Pablo PICASSO, (1881-1973)
The greatest painter and most innovative sculptor of the twentieth century,
Pablo Picasso was also its greatest graphic artist. His published prints
total approximately 2,000 different images pulled from metal, stone and
other media. Although Picasso learned painting and drawing in childhood,
he acquired his many-sided proficiency as a printmaker in the graphic
arts by stages in the course of his adult life.
The cataloguer of Picasso's prints Georges Bloch has observed: "Picasso
is truly revealed by following the genesis of his work from one date
to another. All his phases and styles, which we use as landmarks, are
in reality only successive stages of a continuity that constitutes the
phenomenon of Picasso."
Picasso spend the first forty years of his work in prints exploring
the various intaglio media, experimenting only occasionally with lithography,
but in the latter part of 1945 the artist took up residence in the Mourlot
studio on the Rue de Chabrol, Paris and began printing his finest lithographs
with the help of this master printer. Lithography offered Picasso the
chance to rework an image on the same printing surface and so preserve
the complete evolution of the composition.
Picasso's graphic art evolved from his early association with such master
printers as Eugene Delatre, Louis Forn and above all, Roger Lacouriere.
Picasso rapidly discovered his own technical and visual vocabulary however
and after acquiring his own press he was able to explore the secrets
of printmaking in his own fashion. This constant experimentation with
new materials and techniques adds another exciting dimension to the appreciation
of his prints.
The final triumph of Picasso the printmaker was his development of the
linocut. Picasso's invention in 1959 of the one-block technique of linocut
printing enabled him to achieve brilliantly and richly colored works
on paper. Like wood-block printing the linoleum is cut away from the
flat surface of the block except those areas that, when inked and printed,
articulate the components of the composition. Softer, more supple and
lighter in weight than wood, linoleum can be cut, gouged and slashed
with greater speed and much less effort than wood. This material and
process suited Picasso's temperament well: by taking something away he
was also creating, a contradiction the artist reveled in. |
