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The Old Guitarist
Pablo Picasso
Spanish, 1881–1973; worked in France starting in 1904
The Old Guitarist
Late 1903–early 1904
Oil on panel
48 3/8 x 32 1/2 in. (122.9 x 82.6 cm)
Signed, l.r.: "Picasso"
Helen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection, 1926.253
나뭇가지처럼 늘어진 길고도 앙상한 손가락, 누더기 옷 사이로 드러난
뼈만 남은 어깨, 더 낮아지기 힘들 정도로 숙인 고개 그리고 고달픈 삶의
상징 같은 힘줄이 새겨진 목... 그런 모습의 한 늙은 기타리스트를
담은 위의 이 단순한 림을 보게 된다면, 누구라도 그 차가운 화면 색조와
그 속에 담긴 체념한 노숙자 모습의 악사에게서 가슴 뭉컬한 어떤 시적 우수를
느끼게 되리라. 이 그림은 피카소가 젊은 시절에 그린, 그의 ,이른바 ,
청색시대(blue Period)의 회화작품이다.
The Old Guitarist is an oil painting by Pablo Picasso created late 1903 – early 1904. It depicts an old, blind, haggard man with threadbare clothing weakly hunched over his guitar, playing in the streets of Barcelona, Spain. It is currently on display in the Art Institute of Chicago as part of the Helen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection.[1]
At the time of The Old Guitarist’s creation, Modernism, Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, and Symbolism had merged and created an overall movement called ｅxpressionism which greatly influenced Picasso’s style. Furthermore, El Greco, Picasso’s poor standard of living, and the suicide of a dear friend influenced Picasso’s style at the time which came to be known as his Blue Period.[1] Several x-rays, infrared images and examinations by curators revealed three different figures hidden behind the old guitarist.
피카소만큼 다양한 작품 세계를 구비한 경우는 많지 않다. 소년기의 ‘초기시대’, 무명시절의 ‘청색시대’, 몽마르트로 정주 시절의
‘장및빛 시대’, 아프리카 흑인조각으로 영감을 얻은 ‘전기입체주의 시대’에서 ‘분석적 입체주의’, ‘종합적 입체주의’, ‘50년대
이후의 시대’에 이르기까지 그는 어디로 튈지 모르는 획기적인 발상으로 당시 사람들을 놀라게 했다. 이번에 소개할 ‘기타치는
노인’이라는 작품은 바로 이러한 작품 시대 중 ‘청색시대’(1901-1904)에 그려진 작품이다. 미술에 대해 거의 문외한으로,
피카소의 입체주의 미술에만 익숙해져 있었던 나로서는 본 작품이 상당히 신선하게 와 닿았다. 입체주의 작품이 아닌 ‘피카소의
작품’이라는 점에도 차별성이 느껴졌지만, 난해하기만 했던 기존의 알려진 작품보다 쉽고, 현실적인 느낌이 무엇보다 마음에 들었다.
인문에게는 이 그림을 연상케 한 거리의 악사- 창동 네거리 혹은 골목길에 혼자
앉아 키는 기타곡으로 행인의 발길을 붙든, 인문이 친하게 지내고 싶었지만
그럴 수 없었던, 노동자 차림의 기타연주자-가 있었다. 키가 크고 늙은 그 악사가
들려주는 세고비아 분위기의 아련한 로만스 곡이나 기타곡으로 편곡한
바흐의 샤콘느 바이올린 곡을
좋아하였다.
Now I am listening to Chaconne of J.S. Bach played by the guitarist Segovia.Such tonality! It is beyond my ｅxpression. Mark, a member of your flamenco group as a guitarist once said to me about Segovia, "There is no other guitarist like Andres Segovia. He is unmatched unsurpassed, and unrivaled." Yes I agree. It is emotionally powerful. Now the Chaconne of Segovia sounds triste like a word of good-bye. The opening section sounds to me like a reminiscence of the wonderful time I spent in Portland. .
I happened to listen this piece late in my life. I was amazed initially by the beautiful, repetitive elements and by the technical ability demanded of the violinist performing the piece. But over time, over the period of 10 years or so that I've been acquainted with this Partita No. 2 in D Minor, and with this particular movement, I now routinely find myself profoundly moved by it's depth of emotion, by it's changing emotional pace and by the ever so powerful soaring emotional heights. It makes sense to me why I've always felt a solace and an expression of my own loss and grief, melancholy over the common tragedies of life, self-pity, abandoned dreams, deferred hope.... and passion. Empathy for the tragedies fallen upon others.
