Sunday, November 23, 2014

Picasso & Jacqueline: The Evolution of Style. Pace Gallery. Chelsea




This is a thrilling and beautiful large exhibition of mostly paintings (there are also some prints and drawings) by this great artist from the last two decades of his life. There is a pull, a rope around our necks with regards to the title of the show, which I don’t like that pushes the idea that the much younger Jacqueline Roque who was his lover and later his wife somehow was his muse. Maybe so but I was not really thinking of this coupling when I was looking mesmerized at his wonderful works. And besides Picasso lived with and loved many women who may have been inspiring to him and served as his models, and did this great artist really need a muse? More than any other artist I can think of, exhibitions of Picasso can be served by many themes and they would all make for fine viewing. How about Picasso and food, Picasso and the theatre, Picasso and children or Picasso and the bullfight not to mention shows of paintings inspired by those many other young women he lived and loved with. For me it’s the paintings that count. What was also terrific was that there were maybe 4 other people in the gallery, (probably this had to do with the freezing cold on the day I visited) in fact the guards outnumbered use viewers so I was able to meander slowly back and forth between the galleries and take my time without the usual crowds which is a given these days at museums and on Saturdays in the some of galleries in Chelsea. This is a museum quality show and I was taken with the fact that I could get up close to the works and really look at his markings, the areas of colors and the texture of his paint. See this one.

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