Standing Nude and Seated Musketeer

Pablo Picasso

1968 · Oil on canvas · Modern and Contemporary Art

In Picasso's universe, the musketeer could be a painter, musician, smoker, or voyeur, but never a fighter. Picasso's dashing soldiers of fortune are ultimately absurd, cartoonish figures whose amorous exploits are more comically libidinous than the sexually predatory behaviors of some of the artist's previous male incarnations. In this composition the expansive figure of the musketeer takes center stage, while the nude at his side seems incidental. Nearly all the musketeers Picasso painted in the two months leading up to this work are single, centralized figures, similarly attired, usually cross-legged, and smoking long clay pipes.

Artist

Pablo Picasso

Date

1968

Medium

Oil on canvas

Department

Modern and Contemporary Art

Credit line

Gift of A. L. and Blanche Levine, 1981