Artist Picasso short biography. Pablo Picasso - biography, facts, paintings - the great Spanish painter

There is hardly a person on the planet who is not familiar with the name Pablo Picasso. The founder of Cubism and an artist of many styles influenced the fine arts of not only Europe, but the whole world in the 20th century.

Artist Pablo Picasso: childhood and years of study

One of the brightest was born in Malaga, in a house on Merced Square, in 1881, on October 25. Nowadays there is a museum and foundation named after P. Picasso. Following the Spanish tradition at baptism, the parents gave the boy a fairly long name, which is an alternation of the names of saints and the closest and most revered relatives in the family. Ultimately, he is known by the very first and the last. Pablo decided to take his mother’s surname, considering his father’s to be too simple. The boy's talent and passion for drawing manifested itself from early childhood. The first and very valuable lessons were taught to him by his father, who was also an artist. His name was Jose Ruiz. He painted his first serious painting at the age of eight - “Picador”. We can safely say that it was with her that the work of Pablo Picasso began. The father of the future artist received an offer to work as a teacher in La Coruña in 1891, and the family soon moved to northern Spain. There, Pablo studied for a year at a local art school. Then the family moved to one of the most beautiful cities - Barcelona. Young Picasso was 14 years old at the time, and too young to study at La Lonja (the school of fine arts). However, his father was able to ensure that he was allowed to take the entrance exams on a competitive basis, which he did brilliantly. After another four years, his parents decided to enroll him in the best advanced art school at that time - “San Fernando” in Madrid. Studying at the academy quickly bored the young talent; in its classical canons and rules he felt cramped and even bored. Therefore, he devoted more time to the Prado Museum and studying its collections, and a year later he returned to Barcelona. The early period of his work includes paintings painted in 1986: “Self-Portrait” by Picasso, “First Communion” (it depicts the artist’s sister Lola), “Portrait of a Mother” (pictured below).

During his stay in Madrid, he made his first trip where he studied all the museums and paintings of the greatest masters. Subsequently, he would come to this center of world art several times, and in 1904 he would move permanently.

"Blue" period

This time period can be seen as precisely at this time, his individuality, still subject to outside influence, begins to manifest itself in Picasso’s work. It is a well-known fact: the talent of creative people manifests itself most clearly in difficult life situations. This is exactly what happened with Pablo Picasso, whose works are now known throughout the world. The takeoff was provoked and occurred after a long depression caused by the death of a close friend, Carlos Casagemas. In 1901, at an exhibition organized by Vollard, 64 works by the artist were presented, but at that time they were still full of sensuality and brightness, the influence of the Impressionists was clearly felt. The “blue” period of his work gradually entered into its rightful rights, manifesting itself with rigid contours of figures and a loss of three-dimensionality of the image, a departure from the classical laws of artistic perspective. The palette of colors on his canvases is becoming more and more monotonous, with an emphasis on blue. The beginning of the period can be considered “Portrait of Jaime Sabartes” and Picasso’s self-portrait, painted in 1901.

Paintings of the "blue" period

The key words for the master during this period were loneliness, fear, guilt, pain. In 1902 he returned to Barcelona again, but could not stay there. The tense situation in the capital of Catalonia, poverty on all sides and social injustice result in popular unrest, which gradually engulfed not only all of Spain, but also Europe. Probably, this state of affairs also influenced the artist, who works fruitfully and extremely hard this year. In the homeland, masterpieces of the “blue” period were created: “Two Sisters (Date)”, “Old Jew with a Boy”, “Tragedy” (photo of the canvas above), “Life”, where the image of the deceased Casagemas once again appears. In 1901, the painting “The Absinthe Drinker” was also painted. It traces the influence of the then popular fascination with “vicious” characters, characteristic of French art. The theme of absinthe appears in many paintings. Picasso's work, among other things, is full of drama. The woman’s hypertrophied hand, with which she seems to be trying to defend herself, is especially striking. Currently, “The Absinthe Lover” is kept in the Hermitage, having got there from a private and very impressive collection of works by Picasso (51 works) by S. I. Shchukin after the revolution.

As soon as the opportunity arises to go to Spain again, he decides to take advantage of it and leaves Spain in the spring of 1904. It was there that he would encounter new interests, sensations and impressions, which would give rise to a new stage in his creativity.

"Pink" period

In Picasso's work, this stage lasted a relatively long time - from 1904 (autumn) until the end of 1906 - and was not entirely homogeneous. Most of the paintings of the period are marked by a light range of colors, the appearance of ocher, pearl-gray, red-pink tones. Characteristic is the emergence and subsequent dominance of new themes for the artist’s work - actors, circus performers and acrobats, athletes. Of course, the overwhelming majority of the material was provided to him by the Medrano Circus, which in those years was located at the foot of Montmartre. The bright theatrical setting, costumes, behavior, variety of types seemed to return P. Picasso to the world of, albeit transformed, but real forms and volumes, natural space. The images in his paintings again became sensual and filled with life and brightness, as opposed to the characters of the “blue” stage of creativity.

Pablo Picasso: works of the “pink” period

The paintings that marked the beginning of a new period were first exhibited at the end of winter 1905 at the Serurrier Gallery - these are “Seated Nude” and “Actor”. One of the recognized masterpieces of the “pink” period is “A Family of Comedians” (pictured above). The canvas has impressive dimensions - more than two meters in height and width. The figures of circus performers are depicted against the background of a blue sky; it is generally accepted that the harlequin on the right side is Picasso himself. All the characters are static, and there is no internal closeness between them; each is shackled by internal loneliness - the theme of the entire “pink” period. In addition, it is worth noting the following works by Pablo Picasso: “Woman in a Shirt”, “Toilet”, “Boy Leading a Horse”, “Acrobats. Mother and Son", "Girl with a Goat". All of them demonstrate to the viewer beauty and serenity, rare for the artist’s paintings. A new impetus for creativity occurred at the end of 1906, when Picasso traveled through Spain and ended up in a small village in the Pyrenees.

African creative period

P. Picasso first encountered archaic African art at a thematic exhibition at the Trocadero Museum. He was impressed by pagan idols of primitive form, exotic masks and figurines that embodied the great power of nature and were distanced from the smallest details. The artist’s ideology coincided with this powerful message, and as a result, he began to simplify his heroes, making them like stone idols, monumental and sharp. However, the first work in the direction of this style appeared back in 1906 - this is a portrait by Pablo Picasso of the writer. He rewrote the picture 80 times and had already completely lost faith in the possibility of embodying her image in the classical style. This moment can rightly be called transitional from following nature to deformation of form. Just look at such paintings as “Nude Woman”, “Dance with Veils”, “Dryad”, “Friendship”, “Bust of a Sailor”, “Self-Portrait”.

But perhaps the most striking example of the African stage of Picasso’s work is the painting “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon” (pictured above), on which the master worked for about a year. It crowned this stage of the artist’s creative path and largely determined the fate of art as a whole. The painting was first published only thirty years after it was painted and became an open door to the world of the avant-garde. The bohemian circle of Paris literally split into two camps: “for” and “against”. The painting is currently kept in the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

Cubism in the works of Picasso

The problem of uniqueness and accuracy of the image remained in the first place in European fine art until the moment when cubism burst into it. Many consider the impetus for its development to be a question that arose among artists: “Why draw?” At the beginning of the 20th century, a reliable image of what you see could be taught to almost anyone, and photography was literally on its heels, which threatened to completely displace everything else. Visual images become not only believable, but also accessible and easily replicated. Pablo Picasso's cubism in this case reflects the individuality of the creator, abandoning a plausible image of the outside world and opening up completely new possibilities and boundaries of perception.

Early works include: “Pot, glass and book”, “Bathing”, “Bouquet of flowers in a gray jug”, “Bread and a bowl of fruit on the table”, etc. The canvases clearly show how the artist’s style changes and acquires increasingly abstract features towards the end of the period (1918-1919). For example, “Harlequin”, “Three Musicians”, “Still Life with a Guitar” (pictured above). The audience’s association of the master’s work with abstractionism did not suit Picasso at all; the very emotional message of the paintings, their hidden meaning, was important to him. Ultimately, the style of cubism that he himself created gradually ceased to inspire and interest the artist, opening the way for new trends in creativity.

Classical period

The second decade of the 20th century was quite difficult for Picasso. Thus, 1911 was marked by the story of stolen figurines from the Louvre, which did not show the artist in the best light. In 1914, it became clear that, even after living in the country for so many years, Picasso was not ready to fight for France in the First World War, which separated him from many of his friends. And the following year his beloved Marcelle Humbert died.

