Picasso
3.5/5
()
About this ebook
For more than a generation, Gertrude Stein's Paris home at 27 rue de Fleurus was the center of a glittering coterie of artists and writers, one of whom was Pablo Picasso. In this intimate and revealing memoir, Stein tells us much about the great man (and herself) and offers many insights into the life and art of the 20th century's greatest painter.
Mixing biological fact with artistic and aesthetic comments, she limns a unique portrait of Picasso as a founder of Cubism, an intimate of Appollinaire, Max Jacob, Braque, Derain, and others, and a genius driven by a ceaseless quest to convey his vision of the 20th century. We learn, for example, of the importance of his native Spain in shaping Picasso's approach to art; of the influence of calligraphy and African sculpture; of his profound struggle to remain true to his own vision; of the overriding need to empty himself of the forms and ideas that welled up within him.
Stein's close relationship with Picasso furnishes her with a unique vantage point in composing this perceptive and provocative reminiscence. It will delight any admirer of Picasso or Gertrude Stein; it is indispensable to an understanding of modern art.
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein (1874-1946) was an American novelist and poet. Born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, Stein was raised in an upper-middle-class Jewish family alongside four siblings. After a brief move to Vienna and Paris, the Steins settled in Oakland, California in 1878, where Stein would spend her formative years. In 1892, following the loss of her mother and father, Stein moved with her sister to live with family in Baltimore, where she was exposed to salon culture. From 1893 to 1897 she attended Radcliffe College, studying psychology under William James. Conducting experiments on the phenomenon of normal motor automatism, Stein produced early examples of steam of consciousness or automatic writing, a hallmark of the Modernist style later practiced by Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, and William Faulkner. In 1897, she enrolled at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine on the recommendation of James, but ultimately left before completing her degree. She moved to Paris with her brother Leo, an artist, in 1903. In the French capital, the Steins gained a reputation as art collectors, purchasing works by Picasso, Matisse, Gauguin, Cézanne, and Renoir. At 27 rue de Fleurus, Stein hosted an influential salon for such artists and intellectuals as Ernest Hemingway, Ezra Pound, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, who recognized her as a leading Modernist and central figure of the so-called Lost Generation. Her influential works include Three Lives (1909), Tender Buttons (1912), and The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas (1933), all of which exemplify her control over vastly different styles of poetry and prose. Capable of producing experimental, hermetic works that draw attention to the constructed nature of language, Stein also excelled with straightforward narratives, essays, and biographical descriptions. From 1907 until her death, Stein and her life partner Alice B. Toklas gained a reputation as leaders in the international avant-garde, and remain essential to our understanding of the development of twentieth century art and culture.
Read more from Gertrude Stein
Tender Buttons Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Geography and Plays Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tender Buttons: Objects Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The World Is Round Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThree LivesStories of The Good Anna, Melanctha and The Gentle Lena Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlood on the Dining-Room Floor Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Making Of Americans: Being A History Of A Family's Progress Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Three Lives Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Great American Poets: New Hampshire, Tender Buttons, Select Poems, and Selected Poems Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Tender Buttons (Zongo Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNarration: Four Lectures Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Gertrude Stein Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTender Buttons Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein With Two Shorter Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGEOGRAPHY & PLAYS: A Collection of Poems, Stories and Plays Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThree Lives and Tender Buttons Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5How to Write Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Tender Buttons – Objects, Food, Rooms: Collection of Poems in Verse and Prose Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThree Lives Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Picasso
Titles in the series (100)
100 Drawings Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Graphic Works of Odilon Redon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dulac's Fairy Tale Illustrations in Full Color Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Chinese Ornament: All 100 Color Plates Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Michelangelo Life Drawings Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Thomas Nast's Christmas Drawings Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5The Art of Fresco Painting in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRackham's Color Illustrations for Wagner's "Ring" Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Full-Color Picture Sourcebook of Historic Ornament: All 120 Plates from "L'Ornement Polychrome," Series II Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Salome Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Steinlen Cats Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Codex Nuttall Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOld Master Life Drawings: 44 Plates Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Sun, The Idea & Story Without Words: Three Graphic Novels Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Point and Line to Plane Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Van Gogh Drawings: 44 Plates Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Anders Zorn, 101 Etchings Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsJapanese No Masks: With 300 Illustrations of Authentic Historical Examples Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Drawings of Albrecht Dürer Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDestiny: A Novel in Pictures Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Painters of the Ashcan School: The Immortal Eight Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A Treatise on Painting Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Leonardo on the Human Body Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Rape of the Lock Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Picasso Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Chinese Brushwork in Calligraphy and Painting: Its History, Aesthetics, and Techniques Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/550 Secrets of Magic Craftsmanship Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Leonardo's Anatomical Drawings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related ebooks
