As every year since I was born, my family and I spend some time at our house in Antibes, South of France, and I always visit Picasso's Museum since I really love the place, its direct view on the sea, the terrace filled with amazing sculptures.
It wasn't disappointing for me because I had seen Picassos many times, so I was very happy to discover other artists together with a few which are always exhibited there.
Here's the complete list of the artists you can find in alphabetical order:
Jean-Michel Atlan
Balthus
Anna-Eva Bergman
Cèsar
Antoni Clavé
Max Ernst
Hans Hartung
Fernand Léger
Alberto Magnelli
Joan Mirò/Josep Lorens Artigas
Zoran Music
Bernard Pagès
Francis Picabia
Pablo Picasso
Anne et Patrick Poirier
Jacques Prévert
Germaine Richier
Michel Sima
Nicolas de Stael
I really like the book's introduction, written by Jean-Louis Andral, look at the picture of the Palace and just try to feel that atmosphere:
"I don't really remember when, or how, I got the news - rather extravagant, I thought - that Picasso was decorating the Museum of Antibes." This is how Jaume Sabartés, the secretary and close friend of Picasso, began the introduction to the work Picasso à Antibes published by René Drouin in 1948, with photographs by Michel Sima commented by Paul Eluard. "However," he continued, "accustomed as I had been for so long to identifying Picasso with the Palais Grimaldi, it was not really difficult to accept the idea that he could do something for the museum."
With true stories, as with legends, the best ones belong to tales recounting the immanence of destiny, of the fantastic entering reality.
So, once upon a time there was a Chateau; like a sentry, it faced the mother of all seas, on the ramparts of a very historic small town. There was also a fabulous artist who would be famous in his century, leaving his mark forever. Their meeting must have been foretold in the stars, for Picasso might well have entered the Chateau Grimaldi as owner rather than invited artist. For he knew the Riviera very well and used to spend his summer holidays there from the beginning of the 1920s, between Juan-les-Pins, le cap d'Antibes and Antibes. This is how he spent the summers of 1923, 1924 and 1925 at Antibes, in a period when the Chateau Grimaldim abandoned by its previous occupants, the military engineers, was put up for sale by the State. Picasso was interested and thought about buying it. But another buyer got there first: the town of Antibes, convinced of the heritage value of the building thanks to the intervention of a decisive personality.
The museum not only became a celebration of modern art and of painters who painted Antibes, but also a reflection on certain artistic movements' forerunners, as you will notice in a minute.
I was shocked and thrilled when I saw this painting by Fernand Léger: Composition à l'aloès n°1, and the thing that shocked me the most is that it was painted in 1935 in a way that remembers the use of colour of pop art, which still had to reach its complete form.
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| Composition à l'aloès n°1, 1935 Oil on canvas 90 x 130 cm |
Here's the artist's comment on his own work:
"If I take some objects like a bit of bark and the wing of a butterfly and from these compose some purely imaginary picture, you will probably not recognise the bark, nor the butterfly wing, but will ask what it all represents."
Here are pictures of my Picasso's favourites:
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| Nu assis sur fond vert, 1946 Oleoresinous paint on plywood 165 x 147.5 cm |
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| Pecheur assis à la casquette, 3 November 1946 Oleoresinous paint on plywood 106.5 x 82.5 cm |
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| Le Corsage à carreaux, 26 March 1949 Lithograph; composition using wash and ink on lithographic paper, transferred to stone; printed on vellum, 20/50 66 x 50 cm |
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| La Femme à la fenetre, 17 May 1952 Sugar aquatint on copper; printed on vellum, 2/50 90 x 63.6 cm |
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| Faune blanc jouant de la diaule, 1946 Oleoresinous paint and charcoal on vellum 66.7 x 50 cm |
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| Nature morte à la bouteille, à la sole et à l'aiguière, 1946 Oleoresinous paint and graphite on fibrocement 120 x 250 cm |
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| La joie de vivre, 1946 Oleoresinous paint and charcoal on fibrocement 120 x 250 cm |
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| Picasso painting Satyre, faune et centaure au trident, 1946 Oleoresinous paint and charcoal on fibrocement (three panels) 250 x 360 cm |
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| Ulysse et les sirènes, September 1947 Oleoresinous paint and graphite on fibrocement (three panels) 360 x 250 cm |
This is Joan Mirò's sculpture, exhibited on the terrace:
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| La Dèesse de la mer, 1968 Red crank clay, decoration painted with oxides and enamelled, cement pedestal 182 x 32 x 60 cm |
Some other works I particularly loved...
Alberto Magnelli
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| Femme et Enfant, 1914 Oil on canvas 70 x 55 cm |
"Daniel Abadie, the executor's of the artist's will, said, in 1983, that the artist practised 'a veritable decanting of the image, only retaining of his 'shorthand' character the cursive organisation of the line and the rhythm of the areas of solid colour."
And, last, but not least...
Nicolas de Stael
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| Le Concert, March 1955 Oil on canvas 350 x 600 cm |
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| Le Fort Carré d'Antibes, 1955 Oil on canvas 114 x 195 cm |
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