The return of a more realistic Pablo Picasso in his work, whose works were again filled with readability, figurativeness and artistic logic, was also influenced by many external factors. Including a trip to Rome, where he became imbued with ancient art, as well as communication with Diaghilev’s ballet troupe and meeting the ballerina Olga Khokhlova, who soon became the artist’s second wife. Her portrait of 1917, which was in some way experimental in nature, can be considered the beginning of a new period. Russian ballet Pablo Picasso not only inspired the creation of new masterpieces, but also gave his beloved and long-awaited son. The most famous works of the period: “Olga Khokhlova” (pictured above), “Pierrot”, “Still Life with a Jug and Apples”, “Sleeping Peasants”, “Mother and Child”, “Women Running on the Beach”, “The Three Graces” .

Surrealism

The division of creativity is nothing more than the desire to sort it into shelves and squeeze it into a certain (stylistic, time) framework. However, this approach to the work of Pablo Picasso, who adorns the best museums and galleries in the world, can be called very conditional. If we follow the chronology, then the period when the artist was close to surrealism falls on the years 1925-1932. It is not at all surprising that at every stage of the master’s work, a muse visited the master of the brush, and when O. Khokhlova wanted to recognize herself in his canvases, he turned to neoclassicism. However, creative people are fickle, and soon the young and very beautiful Maria Teresa Walter, who was only 17 years old at the time of their acquaintance, entered Picasso’s life. She was destined for the role of a mistress, and in 1930 the artist bought a castle in Normandy, which became a home for her and a workshop for him. Maria Teresa was a faithful companion, steadfastly enduring the creative and loving tossing of the creator, maintaining friendly correspondence until the death of Pablo Picasso. Works from the period of surrealism: “Dance”, “Woman in a Chair” (in the photo below), “Bather”, “Nude on the Beach”, “Dream”, etc.

World War II period

Picasso's sympathy during the war in Spain in 1937 belonged to the Republicans. When in the same year Italian and German aircraft destroyed Guernica - the political and cultural center of the Basques - Pablo Picasso depicted the city lying in ruins on a huge canvas of the same name in just two months. He was literally gripped by horror from the threat that hung over all of Europe, which could not but affect his creativity. Emotions were not expressed directly, but were embodied in the tone, its gloom, bitterness and sarcasm.

After the wars died down and the world came into relative balance, restoring everything that had been destroyed, Picasso’s work also acquired happier and brighter colors. His canvases, painted in 1945-1955, have a Mediterranean flavor, are very atmospheric and partly idealistic. At the same time, he began to work with ceramics, creating many decorative jugs, dishes, plates, and figurines (photo shown above). The works that were created in the last 15 years of his life are very uneven in style and quality.

One of the greatest artists of the twentieth century, Pablo Picasso, died at the age of 91 at his villa in France. He was buried near the Vovenart castle that belonged to him.

Pablo Ruiz Picasso is one of the most significant figures to have a profound influence on 20th century art. During his long creative career, which lasted more than 75 years, he created thousands of creations, including not only paintings, but also engravings, scenography, ceramics, mosaics and numerous sculptures made using a variety of materials. He was one of the most revolutionary artists in the history of Western painting. Picasso created and developed in his element with incredible vitality, at an accelerated pace characteristic of a rapid age. Each direction of his activity was the embodiment of a radically new idea. One gets the feeling that in one fate of the creator, several artistic lives fit at once. The Spanish artist was a central figure in the development of Cubism and laid the foundations for the concept of abstract art.

Childhood

Pablo appeared on October 25, 1881 in the Andalusian region of southern Spain. After birth, the midwife decided that the baby was dead, since the birth was long and difficult. His uncle, a doctor named Salvador, literally saved the newborn by blowing smoke from a cigar towards the baby, who immediately reacted to the smell with a desperate roar. The full name received at baptism contains 23 words. He was named after various saints and relatives.

His father, José Ruiz Blasco, came from an ancient, wealthy family in northwestern Spain. He was an artist, taught at the school of fine arts founded by the Academy of Fine Arts and located in the building of San Telmo, an old Jesuit monastery, and served as curator at the municipal museum. The School of Art in Malaga has been operating since 1851. The artist owes his surname to his mother Maria Picasso Lopez. He actively used it starting in 1901.

According to legend, one of the first words spoken was "piz", short for "lápiz", meaning "pencil". Pablo loved to draw since childhood. The father had complete control over his son's artistic education. He gave him lessons himself and sent him at the age of five to the school where he worked. Being the son of an academic painter and inspired by his works, Pablo began to create from an early age. As a child, his father often took him to bullfights, and one of his early paintings contained a bullfighting scene.

In 1891, his father received a teaching position at the institute in La Coruña, and in 1892 Pablo entered the same educational institution as a student. For three years he received classical art education. Under his father's academic guidance, he developed his artistic talent with extraordinary speed.

years of education

In January 1895, when Picasso was a teenager, his younger sister Conchita died of diphtheria. This tragic event affected the family's plans. By this same period, Juan was hired as a teacher at the art academy in La Longe, and the family moved. His father promoted Pablo's independence by renting him a studio in Barcelona.

A year later he was accepted as a student at the Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid. He demonstrated his remarkable ability by completing a month-long entrance exam in one day, despite being younger than the official training requirement. With financial help from his relatives, Pablo went to study in Madrid at the end of 1897. However, Pablo was bored by the classical techniques of the art school. He did not want to paint like the artists of the past, but wanted to create something new. Returning to Barcelona in 1900, he often visited the famous cafe, focused on meetings of the intelligentsia and artists, “The Four Cats”. His visit to Horta de Ebro between 1898 and 1899 and his association with the café group in 1899 were decisive for early artistic development. It was in Barcelona that he moved away from traditional classical methods, leaning towards an experimental and innovative approach to painting. This literary and artistic environment attracted many adherents of contemporary French art from France, as well as Catalan traditional and folk art. There is a myth that the father was so impressed by his son's abilities that in 1894 he swore off painting himself, but in fact José continued to paint until his death. Picasso's relationship with his parents became strained when he stopped studying. In a cafe, he became friends with the young Catalan painter Carlos Casajemas, with whom he later moved to France.

In 1900, Picasso's first exhibition took place in Barcelona, ​​and in the fall he went to Paris.

Parisian period

At the turn of the twentieth century, Paris was the center of the international art world. For painters, it was the home of the Impressionists, who depicted the world around them using brushstrokes or strokes of unmixed colors to create the feeling of real reflected light. Although their works retained certain connections with the outside world, there were certain tendencies towards abstractionism. After leaving Spain, Picasso presented his painting “Last Moments” at the World Exhibition in Paris.

However, the trip to the capital of art was overshadowed. The artist's friend became depressed because of an unhappy and painful love affair with a dancer from the Moulin Rouge. They decided to spend a vacation in Picasso's hometown, but this was not destined to happen. Carlos committed suicide with a shot to the temple. Pablo was so crushed by this loss that it could not help but affect his work. He paints several portraits of a friend in a coffin. Picasso is approaching the “blue period” of his work, during which melancholy and depression shine through canvases replete with blue tones. Over the next four years, blue dominated his paintings. He painted people with elongated facial features. Some of his paintings from this period depicted poor people, beggars, sad and gloomy people.

Two outstanding examples of works from Picasso's Blue Period:

• "Old Guitarist"
• “Beggar Old Man with a Boy”;
• "Life";
• "Woman with a bun of hair."

In 1902, two exhibitions of the artist were organized. Nevertheless, he lives and works practically penniless in Max Jacob's room. A love story with Fernanda Olivier, who was first his model, helped him emerge from deep depression over the death of his close friend Carlos Casajemas. He fell in love with a French woman and lived with her until 1912. The paintings began to be filled with warmer colors, including shades of red, beige, and orange. Art historians call this time in Pablo's life the “pink period.” The plots depicted happier scenes, including a circus theme.

Picasso acquired a permanent Paris studio in 1904. His studio soon became a meeting place for the city's artists and writers. Soon the circle of friends included the poet Guillaume Apollinaire, Max Jacob, Lev and Gertrude Stein, Andre Salmo, two agents: Ambroise Vollard and Bertha Weil.

Since 1905, he became increasingly interested in visual techniques. This interest seems to have been awakened by the late paintings of Paul Cézanne.