abrazos
Moon
Contents
Blue Period
At the time, having renounced his classical and traditional education and searching for fame, Picasso and his friend Carlos Casagemas moved to Paris. A year later, Casagemas became hopelessly miserable from a failed love affair and committed suicide. Picasso was greatly afflicted by this event and was soon depressed and desolate. In addition, Picasso was very poor. His poverty made him identify and relate to beggars, prostitutes and other downtrodden outcasts in society.[1]
These events and circumstances were the impetus for the beginning of Picasso’s Blue Period which lasted from 1901 to 1904. The Blue Period is identified by the flat expanses of blues, greys and blacks, melancholy figures lost in contemplation, and a deep and significant tragedy. After the Blue Period came Picasso's Rose Period, and eventually the Cubism movement which Picasso co-founded.[1]
Analysis
Elements in The Old Guitarist were carefully chosen to generate a reaction from the spectator. For example, the monochromatic color scheme creates flat, two-dimensional forms that dissociate the guitarist from time and place. In addition, the overall muted blue palette creates a general tone of melancholy and accentuates the tragic and sorrowful theme. The sole use of oil on panel causes a darker and more theatrical mood. Oil tends to blend the colors together without diminishing brightness, creating an even more cohesive dramatic composition.[2]
Furthermore, the guitarist shows no sign of life and appears to be close to death, implying little comfort in the world and accentuating the misery of his situation. Details are eliminated and scale is manipulated to create elongated and elegant proportions while intensifying the silent contemplation of the guitarist and a sense of spirituality. The large, brown guitar is the only significant shift in color found in the painting;[1] its dull brown, prominent against the blue background, becomes the center and focus. The guitar comes to represent the guitarist’s world and only hope for survival. This blind and poor subject depends on his guitar and the small income he can earn from his music for survival. Some art historians believe this painting expresses the solitary life of an artist and the natural struggles that come with the career. Therefore, music, or art, becomes a burden and an alienating force that isolates artists from the world.[3] And yet, despite the isolation, the guitarist (artist) depends on the rest of society for survival. All of these emotions reflect Picasso’s predicament at the time and his criticism of the state of society. The Old Guitarist becomes an allegory of human existence.[1]
His so-called Blue Period( the term refers to the prevailing color of his canvases
as well as to their mood) consists of almost exclusively pictures of beggars and derelicts
such as The Old Guitarist -outcasts or victims of society whose pathos reflects the artist's
own sense of isolation.
These figures conveys poetic melancholy more than outright despair. The aged musician
accepts his fate with a resignation that seems almost saintly , and the attenuated grace
of his limbs reminds us El Greco ( color plate 45).
The Old Guitarist is a strange amalgam of Mannerism and of the art of Gaugin and Toulous
Lautrec, imbued with the personal gloom of a 22-year-old genius.
엘
그레코는 매너리즘의 대표적인 화가이다. 그리스 크레타에서 출생하여 베네치아와 로마에서 공부했고 스페인에서 활동하였다. 따라서
비잔틴 양식의 인물과 강하고 대조적인 베네치아 기법의 색채와 붓놀림, 강렬한 스페인의 종교적 분위기 등을 반영하고 있다. 그의
작품이 후기로 갈수록 육체를 극단적으로 일그러뜨리고 환상적인 배경처리를 사용하면서도 인물들의 뛰어난 성격묘사를 통하여 자신의
독특한 개성을 발휘하였다.
이 논문에서는 그의 작품을 제작 시기에 따라 살펴보면서 중요 작품을 분석하고 작품속에 드러난 그의 양식적 경향을 살펴보았다.
Pablo Picasso dominated the development of the visual arts during the first half of the 20th century. Along with Georges Braque, Picasso is best known as one of the creators of Cubism, though he utilized many styles during his career. In the paintings of his Blue Period (1901–1904), such as The Old Guitarist, Picasso worked with a monochromatic palette, flattened forms, and tragic, sorrowful themes.
The tragic themes and expressive style of Picasso's Blue Period began after a close friend committed suicide in Paris. During this time, the artist was sympathetic to the plight of the downtrodden and painted many canvases depicting the miseries of the poor, the ill, and those cast out of society. He knew what it was like to be impoverished, having been nearly penniless during all of 1902.
This bent and sightless man holds close to him a large, round guitar. Its brown body represents the painting’s only shift in color. Both physically and symbolically, the instrument fills the space around the solitary figure, who seems oblivious to his blindness and poverty as he plays. At the time the painting was made, literature of the Symbolist movement included blind characters who possessed powers of inner vision. The thin, skeletonlike figure of the blind musician also has roots in art from Picasso’s native country, Spain. The old man’s elongated limbs and cramped, angular posture recall the figures of the great 16th-century artist El Greco.
