. Indeed, the arrangement of Carafon, pot et compotier (Zervos, vol. 2a, no. 164; The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum), painted in 1909, with its crumpled tablecloth and assortment of glassware, can be traced back to Le repas frugal.
It is not known how many impressions were printed by Auguste Delâtre in 1904 and 1905. Bernhard Geiser and Brigitte Baer record one impression of the first state (Musée Picasso, Paris); and approximately 35 impressions of the second state, including three printed in Prussian blue. Of these, the following nine examples are in public collections: The Museum of Modern Art, New York (signed, dedicated to Junyent); the Art Institute of Chicago (two impressions: one in blue, signed; one unsigned); Musée Picasso, Paris (signed, numbered no. 1); Museo Picasso, Barcelona (signed, numbered no. 2); National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (signed, numbered no. 3); Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Mass. (signed, numbered no. 4); Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (signed, dedicated to Mlle. Gatte); and Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid (signed, dedicated to Canudo).
Once Vollard acquired the plates of Picasso’s earliest prints, he had them steel-faced, a process in which the copper plates were electroplated with a thin layer of steel. Although this meant the matrix could withstand a much larger print-run, it also eroded the definition, depth and clarity of the etched lines. Only impressions of Le repas frugal printed by Delâtre in 1904-05 prior to the steel-plating, possess the strong contrasts, rich plate tone, and graphic intensity as seen in the present lot.