Between 1900 and 1906 he tried almost all the major painting styles. At the same time, his own style changed with extraordinary speed. The Steins introduce him to Henri Matisse. The portrait of Gertrude Stein began a series of experiments in portrait abstraction, inspired by Iberian sculpture, the exhibition of which Picasso visited at the Louvre in the spring of 1906.

Picasso and Cubism

Les Demoiselles d'Avignon was Picasso's attempt to forget his past relationships. Executed in a new revolutionary manner, under the influence of the art of Cézanne and Negro, the painting became the founder of the emerging painting movement, the parent of which is considered to be Picasso.

Together with the painter and friend Georges Braque, he began his artistic experiments in 1907. Cubism was a new artistic concept for the artist, through which Pablo tried to challenge the generally accepted laws of copying nature. Objects are laid on the canvas by cutting and breaking objects to emphasize the two dimensions of the canvas.

Between 1907 and 1911, Picasso continued to decompose the visible world into smaller facets of monochrome planes. At the same time, his works became more and more abstract. The most striking examples that clearly illustrate the development of the direction are the paintings: “Fruit Plate” (1909), “Portrait of Ambroise Vollard” (1910) and “Woman with a Guitar” (1911-12). In 1912, Picasso began combining cubism and collage. It was during this period that he began using sand or plaster in his paint to give it texture. He also used colored paper, newspapers and wallpaper to give his canvases additional expressiveness.

Picasso's Russian wife

Picasso began collaborating with directors of ballet and theater productions in 1916. The designed and realized sets and costumes for Diaghilev's ballets amazed audiences from 1917 to 1924. Thanks to his work with the Diaghilev Russian Ballet, Pablo meets the ballerina Olga Khokhlova, who becomes his wife. They lived together for 18 years, during which their son Paulo was born in 1921. In the 20s of the twentieth century, the artist and his wife Olga continued to live in Paris, often traveling and spending their summers on the beach. Due to Picasso having an affair with a young French woman, which resulted in pregnancy and the birth of an illegitimate child, the family broke up. The wife broke off the relationship and left for the south of France. The divorce did not happen, and Olga remained the artist’s wife until the end of her days due to Pablo’s unwillingness to comply with the terms of the marriage contract.

New achievements

In several stages, Picasso turned away from abstraction and a series of paintings in a realistic and serenely beautiful classical style saw the light of day. One of the most famous works was “The Woman in White.” Written just two years after The Three Musicians, calm and not attracting too much attention to itself by being shocking, it once again demonstrated the ease with which it could express itself.

After a short turn to classicism, the master became known for his surrealist works, which replaced cubism.

Between 1925 and the 1930s he was to some extent associated with the surrealists, and from the autumn of 1931 he was particularly interested in sculpture. In 1932, in connection with major exhibitions at the Georges Petit galleries in Paris and the Haus des Arts in Zurich, Picasso's fame increased markedly. By 1936, the Spanish Civil War had a profound impact on Picasso, culminating in his most famous painting. "Guernica" is an allegorical condemnation of fascism, a powerful image depicting the realities of both war and its consequences.

This work was commissioned by the government for the Spanish pavilion before the Paris World Fair. It depicts the catastrophic destruction of the city during the civil uprising. The work was completed within six or seven weeks. Painted entirely in black, white and grey, measuring 25 feet wide and 11 feet tall, the painting serves as a distillation of the people's pain and suffering from brutality. Picasso applied the pictorial language of Cubism to a situation that arose from social and political consciousness.

Picasso's political views

Picasso publicly declared in 1947 that he was a communist. When asked about his motives, he stated: “When I was a boy in Spain, I was very poor and was aware of how poor people lived. I learned that communists are pro-poor. That's why I became a communist." After the death of Joseph Stalin, the French communists turned to the artist with a request to paint a party figure. His portrait caused a stir in the leadership of the Communist Party. The Soviet government rejected his portrait.

Even though Picasso was in exile from his native Spain following the 1939 victory of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, he gave more than eight hundred of his early works to Barcelona. But due to Franco's hostility, his name never appeared in the museum. Among the huge number of Picasso exhibitions that were held during the artist’s life, the most significant were those in New York and Paris.

In 1961, Pablo married Jacqueline Roque and they moved to Mougins. There Picasso continued his fruitful work, which did not stop until the end of his days. One of the last works was a self-portrait made in pencil on paper, “Self-Portrait Facing Death.” He died a year later at the age of 91 in his thirty-five-room villa on the hill of Notre-Dame de Vie in Mougins on April 8, 1973.

According to Picasso's official biography, he was born in the village of Malaga, which is located in Andalusia. His father, Jose Ruiz, was a painter who did not gain much fame and worked part-time as a caretaker at a local museum. Already at the age of 7, little Pablo helped his father paint canvases, and from the age of 13 he began to take on the main work.

In 1894, Pablo entered the Academy of Fine Arts in Barcelona. With great effort, the 13-year-old boy convinced the teachers to accept him. After studying for 3 years, he exchanges Barcelona for Madrid. There, at the San Fernando Academy, for six months he studied the techniques of such artists as Francisco Goya and El Greco. He was never able to complete his studies, which was due to his wayward character. Having left the academy, the young man goes to travel the world and paint.

Creation

While still at the academy, Pablo wrote his early works - “First Communion” and “Self-Portrait”. In 1901, his best friend Carles committed suicide due to unrequited love and in memory of him, Picasso painted paintings such as “Tragedy”, “Rendezvous” and others. They are filled with anxiety, excitement, sadness and belong to the “Blue Period” of creativity. The artist’s writing technique changes, acquiring angular features, becoming torn, and perspective is replaced by clear contours of flat figures.

In 1904, the artist moved to Paris, which gave impetus to his “Rose Period”. Now his work, represented by the films “Actor” and “Family of Comedians,” is filled with joy for life and bright colors. The content of the paintings, previously filled with images of nature, is replaced by the predominance of strict geometry, which constitutes the main idea of ​​the portrait. “Factory in Horta de San Juan”, “Still Life with Wicker Chair” and other paintings are increasingly becoming posters. Despite the contradictory attitude of society towards his paintings, Picasso begins to receive high income from their sales.

Works in the style of surrealism

Pablo soon becomes fed up with the life of a rich man and he returns to his old life as a poor man. In 1925, he painted the painting “Dance” in a completely new style for himself - surrealism. Dissatisfaction with personal life spilled out in distorted and curved lines. In the 30s, Picasso interrupted his career as an artist and became interested in sculpture, creating “Reclining Woman.”

In 1937, during the war in Spain, a small town was destroyed by German aircraft. The tragedy of an entire people is reflected in Pablo’s painting, which contains images of a grieving mother, a dead warrior and parts of human bodies. He represents war in the form of a Minotaur. Even after the Wehrmacht captured Paris, Pablo continued his work, creating the paintings “Still Life with a Bull Skull” and “Morning Serenade”.

The end of the war was captured in the 1949 painting Dove of Peace.

Personal life

Considering the short biography of Pablo Picasso, it should be noted that from his youth the artist was constantly in a relationship with someone. In Barcelona he met with Rosita del Oro. In Paris, Picasso had a relationship with Marcelle Humbert, but the sudden death of the girl separated them. Once Picasso was invited by a Russian troupe to paint scenery for a ballet. There he met and later married Olga Khokhlova, who three years later gave birth to his son Paulo.

But soon Pablo got tired of this life and he begins a life separately from Olga. He begins an affair with Marie-Therese Walter. In 1935, as a result of their relationship, a daughter, Maya, was born, whom Pablo never recognized.

In the 40s, Picasso was in a relationship with photographer Dora Maar from Yugoslavia. It was she who influenced the artist at the birth of a new style in art.

By the end of his life he was already a multimillionaire. Pablo Picasso died of cardiac arrest at the age of 92.

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Childhood and youth

Fate did not spoil this woman. Her father, Don Francisco Picasso Guardena, was considered a rich man in Malaga - he owned vineyards on the slope of Mount Gibralfaro. But, having heard enough stories about America, he left his wife and three daughters in Malaga and went to make money in Cuba, where he soon died of yellow fever. As a result, his family was forced to earn a living by doing laundry and sewing. At the age of 25, Maria married Don Jose, a year later her first child, Pablo, was born, followed by two sisters, Dolores and Conchita. But Pablo was still his favorite child.