Pablo Picasso
Spanish, 1881–1973; worked in France starting in 1904
Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler
Autumn 1910
Oil on canvas
39 13/16 x 28 7/8 in. (101.1 x 73.3 cm)
Gift of Mrs. Gilbert W. Chapman in memory of Charles B. Goodspeed, 1948.561
Influenced by the breakthroughs of Post-Impressionists such as Paul Cézanne, Picasso no longer sought to imitate nature in his Cubist art. Instead, he invited the viewer to examine the figures and shapes that he broke down and recombined in totally new ways. In this portrait, the subject, Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, a dealer who championed Picasso’s radical new style, has been fractured into various planes and shapes and is presented from several points of view. From flickering, partially transparent planes of brown, gray, black, and white emerges his upper torso, hands clasped in his lap.
Pablo Picasso produced The Old Guitarist, one of his most haunting images, while working in Barcelona. In the paintings of his Blue Period (1901–04), of which this is a prime example, Picasso restricted himself to a cold, monochromatic blue palette; flattened forms; and the emotional, psychological themes of human misery and alienation, which are related to the Symbolist movement and the work of such artists as Edvard Munch.
Picasso presented The Old Guitarist as a timeless ｅxpression of human suffering. The bent and sightless man holds his large, round guitar close to him; its brown body is the painting’s only shift in color. The elongated, angular figure of the blind musician relates to Picasso’s interest in the history of Spanish art and, in particular, the great sixteenth-century artist El Greco. Most personally, however, the image reflects the struggling twenty-two-year-old Picasso’s sympathy for the plight of the downtrodden; he knew what it was like to be poor, having been nearly penniless during all of 1902. His works from this time depict the miseries of the destitute, the ill, and the outcasts of society.
Pablo Picasso dominated the development of the visual arts during the first half of the 20th century. Along with Georges Braque, Picasso is best known as one of the creators of Cubism, though he utilized many styles during his career. In the paintings of his Blue Period (1901–1904), such as The Old Guitarist, Picasso worked with a monochromatic palette, flattened forms, and tragic, sorrowful themes.
The tragic themes and expressive style of Picasso's Blue Period began after a close friend committed suicide in Paris. During this time, the artist was sympathetic to the plight of the downtrodden and painted many canvases depicting the miseries of the poor, the ill, and those cast out of society. He knew what it was like to be impoverished, having been nearly penniless during all of 1902.
This bent and sightless man holds close to him a large, round guitar. Its brown body represents the painting’s only shift in color. Both physically and symbolically, the instrument fills the space around the solitary figure, who seems oblivious to his blindness and poverty as he plays. At the time the painting was made, literature of the Symbolist movement included blind characters who possessed powers of inner vision. The thin, skeletonlike figure of the blind musician also has roots in art from Picasso’s native country, Spain. The old man’s elongated limbs and cramped, angular posture recall the figures of the great 16th-century artist El Greco.
Pablo Picasso
Spanish, 1881–1973; worked in France starting in 1904
Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler
Autumn 1910
Oil on canvas
39 13/16 x 28 7/8 in. (101.1 x 73.3 cm)
Gift of Mrs. Gilbert W. Chapman in memory of Charles B. Goodspeed, 1948.561
Influenced by the breakthroughs of Post-Impressionists such as Paul Cézanne, Picasso no longer sought to imitate nature in his Cubist art. Instead, he invited the viewer to examine the figures and shapes that he broke down and recombined in totally new ways. In this portrait, the subject, Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, a dealer who championed Picasso’s radical new style, has been fractured into various planes and shapes and is presented from several points of view. From flickering, partially transparent planes of brown, gray, black, and white emerges his upper torso, hands clasped in his lap.
Pablo Picasso produced The Old Guitarist, one of his most haunting images, while working in Barcelona. In the paintings of his Blue Period (1901–04), of which this is a prime example, Picasso restricted himself to a cold, monochromatic blue palette; flattened forms; and the emotional, psychological themes of human misery and alienation, which are related to the Symbolist movement and the work of such artists as Edvard Munch.
Picasso presented The Old Guitarist as a timeless ｅxpression of human suffering. The bent and sightless man holds his large, round guitar close to him; its brown body is the painting’s only shift in color. The elongated, angular figure of the blind musician relates to Picasso’s interest in the history of Spanish art and, in particular, the great sixteenth-century artist El Greco. Most personally, however, the image reflects the struggling twenty-two-year-old Picasso’s sympathy for the plight of the downtrodden; he knew what it was like to be poor, having been nearly penniless during all of 1902. His works from this time depict the miseries of the destitute, the ill, and the outcasts of society.