Málaga, (EFE).- With its new exhibition, “The Ages of Pablo”, the Casa Natal de Picasso invites you to fall in love with the artist from Málaga through a tour of his vital and artistic stages in what is the main commitment of this institution for the commemoration of the fifty years of his death.
The exhibition is also “a tribute to Picasso, to Pablo, the boy from this Plaza de la Merced, where he left his footprints with the shoes that are kept in the Casa Natal”, the curator said this Friday at the presentation, Mario Virgilio Montañez.
“With the exhibition we want, especially those who do not know Picasso, to fall in love with the artist, following him through each of the phases of his life and his work, throughout 76 years of creation,” adds Montañez.
This journey begins with his formative years, continues with the blue and pink Picasso and then with cubism, a stage in which pieces of the preparatory notebook for “Las senoritas de Avignon” that the House of Birth owns and two bibliographic jewels of his documentation center, the most important in the world on the artist.
The following sections are those of surrealism and the years of the Civil War, with an oil portrait of Dora Maar, the series “Franco’s Dream and Lie” or an illustration for the book “Le chant des morts”, among other pieces.
Last 20 years of Picasso
Finally, there are the last two decades of Picasso’s life, with the years of “The joy of living”, when he lived and created with Françoise Gilot -who died two weeks ago- and the section of the final stage with Jacqueline Roque.
“With this combination of works, we try, at a time when Picasso is so discussed, often based on prejudices, to show that he is above that and that he is the greatest creator of his century and one of the three main creators of universal culture”, highlights the curator.
He considers that the public’s attention may be especially drawn to the works from his childhood years, which he did once he left his hometown, when he returned to Malaga during the summers.
This is the case of “Allegory of Glory” (1895), belonging to the Picasso Museum in Barcelona, which contains “a series of Málaga elements such as the city’s coat of arms, the profile of the Cathedral, the word ‘Málaga’ on the flag of Spain and some allegorical figures reminiscent of the ceiling of the old María Cristina Conservatory”.
Also relevant is the oil painting “Montañas de Málaga” (1896), with which a young Picasso of only 14 years “not only wants to measure himself with his father”, the also painter José Ruiz Blasco, but with his brushstrokes “confronts, honors and surpasses” one of the great masters of the moment, Antonio Muñoz Degráin.
A total of 58 works
Another piece that is exhibited for the first time in Malaga, also from the Museum of Barcelona, is the drawing on paper “The shipwreck of the Gneisenau frigate in the port of Malaga”, with which Picasso captured that historical event a few days after it happened.
“The shipwreck occurred on December 16, 1900, and Picasso arrived with Casagemas on the 28th to a city still in turmoil, where the convalescent sailors were still there and drama was in the air. Picasso portrayed the remains of the shipwreck, with floating planks and barrels, as if showing that he was there”, the curator points out.
With a total of 58 works, coming from the Casa Natal itself and from other institutions such as the Picasso Museum in Barcelona or the Reina Sofía Art Center, it is “certainly the greatest exhibition effort of the Casa Natal since it was created in 1988”. Montañez assures. EFE