According to Doña Maria, “he was so beautiful, like an angel and a demon at the same time, that you could not take your eyes off him.” It was his mother who formed the unshakable self-confidence in Pablo’s character that accompanied him throughout his life. “If you become a soldier. - she told the baby, “you will certainly rise to the rank of general, and if you become a monk, you will become a Pope.” This sincere admiration for the child was shared with his mother by his grandmother and two aunts who moved to live in their house. Pablo, raised surrounded by women who adored him, said that from childhood he was accustomed to the fact that there should always be a loving woman nearby, ready to fulfill his every whim.

Another childhood experience in Pablo’s biography that radically influenced Picasso’s entire life was the 1884 earthquake. Half of the city was destroyed, more than six hundred citizens died and thousands were injured. Pablo remembered for the rest of his life the ominous night when his father miraculously managed to pull him out from under the ruins of his home. Few people realized that the ragged and angular lines of cubism were an echo of that very earthquake when the familiar world fell apart.

Pablo began drawing at the age of six. “There was a statue in the hallway at home. “Hercules with a club,” Picasso said. - So, I sat down and drew this Hercules. And it wasn’t a child’s drawing, it was quite realistic.” Of course, Don Jose immediately saw in Pablo the successor of his work and began to teach his son the basics of painting and drawing. Pablo remembered the tough drill of his father, who spent days “putting a hand” on his son for many years. At the age of 65, having visited an exhibition of children's drawings, he bitterly remarked: “When I was as old as these children, I could draw like Raphael. It took me many years to learn to draw like these kids!”

In 1891, 10-year-old Pablo began attending painting courses in La Coruña. where his father got him a job, having received a teaching position there. Pablo studied in La Coruña for a short time. At the age of 13, he considered himself independent enough to live without his parents, who really did not like his numerous affairs, including with young school teachers. Moreover, Pablo was a poor student, and his father had to beg the school director, an acquaintance of his, not to kick his son out. In the end, Pablo himself left school and went to Barcelona to enter the Academy of Arts.

He did not do it without difficulty - the teachers did not believe that the paintings presented to them for viewing were drawn not by an adult man, but by a boy who was 14 years old. Pablo got very angry when people called him “boy.” Already at the age of 14, he was a regular at brothels, of which there were many at that time near the Academy of Arts. “Sex from a young age was my favorite pastime,” Picasso admitted. We Spaniards are mass in the morning, bullfighting in the afternoon and brothel late in the evening.”

As his classmate Manuel Palhares later recalled from his biography of that time, Pablo once lived for a week in one of the brothels and, as payment for his stay, painted the walls of the brothel with frescoes of erotic content. At the same time, night trips to brothels did not in the least prevent Pablo from devoting all his days to religious painting. The young artist was even ordered several paintings to decorate the convent. One of them - “Science and Charity” - was awarded a diploma at the National Exhibition in Madrid. Unfortunately, most of these paintings were lost during the Spanish Civil War.

And yet, fellow students recalled the biography of their friend, Pablo was constantly in love with someone. His first love was named Rosita del Oro. She was more than ten years older than him and worked as a dancer in a popular Barcelona cabaret. Rosita, like many of Picasso’s women later, recalled that Pablo struck her with his “magnetic” gaze and literally hypnotized her. This hypnosis lasted for five years. In Picasso's memory, Rosita remained the only woman who did not say nasty things about him after breaking up.

They separated when Pablo went to Madrid to attend the Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando, considered at that time the most advanced art school in all of Spain. He entered there very easily, but lasted only 7 months at the Academy. The teachers recognized the young man’s talent, but could not cope with his character: Pablo flew into a rage every time when they told him how and what to draw.

As a result, he spent most of the first six months of his studies “under arrest” - at the Academy of San Fernando there was a special punishment cell for guilty students. In the seventh month of his “imprisonment,” during which Pablo became friends with a similarly obstinate student, Carles Casagemas, the son of the United States Consul in Barcelona, ​​a typical representative of the “golden youth,” who also flaunted his homosexual inclinations, he decided leave the country.

If Cezanne had lived in Spain, he said, he would probably have been shot altogether...” Together with Casagemas, they went to Paris - to Montmartre, where, as they said, real Art and Freedom reigned.

Pablo’s father gave him money for Pablo’s trip, 300 pesetas. He himself once intended to conquer Paris and really wanted the whole world to know the name Ruiz. When rumors reached him that, having ended up in Paris. Pablo began signing his works with his mother's maiden name - Picasso Jos Ruiz had a heart attack.

“Can you imagine me being Ruiz? - Picasso made excuses many years later, - Or Diego Jose Ruiz? Or Juan Nepomuceno Ruiz? No, my mother's last name always seemed better to me than my father's last name. This surname seemed strange, and it had a double “s”, which is rare in Spanish surnames, since Picasso is an Italian surname. And besides, have you ever noticed the double “s” in the names of Matisse and Poussin?”

Picasso failed to conquer Paris the first time. Casagemas, with whom Picasso shared an apartment on Kolechkur Street, already on the second day after his arrival, forgetting about all his “homosexual chic”, fell head over heels in love with the model Germaine Florentin. She was in no hurry to reciprocate the ardent Spaniard's feelings. As a result, Carles fell into a terrible depression, and the young artists, having forgotten about the purpose of their visit, spent two months in constant drunkenness. After which Pablo grabbed his friend and went with him back to Spain, where he tried to bring him back to life. In February 1901, Carles, without telling Pablo, went to Paris, where he tried to shoot Germaine, and then committed suicide.

This event shocked Pablo so much that, returning to Paris in April 1901, he first went to the fatal beauty Germaine and unsuccessfully tried to persuade her to become his muse. That's right - not a mistress, but a muse, since Picasso simply did not have money even to feed her lunch. There wasn’t even enough money for paints - that’s when his brilliant “blue period” was born, and blue and gray paints forever became synonymous with poverty for Pablo.

In those years he lived in a dilapidated house on Place Ravignan, nicknamed Bateau Lavoir, that is, “Laundry Barge.” In this barn, without light or heat, huddled a commune of poor artists, mostly emigrants from Spain and Germany. No one locked the doors to Bateau Lavoir; all property was shared. Both models and friends had something in common. Of the dozens of women who shared bed with Picasso at that time, the artist himself recalled only two.

The first was a certain Madeleine (her only portrait is now kept in the Tate Gallery in London). As Picasso himself said, in December 1904 Madeleine became pregnant, and he seriously considered the issue of marriage. But due to the eternal cold in Bateau-Lavoir, the pregnancy ended in miscarriage, and Picasso soon fell in love with a stately girl with green eyes, the first beauty of Bateau-Lavoir. Everyone knew her as Fernande Olivier, although her real name was Amelie Lat. There were rumors that she was the illegitimate daughter of a very noble man.

Fernanda ended up in Bateau Lavoir, where she made a living by posing for artists, at the age of fifteen after the death of her mother.

Opium helped them get closer. In September 1905, Pablo invited Fernanda to celebrate the sale of one of his paintings - galleries began to be interested in his works - at a literary club in Montparnasse, where both future geniuses and successful mediocrities gathered. After absinthe, Pablo invited the girl to smoke a pipe of the then fashionable drug, and in the morning she found herself in Picasso’s bed. “Love flared up, overwhelming me with passion,” she wrote in her diary, which many years later she published in the form of a book, “Loving Picasso.” - He won my heart with the sad, pleading look of his huge eyes, which pierced me against my will...

Personal life

Poverty receded, and the depressive “blue” period in Picasso’s work gently turned into a calmer “pink”, when wealthy collectors became interested in the paintings of the young Spaniard. The first was Gertrude Stein, the daughter of an American millionaire, who fled to Paris for the delights of bohemian life. However, she paid little money for Picasso’s paintings, but she introduced him to Henri Matisse, Modigliani and other artists who set the tone in art.

The second millionaire was Russian merchant Sergei Shchukin. They met in the same 1905 in Montmartre, where Pablo drew cartoons of passers-by for a couple of francs. They drank to meet each other, after which they went to Picasso’s studio, where the Russian guest purchased a couple of paintings by the artist for a hundred francs. For Picasso it was a lot of money. It was Shchukin, regularly buying up Picasso's paintings, who finally pulled him out of poverty and helped him get back on his feet. The Russian merchant collected 51 paintings by Picasso - this is the largest collection of the artist’s works in the world, and it is Shchukin who we owe to the fact that Picasso’s originals hang in both the Hermitage and the Museum of Fine Arts. Pushkin.