The ultimate book on Picasso Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Picasso Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Modigliani Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pablo Picasso Masterworks - Volume 2 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Marc Chagall Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDalí Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) - Volume 1 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Cézanne Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPablo Picasso Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRodin on Art and Artists Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Pierre Bonnard and artworks Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Toulouse-Lautrec Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Kandinsky Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bonnard and the Nabis Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Cassatt and artworks Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Pablo Picasso and artworks Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Paul Cezanne: 235 Colour Plates Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Gustave Caillebotte (1848-1894) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dada Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5August Macke and artworks Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Camille Pissarro: Drawings Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPaul Cezanne: 140 Master Drawings Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Vision and Design Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Caravaggio Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Delphi Complete Works of John Singer Sargent (Illustrated) Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Great Goya Etchings: The Proverbs, The Tauromaquia and The Bulls of Bordeaux Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Klee Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFrancois Boucher: Drawings 143 Colour Plates Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Art For You
Art 101: From Vincent van Gogh to Andy Warhol, Key People, Ideas, and Moments in the History of Art Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Art Models SarahAnn031: Figure Drawing Pose Reference Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5How to Make Love Like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Lust Unearthed: Vintage Gay Graphics From the DuBek Collection Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Everything Is F*cked: A Book About Hope Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Anatomy for Fantasy Artists: An Essential Guide to Creating Action Figures & Fantastical Forms Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Drawing and Sketching Portraits: How to Draw Realistic Faces for Beginners Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Alchemist: A Graphic Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Draw and Paint Anatomy, All New 2nd Edition: Creating Lifelike Humans and Realistic Animals Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Designer's Dictionary of Color Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World--and Why Their Differences Matter Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Draw Like an Artist: 100 Flowers and Plants Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Drawing School: Fundamentals for the Beginner Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Find Your Artistic Voice: The Essential Guide to Working Your Creative Magic Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Designer's Guide to Color Combinations Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Shape of Ideas: An Illustrated Exploration of Creativity Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Story: Style, Structure, Substance, and the Principles of Screenwriting Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Make Your Art No Matter What: Moving Beyond Creative Hurdles Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Botanical Drawing: A Step-By-Step Guide to Drawing Flowers, Vegetables, Fruit and Other Plant Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Egyptian Book of the Dead: The Complete Papyrus of Ani Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Art of Living: The Classical Mannual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The World Needs Your Art: Casual Magic to Unlock Your Creativity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCreative, Inc.: The Ultimate Guide to Running a Successful Freelance Business Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Picasso
36 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This is the first of Gertrude Stein's work I have read. You can definitely feel the intention that quite possibly influenced Hemingway's style, but I can't help thinking that Stein was one of those many intelligent people who cannot write very well. If anything, I shall probably remember her classification of Picasso's various periods simply through her repetition. It is a very quick read expedited by the various useful pictures of Picasso's work and a handful of photographs. Nonetheless, I doubt I would have bothered to read this if the subject matter wasn't of interest and Stein had not been a part of Hemingway's early development.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I don't love Gertrude Stein, but this little book at least accomplishes what any book on an artist or writer should do: deepen your appreciation of and heighten your interest in the subject. The account of Picasso's life is unabashedly personal, and the main source of "information" is Stein's own relationship with Picasso, and her own judgements of his work and its meaning. The generalizations about European nations, the repeated claims that "it was only natural for Picasso to do X" because he was he was a Spaniard, the somewhat dismissive attitude towards other artists of the period--if you can just let this wash over you, take them as simply idiosyncratic musings, an offering of a perspective, then they will be, if not charming, at least tolerable. At any rate, I imagine these things are what make some people find Stein charming. The claim that, e.g., the 17th century had less reason than the 16th, and was therefore more splendid just strikes me as lazy and uninteresting. But anyway back to Stein on Picasso. She writes early in the book that for Picasso, faces were as old as the world. Elsewhere she relates an overheard conversation in which a woman suggests she finds portraits more interesting than still lifes because she knows what fruits and plants are, but doesn't know what humans are. Episodes like these make the book more than worth the short amount of time it takes to read it.
