Landscape

Pablo Picasso

Paris, spring 1908 · Gouache and charcoal on paper · Modern and Contemporary Art

Picasso depicted this hillside scene using interlocking facets of color that determine whether a given shape should be understood as land or sky. The deliberately naive rendering of the tree branches and foliage recalls the style of the self-taught painter Henri Rousseau, a favorite of the Parisian avant-garde. Extensive underdrawing in charcoal is particularly noticeable in the unpainted areas, and while the work may appear to be unfinished, it is not. Signed and dated on the verso, it was sold by the artist to his dealer Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler and then loaned to an important 1913 Picasso exhibition at Heinrich Thannhauser’s Moderne Galerie in Munich.

Artist

Pablo Picasso

Date

Paris, spring 1908

Medium

Gouache and charcoal on paper

Department

Modern and Contemporary Art

Credit line

Leonard A. Lauder Cubist Collection, Purchase, Leonard A. Lauder Gift, 2014