But with prosperity came the end of family happiness. Fernanda briefly enjoyed life in a luxurious apartment on the Boulevard Clichy, where there was a real piano, mirrors, a maid and a cook. Moreover, Fernanda herself took the first step towards separation. The thing is. that in 1907, Picasso became interested in a new direction in art - cubism, and presented to the public his painting “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon”. The painting caused a real scandal in the press: “This is a canvas stretched on a stretcher, rather controversially, but confidently stained with paint, and the purpose of this canvas is unknown,” wrote Parisian newspapers. - There is nothing that might be of interest. You can guess the roughly drawn female figures in the picture. What are they for? What do they want to express or at least demonstrate? Why did the author do this?

But an even bigger scandal broke out at Picasso’s home. Fernanda, who was not at all interested in fashionable trends in art, perceived this picture as a mockery of herself personally. Say, using her as a model for a painting. Pablo deliberately, “out of jealousy, disgustingly disfigured her face and body, which was admired by so many artists.” And Fernanda decided to “take revenge”: she began to secretly leave home and pose nude for artists in Bateau Lavoir. It is not difficult to imagine the rage of the jealous Picasso, who did not allow the thought of his beloved posing for another artist when he saw nude portraits of his girlfriend in Montmartre.

Since then, their life together has turned into an ongoing scandal. Picasso tried to be at home as little as possible, spending most of his time in the Hermitage cafe, where he met the Polish artist Ludwig Markoussis and his girlfriend, petite 27-year-old Eva Guell. She - unlike Fernanda - was calm about modern painting and willingly posed for Pablo for his portraits in the cubist style. She perceived one of them, which Picasso called “My Beauty,” as a declaration of love and reciprocated it.

So when Picasso and Fernanda Olivier separated in 1911, Eva Guell became the mistress of the artist’s new house on Raspail Boulevard. However, they rarely visited Paris, only when there was a din of exhibitions in which Picasso was increasingly invited to participate. They traveled with great pleasure throughout Spain and England, living either in Céret, at the foot of the Pyrenees, or in Avignon. It was, as they said, “an endless pre-wedding journey.” It ended in the spring of 1915, when Pablo and Eva decided to get married, but did not have time. Eva fell ill with tuberculosis and died. “My life has turned into hell. - Pablo wrote in a letter to Gertrude Stein. “Poor Eva is dead, I am in unbearable pain...”

Picasso had a hard time with the death of his beloved. He stopped taking care of himself, drank constantly, smoked opium and did not leave brothels. This went on for almost two years, until the poet Jean Cocteau persuaded Picasso to take part in his new theatrical project. Cocteau had long collaborated with Sergei Diaghilev, the owner of the famous Russian Ballet, painted posters for the enterprises of Nijinsky and Karsavina, composed the libretto, but then he came up with the ballet “Parade”, a strange performance without a plot, and there was less music in it than street noises .

Until that day, Picasso had been indifferent to ballet, but Cocteau’s proposal interested him. In February 1917, he went to Rome, where at that moment Russian ballerinas were fleeing the horrors of the Civil War. There, in Italy, Picasso found new love. This was Olga Khokhlova, the daughter of a Russian army officer and one of the most beautiful ballerinas in the troupe.

Picasso became interested in Olga with all his characteristic temperament. After the extravagant Fernanda and temperamental Eva, Olga attracted him with her calmness, commitment to traditional values ​​and classical, almost ancient beauty.

“Be careful,” Diaghilev warned him, “you have to marry Russian girls.”

“You’re joking,” the artist answered him, confident that he would always remain the master of the situation. But everything turned out just as Diaghilev said.

Already at the end of 1917, Pablo took Olga to Spain to introduce her to his parents. Dona Maria warmly received the Russian girl, went to performances with her participation and once warned her: “With my son, who was created only for himself and for no one else, no woman can be happy.” But Olga did not heed this warning.

On July 12, 1918, a wedding ceremony took place in the Orthodox Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Paris. They spent their honeymoon in each other's arms in Biarritz, forgetting about war, revolution, ballet and painting.

“Upon their return, they settled in a two-story apartment on La Boesie Street,” Picasso’s friend, the Hungarian photographer and artist Gyula Halas, better known as Brassaï, described their life in the book “Meetings with Picasso.” - Picasso allocated one floor for his studio, the other was given to his wife. She turned it into a classic social salon with cozy sofas, curtains and mirrors. Spacious dining room with a large sliding table, a serving table, in each corner there is a round table on one leg; the living room is decorated in white tones, and the bedroom has a copper-trimmed double bed.

Everything was thought out to the smallest detail, and there was not a speck of dust anywhere, the parquet floor and furniture sparkled. This apartment was completely at odds with the artist’s usual lifestyle: there was neither that unusual furniture that he loved so much, nor any of those strange objects with which he liked to surround himself, nor things scattered as needed. Olga jealously protected the possessions that she considered her property from the influence of Picasso’s bright and strong personality. And even hanging paintings by Picasso from the Cubist period, in large beautiful frames, looked as if they belonged to a wealthy collector...”

Picasso himself gradually turned into a successful bourgeois with all the external attributes of success befitting this position. He bought a Hispano-Suiza limousine, hired a driver in livery, and began wearing expensive suits made by famous Parisian tailors. The artist led a hectic social life, never missing premieres in the theater and opera, attended receptions and parties - always accompanied by his beautiful and sophisticated wife: he was at the zenith of his “secular” period.

The crowning achievement of this period was the birth of his son Paolo in February 1921. This event excited Picasso - he made endless drawings of his son and wife, marking on them not only the day, but also the hour when he drew them. All of them are made in the neoclassical style, and the women in his image resemble Olympian deities. Olga treated the child with almost painful passion and adoration.

But over time, this beautiful, measured life began to seem to Picasso as his curse. “The more rich he became, the more he envied that other Picasso, who once wore a mechanic’s robe and huddled with Fernanda in the windswept Bateau Lavoir,” wrote Brassaï. “Soon Picasso left the upper apartment and moved to live in his workshop on the lower floor. And, without a doubt, never before has any “respectable” apartment been so unrespectable.

It consisted of four or five rooms, each with a fireplace with a marble plaque, above which there was a mirror. The furniture was taken out of the rooms, and in its place there were piled up paintings, cardboards, bags, forms from sculptures, bookshelves, piles of papers... The doors of all the rooms were thrown open, or perhaps simply removed from their hinges, thanks to which this huge apartment turned into one large space, divided into nooks and crannies, each of which was assigned to perform a specific job.

The parquet floor, which had not been polished for a long time, was covered with a carpet of cigarette butts... Picasso's easel stood in the largest and brightest room - no doubt, there had once been a living room here; it was the only room in this strange apartment that was at least somehow furnished. Madame Picasso never entered this workshop, and since, with the exception of a few friends, Picasso did not allow anyone in there, the dust could behave as it pleased, without fear of a woman’s hand starting to restore order.”

Olga felt her husband gradually returning to his inner world - the world of art, to which she did not have access. From time to time she staged violent scenes of jealousy, in response Picasso became even more withdrawn into himself. “She wanted too much from me,” Picasso later said about Olga. “It was the worst period of my life.” He began to take out his irritation in painting, depicting his wife either as an old nag or as an evil vixen. Nevertheless, Picasso did not want a divorce.

After all, then, according to the terms of their marriage contract, they would have to equally divide their entire fortune, and most importantly, his paintings. Therefore, Olga remained the official wife of the artist until her death. She claimed that she never stopped loving Picasso. He answered her: “You love me like they love a piece of chicken, trying to gnaw it to the bone!”

Marie-Therese became his “Thursday woman” - Picasso visited her only once a week. This continued until 1935, when she gave him a daughter, Maya. Then he brought Marie-Therese and her daughter into the house and introduced her to Olga: “This child is a new work by Picasso.”

It seemed that after such a statement a break was inevitable. Olga left their apartment, moving to a villa in the suburbs of Paris. Many years later, Picasso argued that politics added fuel to the fire in his conflict with his wife - in those years, a civil war was unfolding in Spain, and the artist began to support the communists and republicans. Olga, as befits a noblewoman who suffered from the Bolsheviks, was on the side of the monarchists. However, the divorce never came to pass. Picasso also did not fulfill his promise to Marie-Therese - Maya never received her father’s surname, and in her birth certificate there was a dash in the “father” column. However, after some time, Picasso agreed... to become Maya's godfather.

In 1936, another change occurred in the biography of Picasso’s personal life. His new lover was Dora Maar, a photographer, artist and simply a bohemian party girl. They met in the cafe "Two Eggs". Picasso admired her hands - Dora amused herself by placing her palm on the table and quickly thrusting a knife between her outstretched fingers. She touched the skin several times, but did not seem to notice the blood or feel any pain. Amazed, Picasso immediately fell head over heels in love.

