Pablo Picasso
‚Les Demoiselles d’Avignon‘

Key Pieces series

For this week’s Key Pieces series we had a close eye on Pablo Picasso’s most iconic painting, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.

1. It is a large oil painting measuring 243.9 x 233.7 cm created in 1907 by Picasso.
2. It took nine months and countless of studies and sketches to complete Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.
3. The work portrays five nude female prostitutes from a brothel in Career d’Avinyó, the red light district of Barcelona
4. Les Demoiselles d’Avignon was therefore originally called The Brothel of Avignon.
5. It is an adaptation of Primitivism and is inspired by African Art.
6. It represents the early development of both Cubism and Modern Art.
7. It is inspired by The Large Bathers of Paul Cezanne and Statue Oviri of Gauguin.
8. During Picasso’s first exhibition in 1916 at the Salon d’Antin, the painting was deemed immoral as mentioned in a article in Le Cri de Paris: « The Cubists are not waiting for the war to end to recommence hostilities against good sense. »
9. In 1920, Jacques Doucet bought the painting for 30.000 francs. When he passed away in 1929, the painting was acquired by private dealers before being sold $24’000to to the MoMa in New York in 1937, where it can still be seen.
10. In 2007, it was elected by the Newsweek as ‘The Most Influential Work Of Art Of The Last 100 Years’.

Pablo Picasso, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, 1907, Oil on canvas, 8′ x 7′ 8″ (243.9 x 233.7 cm)

Paul Cézanne, The Large Bathers, 1906, Oil on canvas, 2,106.68 x 2,510.03 mm (82.94 in x 98.82 in).

MoMa