Picasso and Africa heads for SA
30 January 2006
Over 80 works by Pablo Picasso are headed for South Africa in early 2006 for an exhibition that will examine the artist and his relationship with Africa.
The exhibition, entitled Picasso and Africa, will run at Johannesburg's Standard Bank Gallery in February and March, and at Cape Town's Iziko National Gallery in April and May.
It will feature paintings, sculptures and drawings from Picasso's private collection and the Picasso Museum in Paris, supplemented by works by South Africans that Picasso "might have liked".
Unfortunately not included in the exhibition is the radical masterwork Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, which provided the spark for a dramatically new style known as cubism.
The painting reveals the profound influence African art had on Picasso, which he first encountered in 1907 in the form of African masks on exhibit at the Musée d'Ethnographic in the Palais du Trocadero in Paris. Cubism, in turn, was to
have a major impact on the direction of 20th century art.
"Picasso and Africa will provide a detailed look at the influence of African art on Picasso's career and the important role it played in the evolution of European modernism in general," says Marilyn Martin, director of art collections at the Iziko South African National Gallery
Part of the exhibition will be a book in which South African artists, including poets Wally Serote and Peter Clark, discuss Picasso's fascination with African art. It will also feature an anthology of what Picasso had to say about African art.
The exhibition will feature more than 60 paintings, drawings and sculptures, dating from 1906 to 1972, which contain and communicate Picasso's African inspiration. It will also have a selection of works that reflect the diversity and rapid changes of which he was capable.
This will be augmented by a selection of African sculptures, similar to those with which Picasso may have been
familiar. These were sourced from various South African holdings, as Picasso's own collection is dispersed and too fragile to travel.
Sponsored by Standard Bank, the French Embassy and the French Institute, the exhibition will also feature an educational component for tourists and people with special needs.
SouthAfrica.info reporter
| 