In addition, Dora was the only one of all Picasso’s women who understood painting and sincerely admired Pablo’s paintings. It was Dora who created a unique photo report about Picasso’s creative process, recording on camera all the stages of the creation of the epoch-making canvas “Guernica,” dedicated to a town destroyed by the Nazis in the Basque Country.

Then, however, it turned out that, along with these and other advantages. Dora also had one, but very significant, drawback - she was extremely nervous. Almost burst into tears. “I could never paint her smiling,” Picasso later recalled, “for me she was always a Crying Woman.”

Therefore, Picasso, already prone to depression, preferred to keep his new mistress at a distance. Picasso's house was run by men - his driver Marcel and his college friend Sabartes, who became the artist's personal secretary. “Those who believed that behind social life the artist forgot about his youth, the independence of that time, the joys of friendship, were deeply mistaken,” wrote Brassaï. - When problems beset Picasso, when he was exhausted from constant family scandals to such an extent that he even stopped writing, he called Sabartes, who had long since moved to the United States with his wife. Picasso asked Sabartes to return to Europe and live with him, with him...

It was a cry of despair: the artist was going through the most difficult crisis of his life. And in November, Sabartes arrived and began to work: he began to sort through Picasso’s books and papers and retype his handwritten poems on a typewriter. From that time on, they became inseparable, like a traveler and his shadow...”

The three of them survived the Second World War. Despite the fact that the Nazis called his paintings “decadent” or “Bolshevik daub,” Picasso decided to take a risk and stay in Paris. “In the occupied city, life was difficult even for Picasso: he could not get gasoline for his car or coal to heat his workshop. - wrote Sabartes. “And he, like everyone else, had to adapt to military reality: standing in lines, riding the subway or taking a bus, which rarely ran and was always crowded. In the evenings he could almost always be found in the hot Café de Flore, among friends, where he felt at home, if not better...

It was at the Café de Flor that Picasso met Françoise Gilot. He approached her table with a large vase full of cherries and offered to help her. A conversation ensued. It turned out that the girl abandoned her studies at the Sorbonne to study painting. For this, her father kicked her out of the house, but Françoise did not lose heart. She earned her living and education by giving riding lessons. “Such a beautiful woman cannot possibly be an artist,” the master exclaimed and invited her to his place... to take a bath. In occupied Paris, hot water was a luxury. “However,” he added. “If you want to see my paintings more than wash yourself, then it’s better to go to the museum.”

Picasso was very wary of fans of his talent. But for Françoise he made an exception. Brassaï wrote: “Picasso was captivated by Françoise’s small mouth, full lips, thick hair that framed her face, huge and slightly asymmetrical green eyes, a teenager’s thin waist and rounded contours. Picasso was captivated by Françoise and allowed her to idolize him. He loved her as if the feeling had come to him for the first time... But always greedy and always satiated, like the Seville seducer, he never allowed a woman to enslave him, freeing himself from her power in creativity. For him, a love adventure was not an end in itself, but a necessary incentive for the realization of creative possibilities, which were immediately embodied in new paintings, drawings, engravings and sculptures.

After the war, Françoise gave birth to two children to Picasso: son Claude in 1947 and daughter Paloma in 1949. It seemed that the 70-year-old artist had finally found his happiness. The same could not be said about his girlfriend, who over time discovered that all the previous women still continued to play a certain role in Pablo’s life. So, if they went to the south of France in the summer, then the vacation was sure to be enlivened by the presence of Olga, who showered her with streams of abuse. In Paris, Thursdays and Sundays were the days when Picasso went to visit Dora Maar or invited her to dinner.

As a result, in 1953, Françoise, taking the children, left the artist. For Picasso this was a complete surprise. Françoise said she “didn’t want to spend the rest of my life with a historical monument.” This phrase soon became known throughout Paris. People began to laugh at Picasso, who boasted that “no woman leaves men like him.”

He found salvation from shame in the arms of a new favorite - Jacqueline Roque, a 25-year-old saleswoman from a supermarket in the resort town of Vallauris, near which the artist’s villa was located. Jacqueline raised her 6-year-old daughter Katrina alone. being a very rational woman, she understood that she should not miss such a chance as to become the companion of an already middle-aged and rich artist. She was neither as sensual as Fernanda, nor as gentle as Eva, she did not have the grace of Olga and the beauty of Marie-Therese, she was not as smart as Dora Maar, and as talented as Francoise. But she had one huge advantage - she was ready to do anything for the sake of life with Picasso. She simply called him God. Or Monsignor - as a bishop. She endured all his whims, depression, suspiciousness with a smile, followed his diet and never asked for anything. For Picasso, exhausted by family feuds, she became a real salvation. And his second official wife.

Olga died of cancer in 1955, releasing Picasso from the obligations of the marriage contract. Jacqueline Rock's wedding took place in March 1961. The ceremony was modest - they drank only water, ate soup and chicken left over from the day before. The further life of the couple, which took place on the Notre-Dame-de-Vie estate in Mougins, was distinguished by the same modesty and solitude. “I refuse to see people,” the artist said to his friend Brassaï. -What for? For what? I would not wish such fame on anyone, even my worst enemies. I suffer from it psychologically, I defend myself as best I can: I erect real barricades, although the doors are double-locked day and night.” This was to Jacqueline’s advantage - she did not intend to share her genius with anyone.

Gradually, she subjugated Picasso to such an extent that she decided almost everything for him. At first she quarreled with all his friends, then she managed to convince her husband that his children and grandchildren were just waiting for his death in order to receive the inheritance.

Last years

He lets go of my fingers so I don't feel how wet his palm is. “Now I’ll find out if the owner can receive you.” The gates slam shut. It's raining, but we have to wait for what the owner will say. Just like it happened last Saturday. And before that on Thursday. We are overcome with guilt. The gate opens slightly again, and the guard drops, looking away: “The owner cannot accept today. Madame Jacqueline asked me to tell you that he was working...” When, after several attempts, my father managed to see him, he asked his grandfather for money. I stood in front of my father. My grandfather took out a stack of bills, and my father, like a thief, took them. Suddenly Pablo (we couldn’t call him “Grandpa”) would start shouting: “You can’t take care of your children yourself. You can't earn your living! You can't do anything on your own! You will always be mediocre."

After a few years, these trips stopped - Picasso lost all interest in his children and grandchildren. However, he also began to treat Jacqueline Rock coldly. “I will die without ever loving anyone,” he once admitted.

“My grandfather was never interested in the fate of his loved ones. He was only concerned about his creativity, from which he suffered or was happy. He loved children only for their innocence in his paintings, and women - for the sexual and cannibalistic impulses that they aroused in him... Once, I was nine years old. I fainted from exhaustion. I was taken to a doctor, and the doctor was very surprised that Picasso’s granddaughter was in such a condition. and wrote him a letter asking him to send me to the medical center. My grandfather didn’t answer - he didn’t care.”

The end of the artist's life

And so it happened. His grandson Pablito, despite everything, retained boundless love for his grandfather, asked to be allowed to attend the funeral, but Jacqueline Roque refused. On the day of the funeral, Pablito drank a bottle of decoloran, a bleaching chemical liquid, and burned his insides. “He died a few days later in the hospital,” recalled Marina Picasso. “I just had to find money for the funeral.” Newspapers have already reported that the grandson of the great artist, who lived a few hundred meters from his villa in complete poverty, could not survive the death of his grandfather. Our college comrades helped us out. Without telling me a word, they collected the amount needed for the funeral from their pocket money.”

“Every positive value has its value in negative terms”

Marina Picasso suggested that if her grandfather had known about these tragedies, he would not have been very worried. “Every positive value has a negative value.” - the artist liked to repeat.

The most productive painter in the history of humanity.

He also became the most successful artist, earning more than a billion dollars in his life.

He became the founder of modern avant-garde art, starting his journey with realistic painting, discovering cubism and paying tribute to surrealism.

The great Spanish painter, founder of Cubism. Over his long life (92 years), the artist created such a huge number of paintings, engravings, sculptures, and ceramic miniatures that it cannot be accurately counted. According to various sources, Picasso's heritage ranges from 14 to 80 thousand works of art.

Picasso is unique. He is fundamentally alone, for the lot of a genius is loneliness.