Book preview
Picasso - Gertrude Stein
DOVER BOOKS ON FINE ART
BEARDSLEY’S LE MORTE DARTHUR: SELECTED ILLUSTRATIONS, AUBREY BEARDSLEY. (0-486-41795-6)
WILLIAM BLAKE’S DIVINE COMEDY ILLUSTRATIONS: 102 FULL-COLOR PLATES, WILLIAM BLAKE. (0-486-46429-6)
BLAKE’S WATER-COLOURS FOR THE POEMS OF THOMAS GRAY: WITH COMPLETE TEXTS, WILLIAM BLAKE. (0-486-40944-9)
CHAGALL DRAWINGS: 43 WORKS, MARC CHAGALL. (0-486-41222-9)
DEGAS DRAWINGS OF DANCERS, EDGAR DEGAS. (0-486-40698-9)
AN EDWARDIAN BESTIARY: 87 COLOR PLATES BY MAURICE & EDWARD J. DETMOLD, MAURICE DETMOLD AND EDWARD J. DETMOLD. EDITED AND WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY JEFF A. MENGES. (0-486-46877-1)
THE DORÉ BIBLE ILLUSTRATIONS, GUSTAVE DORÉ. (0-486-23004-X)
THE DORÉ GALLERY: His 120 GREATEST ILLUSTRATIONS, GUSTAVE DORÉ. EDITED BY CAROL BELANGER GRAFTON. (0-486-0160-X)
KIOWA AND PUEBLO ART: WATERCOLOR PAINTINGS BY NATIVE AMERICAN ARTISTS, DOVER. (0-486-46441-5)
THE COMPLETE ENGRAVINGS, ETCHINGS AND DRYPOINTS OF ALBRECHT DÜRER, ALBRECHT DÜRER. (0-486-22851-7)
GREAT SELF-PORTRAITS, EDITED BY CAROL BELANGER GRAFTON. (048642168-6)
GREAT ANIMAL DRAWINGS AND PRINTS, EDITED BY CAROL. BELANGER GRAFTON. (0-486-44830-4)
GREAT DRAWINGS OF WOMEN: FROM THE RENAISSANCE TO THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, SELECTED BY CAROL BELANGER GRAFTON. (0-486-44606-9)
GREAT DRAWINGS OF NUDES: 45 WORKS, EDITED BY CAROL BELANGER GRAFTON. (0-486-42766-8)
HOLBEIN PORTRAIT DRAWINGS. HANS HOLBEIN THE YOUNGER. (0-486-24937-9)
GRAPHIC WORKS OF MAX KLINGER, MAX KLINGER. (0-486-23437-1)
JAPANESE WOODBLOCK FLOWER PRINTS. TANIGAMI KÔNAN. (0-486-46442-3)
LEONARDO’S ANATOMICAL DRAWINGS, LEONARDO DA VINCI. (0-486-43862-7)
LEONARDO ON ART AND THE ARTIST. LEONARDO DA VINCI. (0-486-42166-X)
LEONARDO DRAWINGS, LEONARDO DA VINCI. (0-486-23951-9)
THE SUN, THE IDEA & STORY WITHOUT WORDS: THREE GRAPHIC NOVELS, FRANS MASEREEL. WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION BY DAVID A. VERONA. (0-486-47169-1)
POE ILLUSTRATED, SELECTED AND EDITED BY JEFF A. MENGES. (0-486-45746-X)
VISIONS OF CAMELOT: GREAT ILLUSTRATIONS OF KING ARTHUR AND HIS COURT, SELECTED AND EDITED BY JEFF A. MENAGES. (0-486-46816-X)
ONCE UPON A TIME . . . A TREASURY OF CLASSIC FAIRY TALE ILLUSTRATIONS, SELECTED AND EDITED BY JEFF A. MENGES. (0-486-46830-5)
MICHELANGELO LIFE DRAWINGS, MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI. (0-486-23876-8)
MIRÓ LITHOGRAPHS, JOAN MIRÓ. (0-486-24437-7)
PICASSO LINE DRAWINGS AND PRINTS, PABLO PICASSO. (0-486-24196-3)
WILLY POGÁNY REDISCOVERED, WILLY POGÁNY. SELECTED AND EDITED BY JEFF A. MENGES. (0-486-47046-6)
RACKHAM’S COLOR ILLUSTRATIONS FOR WAGNER’S RING
, ARTHUR RACKHAM. (0-486-23779-6)
THE ARTHUR RACKHAM TREASURY: 86 FULL-COLOR ILLUSTRATIONS, ARTHUR RACKHAM. SELECTED AND EDITED BY JEFF A. MENGES. (O-486-44685-9)
THE LIFE OF CHRIST IN WOODCUTS, JAMES REID. (0-486-46884-4)
THE COMPLETE ETCHINGS OF REMBRANDT: REPRODUCED IN ORIGINAL SIZE, REMBRANDT. (0-486-28181-7)
SEE EVERY DOVER BOOK IN PRINT AT WWW.DOVERPUBLICATIONS.COM
1 STILL-LIFE, MA JOLIE
(1914)
This Dover edition, first published in 1984, is an unabridged republication of the work originally published by B. T. Batsford Ltd, London, in 1938. Plates 1, 2, 7, 21, 22, 29, 34 and 61, originally reproduced in color, are here reproduced in black and white.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Stein, Gertrude, 1874-1946.
