Picasso. Twentieth Century, 1901-1972

The opening of the Museo Picasso Málaga has given us many reasons to celebrate, but there can be no doubt that among the most important of these is the one-year loan made possible by Bernard Ruiz-Picasso and the Fundación Almine y Bernard Ruiz-Picasso of forty works by the master. It is important, first, because it will substantially enrich what the brand new museum will be showing during the first year of itz dazzling public inauguration, but also because this is a group of works of extraordinary artistic quality. In itself it constitutes an almost complete summary of Pablo Picasso’s huge career.

This unity is reflected in the title of this essay, Picasso Twentieth Century 1901-1972, marking, respectively, the dates of the earliest and the latest work included. So here we have the two chronological poles of seventy-one years of creative production. Even though there is an important nineteenth-century Picasso producing work of higher and higher quality as the end of the century approaches—when he is nineteen: even if we take into account the precocity and talent of this almost legendary being, such production is much more than we might expect of any one else—the true Picasso manifests himself beginning in 1901, when he is about to establish himself permanently in Paris, when he sets out on his most genuinely personal artistic path.

Text: Francisco Calvo Serraller, “Picasso Twentieth Century 1901-1972”, en Picasso Twentieth Century 1901-1972, Málaga, Fundación Museo Picasso Málaga, Legado Paul, Christine y Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, 2003, p. 13.