On October 25, 1881, a joyful event occurred in the family of Jose Ruiz Blasco and Maria Picasso Lopez. Their first-born was born, a boy, who was named, according to the Spanish tradition, long and ornate - Pablo Diego Jose Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno Maria de los Remedios Crispignano de la Santisima Trinidad Ruiz and Picasso. Or simply Pablo.

The pregnancy was difficult - thin Maria could barely bear the baby. And the birth was completely difficult. The boy was born dead...

That's what the doctor, Jose Salvador Ruiz's older brother, thought. He accepted the baby, examined him and immediately realized that it was a failure. The boy was not breathing. The doctor spanked him and turned him upside down. Nothing helped. Doctor Salvador hinted with his eyes to the obstetrician to take away the dead child and lit a cigarette. A cloud of gray cigar smoke enveloped the baby's blue face. He tensed convulsively and screamed.

A small miracle happened. The stillborn child turned out to be alive.

The house in Malaga's Merced Square, where Picasso was born, now houses the artist's house-museum and a foundation bearing his name.

His father was an art teacher at the Malaga art school and was also the curator of the local Art Museum.

After Malaga, Jose moved with his family to the town of La Coruña and got a place at the school of fine arts, teaching children painting. He became the first and, perhaps, main teacher of his brilliant son, giving humanity the most outstanding artist of the 20th century.

We know little about Picasso's mother.

An interesting fact is that Mother Maria lived to see her son’s triumph.

Three years after the birth of her first child, Maria gave birth to a girl, Lola, and three years later, the youngest, Conchita.

Picasso was a very spoiled boy.

He was allowed to do everything positively, but he almost died in the first minutes of his life.

At the age of seven, the boy was sent to a regular high school, but he studied disgustingly. Of course, he learned to read and count, but he wrote poorly and with errors (this remained for the rest of his life). But he was not interested in anything other than drawing. He was kept at school only out of respect for his father.

Even before school, his father began to let him into his workshop. Gave me pencils and paper.

José was pleased to note that his son had an innate sense of form. He had a fantastic memory.

At the age of eight, the child began to draw on his own. What the father took weeks to complete, the son managed to complete in two hours.

The first painting painted by Pablo has survived to this day. Picasso never parted with this canvas, painted on a small wooden board with his father’s paints. This is a Picador from 1889.

Pablo Picasso – “Picador” 1889

In 1894, his father took Pablo from school and transferred the boy to his lyceum - a school of fine arts in the same La Coruña.

If Pablo did not have a single good grade at a regular school, then at his father’s school he did not have a single bad one. He studied not just well, but brilliantly.

Barcelona... Catalonia

In the summer of 1895, the Ruiz family moved to the capital of Catalonia. Pablo was only 13 years old. The father wanted his son to study at the Barcelona Academy of Arts. Pablo, still just a boy, submitted documents as an applicant. And immediately received a refusal. Pablo was four years younger than the first-year students. My father had to look for old acquaintances. Out of respect for this distinguished man, the selection committee of the Barcelona Academy decided to allow the boy to participate in the entrance exams.

In just a week, Pablo painted several paintings and completed the commission’s assignment - he painted several graphic works in the classical style. When he took out and unfolded these sheets in front of the painting professors, the members of the commission were speechless with surprise. The decision was unanimous. The boy was accepted into the Academy. And immediately to the senior year. He did not need to learn to draw - a fully formed professional artist sat in front of the commission.

The name “Pablo Picasso” appeared precisely during his studies at the Barcelona Academy. Pablo signed his first works with his own name – Ruiz Blesco. But then a problem arose - the young man did not want his paintings to be confused with the paintings of his father Jose Ruiz Blasco. And he took his mother’s last name – Picasso. And this was also a tribute to respect and love for Mother Mary.

Picasso never spoke about his mother. But he loved and respected his mother very much. He painted his father as a doctor in the painting “Knowledge and Mercy.” Portrait of Mother – painting “portrait of the artist’s mother”, 1896.

But the painting “Lola, Picasso’s sister” is even more interesting. It was painted in 1899, when Pablo was under the influence of the Impressionists.

In the summer of 1897, changes came to the family of José Ruiz Blasco. An important letter arrived from Malaga - the authorities again decided to open the Art Museum and invited the authoritative person José Ruiz to the position of its director. In 1897 in June. Pablo completed his studies at the Academy and received a diploma as a professional artist. And after that the family set off.

Picasso did not like Malaga. For him, Malaga was like a provincial horror hole. He wanted to study. Then at a family council, in which his uncle also participated, it was decided that Pablo would go to Madrid to try to enter the most prestigious art school in the country - the Academy of San Fernando. Uncle Salvador volunteered to finance his nephew’s education.

He entered the San Fernando Academy without much difficulty. Picasso was simply beyond competition. At first, he received good money from his uncle. The reluctance to learn what Pablo already knew without lessons from professors led to the fact that after a few months, he dropped out of school. The receipt of money from his uncle immediately stopped, and difficult times came for Pablo. He was 17 years old at the time, and by the spring of 1898 he decided to go to Paris.

Paris amazed him. It became clear that we had to live here. But without money he could not stay in Paris for long and in June 1898 Pablo returned to Barcelona.

Here he managed to rent a small workshop in old Barcelona, ​​painted several paintings and was even able to sell them. But this could not continue for long. And again I wanted to return to Paris. and even convinced his friends, the artists Carlos Casagemas and Jaime Sabartes, to go with him.

In Barcelona, ​​Pablo often visited the Santa Creu hospital for the poor, where prostitutes were treated. His friend worked here. Putting on a white robe. Picasso sat for hours during examinations, quickly making pencil sketches in a notebook. These sketches will later turn into paintings.

Eventually Picasso moved to Paris.

His father saw him off at the Barcelona train station. As a farewell, the son gave his father his self-portrait, on which he wrote “I am the king!” on top.

Life in Paris was poor and hungry. But all the museums of Paris were at Picasso’s service. Then he became interested in the work of the impressionists - Delacroix, Toulouse-Lautrec, Van Gogh, Gauguin.

He became interested in the art of the Phoenicians and ancient Egyptians, Japanese prints and Gothic sculpture.

In Paris, he and his friends had a different life. Available women, drunken conversations with friends past midnight, weeks without bread and most importantly OPIUM.

The sobering happened in one moment. One morning he went into the next room where his friend Casagemas lived. Carlos was lying on the bed with his arms spread out to his sides. A revolver lay nearby. Carlos was dead. It later turned out that the cause of suicide was drug withdrawal.

Picasso's shock was so great that he immediately abandoned his passion for opium and never returned to drugs. The death of a friend turned Picasso's life upside down. After living in Paris for two years, he returned to Barcelona.

Cheerful, temperamental, seething with cheerful energy, Pablo suddenly turned into a thoughtful melancholic. The death of a friend made him think about the meaning of life. In a self-portrait from 1901, a pale man looks at us with tired eyes. Pictures of this period - depression, loss of strength are everywhere, you see these tired eyes everywhere.

Picasso himself called this period blue - “the color of all colors.” Against the blue background of death, Picasso paints life with bright colors. For two years spent in Barcelona, ​​he worked at an easel. I almost forgot my youthful trips to brothels.

“The Ironer” was painted by Picasso in 1904. A tired, fragile woman bent over an ironing board. Weak thin arms. This picture is a hymn to the hopelessness of life.

He reached the pinnacle of his skill at a very early age. But he continued to search and experiment. At 25, he was still an aspiring artist.

One of the striking paintings of the “Blue Period” is “Life” of 1903. Picasso himself did not like this painting, considered it unfinished and found it too similar to the works of El Greco - but Pablo did not recognize secondary art. The picture shows three times, three periods of life - past, present and future.

In January 1904, Picasso again went to Paris. This time I am determined to gain a foothold here by any means necessary. And under no circumstances should he return to Spain until he achieves success in the capital of France.

He was close to his “Rose Period”.

One of his Parisian friends was Ambroise Vollard. Having organized the first exhibition of Pablo’s works in 1901, this man soon became a “guardian angel” for Picasso. Vollard was a collector of paintings and, very significantly, a successful art dealer.

Having managed to charm Voller. Picasso provided himself with a sure source of income.

In 1904, Picasso met and became friends with Guillaume Apollinaire.

Also in 1904, Picasso met the first true love of his life, Fernanda Olivier.

It is unknown what attracted Fernanda to this short, compact Spaniard (Picasso was only 158 centimeters tall - he was one of the “great shorties”). Their love blossomed quickly and magnificently. Tall Fernanda was crazy about her Pablo.

