PICASSO at Midday Gallery

May 8 - 22, 2010

For the first time in Bergen County, an exhibition of original prints by Pablo Picasso, presented by Midday Gallery and John Szoke Editions, New York.
John Szoke is a major dealer of Picasso’s prints with over 40 years of experience.
The show is an outstanding collection of etchings, engravings, lithographs and linocuts, from the 3 major cycles of Picasso’s prints: Suite Vollard, The 347 Series, and the 156 Series.

Picasso’s ouvre of multiples is considered one of the largest in all of art history. In the introduction to Picasso The Engraver, Dominique Dupuis-Labbe of the Musee Picasso tells us:
His inventiveness was prodigious. He worked on the prints with the same freedom he showed when confronted with every technique. Picasso was not a ‘trained’ etcher or engraver. But what did it matter? He attacked wood and metal without any a prioris and managed, through his ‘finds’, to enhance the opposition and marriage of black and white, as well as to obtain an extraordinary linear subtlety.

…More than his painting or drawing, printmaking gives us the feeling that for Picasso it was a kind of day-to-day private diary, telling us about his deepest emotions, his brooding on desires, suffering separation, fear of old age and death. A kind of pillow-talk, an account, also an outlet and a therapy, his printmaking throbs so strongly with life that we can all of us, in our own ways, find while reading his ‘picture-story’ bits of our own lives. His magic wand allowed him to give a universal meaning to his most private feelings. (8, 1997)

It is rare to have a vast collection of the beautiful Picasso’s original prints in one exhibition. This is an opportunity for the Bergen County art lovers to experience an exhibition of that scale, right in their neighborhood and outside of New York museums.

Enjoy wine and refreshments, at the opening reception on Saturday, May 8th form 10 – 6pm.
John Szoke will be available to answer your questions and to consult about the collection on Saturday, May 8th, between 1-4 pm.

The exhibit will be on view until May 22, 2010.

Picasso’s prints

In the annals of art history. Picasso’s ouvre of multiples is considered one of the largest. In the introduction to Picasso The Engraver, Dominique Dupuis-Labbe of the Musee Picasso tells us:
His inventiveness was prodigious. He worked on the prints with the same freedom he showed when confronted with every technique. Picasso was not ‘trained’ etcher or engraver. But what did it matter? He attacked wood and metal without any a prioris and managed, through his ‘finds’, to enhance the opposition and marriage of black and white, as well as to obtain an extraordinary linear subtlety. (8, 1997)
Picasso’s prints are composed from four major cycles:
1. Suite Vollard. Bloch #134 - #233 (series of 100 images) from 1930 to 1937.
2. The 347 Series. Bloch #1481-#1827
3. 156 Series. Bloch #1857-#2011.
There is also the collection of 45 prints created mostly in the 1920’s and 1930’s, with the exception of 8 images which were made in the 1950’s. Only 10 of these prints were editioned. In 1961 the rest of the prints were finally realeased under the collective title: La Caisse a Remords.

It is interesting to observe that the Suite Vollard is not signed, the 347 is hand signed, while the 156 and the La Caisse a Remords are stamp signed

A lot of literature focuses on the subject matter in Picasso’s prints. Because he was so prolific and his work so multifaceted, it is very hard to limit discussions of the subject matter found in his work. It is equally hard to definitively categorize the work. Although viewpoints differ widely, it is generally held that with the exception os some experimentation with cubism and abstraction, his early work is very representational. His imagery is very lyrical from the start, as time goes on it becomes more and more symbolic. He develops an kind of personal symbology that manages, even when abstract, to clearly communicate the emotional states surrounding the life events of the artist. In the words of Dupuis-Labbe:
…He shows us the wonderful world he created. Weather invented or rooted in his private life, a crowd of characters lives, love, suffers and dies before our eyes. (8, 1997)
Picasso had many deeply meaningful and long lasting friendships throughout his life. He also shared much comradery with other artists. Still, the relationships most often reflected in his imagery were of the women with whom he was intimately involved. Although very few of the prints are titled it is easy to identify the faces of these women in his work. His relationship with: Fernande Olivier; Olga Koklova, his first wife; MarieTheresa Walter; Dora Marr; Francois Gilot; and, Jacqueline Rogue, his second wife each form a cycle of work. His fascination with Dora Marr’s face as well as his mellowed-out reading of Jacqueline Rogue’s features in which his ouvre is study a in love, tenderness, and friendship they are simply wonderful, wonderful images.

Also running through Picasso’s work are reflections of day-to-day intra-psychic preoccupations. Coming from a Spanish background, with a male-oriented culture, machismo figured largely into his identity. Examples of this aspect of self are found in his imagery in the appearance of the bull and the Minotaur. These figures become symbolic of Picasso’s often dichotomous feelings about this aspect of his identity.
Although most often we see the bull as powerfully mastering the woman, at other times we find the bull wounded and vulnerable in her company. The Minotaur too is sometimes portrayed as the all-powerful, conquering male and at other times he blindly fumbles through the image.

Besides these images, the best-known cycles of Picasso’s print work are the final cycles. Specifically, the Suite 347 and the Suite 156. The images in these portfolios portray the desires, wishes, failings, and memories of an ageing man. Some are highly charged sexual images while others are poignant depictions from artist’s viewpoint of life continuing as he moves from the role of active participant to passive observer; as he becomes an old man.

To end with a quote Domimique Dupuis-Labbe of the Musee Picasso:
More than his painting or drawing, printmaking gives us the feeling that for Picasso it was a kind of day-to-day private diary, telling us about his deepest emotions, his brooding on desires, suffering separation, fear of old age and death. A kind of pillow-talk, an account, also an outlet and a therapy, his printmaking throbs so strongly with life that we can all of us, in our own ways, find while reading his ‘picture-story’ bits of our own lives. His magic wand allowed him to give a universal meaning to his most private feelings. (8, 1997)