Picasso.
Reprint. Originally published: London : B.T Batsford, 1938.
Includes index.
1. Picasso, Pablo, 1881-1973. I. Title.
ND553.P5S8 1984
759.4
84-5934
9780486136523
Manufactured in the United States by Courier Corporation
24715518
www.doverpublications.com
Table of Contents
DOVER BOOKS ON FINE ART
Title Page
Copyright Page
PICASSO
INDEX
A CATALOG OF SELECTED DOVER BOOKS IN ALL FIELDS OF INTEREST
LINES AND STARS
Drawing in Pure Calligraphy (1923)
2 LES PAUVRES : Water Colour (1902)
PICASSO
PAINTING in the nineteenth century was only done in France and by Frenchmen, apart from that, painting did not exist, in the twentieth century it was done in France but by Spaniards.
In the nineteenth century painters discovered the need of always having a model in front of them, in the twentieth century they discovered that they must never look at a model. I remember very well, it was between 1904-1908, when people were forced by us or by themselves to look at Picasso’s drawings that the first and most astonishing thing that all of them and that we had to say was that he had done it all so marvellously as if he had had a model but that he had done it without ever having had one. And now the young painters scarcely know that there are models. Everything changes but not without a reason.
When he was nineteen years old Picasso came to Paris, that was in 1900, into a world of painters who had completely learned everything they could from seeing at what they were looking. From Seurat to Courbet they were all of them looking with their eyes and Seurat’s eyes then began to tremble at what his eyes were seeing, he commenced to doubt if in looking he could see. Matisse too began to doubt what his eyes could see. So there was a world ready for Picasso who had in him not only all Spanish painting but Spanish cubism which is the daily life of Spain.
His father was professor of painting in Spain and Picasso wrote painting as other children wrote their a b c. He was born making drawings, not the drawings of a child but the drawings of a painter. His drawings were not of things seen but of things expressed, in short they were words for him and drawing always was his only way of talking and he talks a great deal.
Physically Picasso resembles his mother whose name he finally took. It is the custom in Spain to take the name of one’s father and one’s mother. The name of Picasso’s father was Ruiz, the name of his mother was Picasso, in the Spanish way he was Pablo Picasso y Ruiz and some of his early canvases were signed Pablo Ruiz but of course Pablo Picasso was the better name, Pablo Picasso y Ruiz was too long a name to use as a signature and he commenced almost at once to sign his canvases Pablo Picasso.
The name Picasso is of Italian origin, probably originally they came from Genoa and the Picasso family went to Spain by way of Palma de Mallorca. His mother’s family were silversmiths. Physically his mother like Picasso is small and robust with a vigorous body, dark-skinned, straight not very fine nearly black hair, on the other hand Picasso always used to say his father was like an Englishman of which both Picasso and his father were proud, tall and with reddish hair and with almost an English way of imposing himself:
The only children in the family were Picasso and his younger sister. He made when he was fifteen years old oil portraits of her, very finished and painted like a born painter.
3 GIRL WITH BARE FEET (1895)
4 HARLEQUIN AND MATCHES (1901)
Picasso was born in Malaga the 25th of October 1881 but he was educated almost entirely in Barcelona where his father until almost the end of his life was professor of painting at the academy of Fine Arts and where he lived until his death, his mother continued living there with his