Fernande Olivier became Picasso's first permanent model. Since 1904, he simply could not work unless there was a female character in front of him. Both were 23 years old. They lived easily, cheerfully and very poorly. Fernanda turned out to be a useless housewife. And Picasso could not stand this in his women, and their civil marriage went downhill.

“Girl on a Ball” - this painting, painted by Picasso in 1905, is considered by painting experts to be a transitional period in the artist’s work - between “blue” and “pink”.

During these years, Picasso's favorite place in Paris was the Medrano Circus. He loved the circus. because they are circus performers, people of an unhappy fate, professional wanderers, homeless vagabonds, forced to pretend to have fun all their lives.

The nude figures in Picasso's 1906 canvases are calm and even peaceful. They no longer look lonely - the theme of loneliness. worries about the future faded into the background.

Several works of 1907, including “Self-Portrait,” were made in a special “African” technique. And the very time of the fascination with masks will be called the “African period” by specialists in the field of painting. Step by step, Picasso moved towards cubism.

“Les Demoiselles d'Avignon” – Picaso worked especially intently on this painting. For a whole year he kept the canvas under a thick cape, not allowing even Fernanda to look at it.

The painting depicted a brothel. In 1907, when everyone saw the picture, a serious scandal broke out. Everyone looked at the picture. The reviewers unanimously declared that Picasso’s picture was nothing more than a publishing house over art.

At the beginning of 1907, at the height of the scandal surrounding “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon,” the artist Georges Braque came to his gallery. Braque and Picasso immediately became friends and began the theoretical development of Cubism. The main idea was to achieve the effect of a three-dimensional image using intersecting planes and construction using geometric shapes.

This period occurred in 1908-1909. The paintings painted by Picasso during this period were still not much different from the same “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon”. The very first paintings in the cubist style found buyers and admirers.

The period of so-called “analytical” cubism occurred in 1909-1910. Picasso moved away from Cezanne's softness of colors. Geometric shapes decreased in size, images became chaotic, and the paintings themselves became more complex.

The final period of the formation of Cubism is called “synthetic”. It occurred between 1911-1917.

By the summer of 1909, Pablo, who was in his thirties, had become rich. It was in 1909 that he accumulated so much money that he opened his own bank account, and by the fall he was able to afford both new housing and a new workshop.

Eva-Marcel became the first woman in Picasso’s life who left him on her own, without waiting for the artist himself to leave her. In 1915 she died of consumption. With the death of his beloved Eva, Picasso lost the ability to work for a long time. The depression lasted for several months.

In 1917, Picasso's social circle expanded - he met an amazing man, poet and artist Jean Cocteau.

Then Cocteau convinced Picasso to go with him to Italy, Rome, to unwind and forget his sadness.

In Rome, Picasso saw a girl and instantly fell in love. It was Russian ballet dancer Olga Khokhlova.

“Portrait of Olga in an Armchair” – 1917

In 1918, Picasso proposed. They went together to Malaga so that Olga could meet Picasso’s parents. The parents gave the go-ahead. At the beginning of February, Pablo and Olga went to Paris. Here on February 12, 1918 they became husband and wife.

Their marriage lasted just over a year and began to crack. This time there was most likely a reason. in differences in temperament. Having become convinced of her husband’s infidelity, they no longer lived together, but still Picasso did not divorce. Olga remained the artist’s wife, albeit formally, until her death in 1955.

In 1921, Olga gave birth to a son, who was named Paulo or simply Paul.

Pablo Picasso devoted 12 years of his creative life to surrealism, periodically returning to cubism.

Following the principles of surrealism formulated by Andre Breton, Picasso, however, always followed his own path.

“Dance” – 1925

Picasso's very first painting, painted in a surrealist style in 1925 under the influence of the artistic creativity of Breton and his supporters, leaves a strong impression. This is the painting “Dance”. In the work with which Picasso marked a new period in his creative life, there is a lot of aggression and pain.

It was January 1927. Pablo was already very rich and famous. One day on the embankment of the Seine, he saw a girl and fell in love. The girl's name was Maria-Therese Walter. They were separated by a huge age difference - nineteen years. He rented her an apartment not far from his house. And soon he wrote only Maria Teresa.

Maria-Therese Walter

In the summer, when Pablo took his family to the Mediterranean Sea, Maria Teresa followed. Pablo settled her next to the house. Picasso asked Olga for a divorce. But Olga refused, because day after day Picasso became even richer.

Picasso managed to buy Boisgeloup Castle for Marie-Therese, where he actually moved himself.

In the fall of 1935, Maria Teresa gave birth to his daughter, whom she named Maya.

The girl was registered under the name of an unknown father. Picasso swore that he would recognize his daughter immediately after the divorce, but when Olga died, he never kept his promise.

“Maya with a Doll” – 1938

Marie-Therese Walter became the main inspiration. Picasso for several years. It was to her that he dedicated his first sculptures, on which he worked at the Château de Boisgelou during 1930-1934.

“Maria-Therese Walter”, 1937

Fascinated by surrealism, Picasso completed his first sculptural compositions in the same surrealist vein.

For Picasso, the Spanish War coincided with a personal tragedy - Mother Maria died two weeks before it began. Having buried her, Picasso lost the main thread connecting him with his homeland.

There is a tiny town in the Basque country in northern Spain called Guernica. On May 1, 1937, German aircraft raided this city and practically wiped it off the face of the earth. The news of the death of Guernica shocked the Planet. And soon this shock was repeated when a Picasso painting called “Guernica” appeared at the World Exhibition in Paris.

“Guernica”, 1937

In terms of the power of impact on the viewer, no painting can compare with “Guernica.”

In the fall of 1935, Picasso was sitting at a table in a street cafe in Montmartre. Here he saw Dora Maar. And …

Quite a bit of time passed and they found themselves in a shared bed. Dora was Serbian. They were separated by the war.

When the Germans began to invade France, a great exodus occurred. Artists, writers, and poets moved from Paris to Spain, Portugal, Algeria and America. Not everyone managed to escape, many died... Picasso did not go anywhere. He was at home and didn’t give a damn about Hitler and his Nazis. It's surprising that they didn't touch him. It is also surprising that Adolf Hitler himself was a fan of his work.

In 1943, Picasso became close to the communists, and in 1944 he announced that he was joining the French Communist Party. Picasso was awarded the Stalinist Award (in 1950). and then the Lenin Prize (in 1962).

At the end of 1944, Picasso went to the sea, to the south of France. It was found by Dora Maar in 1945. It turned out she was looking for him throughout the war. Picasso bought her a cozy house here in the south of France. And he announced that it was all over between them. The disappointment was so great that Dora perceived Pablo's words as a tragedy. Soon she suffered from mental illness and ended up in a psychiatric clinic. There she lived the rest of her days.

In the summer of 1945, Pablo returned briefly to Paris, where he saw Françoise Gilot and immediately fell in love. In 1947, Pablo and Françoise moved to the south of France to Valoris. Soon Pablo learned the good news - Françoise was expecting a child. In 1949, Picasso's son Claude was born. A year later, Françoise gave birth to a girl, who was given the name Paloma.

But Picasso was not Picasso if the family relationship lasted a long time. They were already starting to quarrel. And suddenly Françoise quietly left, it was the summer of 1953. Because of her departure, Picasso began to feel like an old man.

In 1954, Fate brought Pablo Picasso together with his last companion, who in the end of the great painter would become his wife. It was Jacqueline Rock. Picasso was older than Jacqueline by as much as... 47 years. At the time they met, she was only 26 years old. He is 73.

Three years after Olga's death, Picasso decided to buy a large castle in which he could spend the rest of his days with Jacqueline. He chose Vauvereng Castle on the slope of Mount Saint Victoria in the south of France.

In 1970, an event took place that became his main reward in these last years. The city authorities of Barcelona turned to the artist with a request to give permission to open a museum of his paintings. This was Picasso's first museum. The second - in Paris - opened after his death. In 1985, the Parisian Hotel Salé was turned into a Picasso museum.

In the last years of his life, he suddenly began to rapidly lose his hearing and vision. Then my memory began to weaken. Then my legs gave out. By the end of 1972 he was completely blind. Jacqueline was always there. She loved him very much. No moaning, no complaining, no tears.

April 8, 1973 - on this day he died. According to Picasso's will, his ashes were buried next to Voverang Castle...

Source – Wikipedia and Informal biographies (Nikolai Nadezhdin).

Pablo Picasso - biography, facts, paintings - the great Spanish painter updated: January 16, 2018 by: website