- Pipe et partition (Pipe and Sheet Music)
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Beginning in 1909, Pablo Picasso and French artist Georges Braque explored the paradoxical relationships between illusion, art, and reality. While working on still-life paintings in 1912, they invented the collage, in which an actual construction of cut-and-paste paper forms replaced the painted illusions of such forms.
In this work, Picasso playfully combines drawn objects (pipe, sheet music, and tabletop) with a trompe l'oeil (fool-the-eye) gilt frame (actually printed wallpaper), illusionistic cast shadows, and a signed nameplate. At the top of the sheet music Picasso has carefully lettered "Ma Jolie" (My Pretty), as if it were the name of the composition. In fact, it was the refrain from a popular song as well as Picasso's pet name for his mistress at the time, Eva Gouel. Picasso stenciled or penciled the phrase "Ma Jolie" across a number of works from this period.
Provenance[Galerie Kahnweiler, Paris]; Dr. Jean Dalsace, Paris, before 1942-after 1942; [Stendahl Gallery, Los Angeles], as of 1952; sold to Mr. and Mrs. S.M. McAshan, Jr., Houston, June 17, 1952-November 10, 1969; gift to MFAH, 1969.
Exhibition HistoryArt Contemporain, Antwerp, 1926.
Galeries Georges Petit, Paris, 1932.
Contemporary Arts Association, Houston, 1955.
"Houston Collectors: A Selection," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, March 22–May 12, 1968.
"One Hundred Master Drawings by Picasso," Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, February 20–April 5, 1981; Art Institute of Chicago, April 29–June 14, 1981; Philadelphia Museum of Art, July 11–August 23, 1981.
"In Our Time: Houston’s Contemporary Arts Museum, 1942–1982," Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, October 23, 1982–January 2, 1983.
"Picasso and Braque: Pioneering Cubism," Museum of Modern Art, New York, September 20, 1989–January 16, 1990; Offentliche Kunstsammlung, Basel, February 25–June 18, 1990.
"Picasso and Things: The Still Lives of Picasso," Cleveland Museum of Art, February 26–April 26, 1992; Philadelphia Museum of Art, June 7–August 30, 1992; Musée Picasso, Paris, September 22–December 28, 1992.
"In Perfect Harmony: Picture and Frame," Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, March 31–July 2, 1995; Kunstforum Wien, Vienna, August 24–November 11, 1995.
"The Dark Mirror – Picasso: Photography and Painting," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, November 16, 1997–February 1, 1998.
"Modernism in a Century of Change III, From Object to Icon: The Art of Assemblage," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, June 21–August 30, 1998.
"Picasso and the Great War," Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, February 13–May 9, 2016; Columbus Museum of Art, Ohio, June 10–September 11, 2016.
"Cubism and the Trompe L'Oeil Tradition," The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, October 17, 2022–January 22, 2023.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
Cataloguing data may change with further research.
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