Pablo Picasso

Marina Picasso (by descent from the artist)
Galerie Jan Krugier, Geneva
Private Collection, Europe (acquired from the above in the late 1990s. Sold: Sotheby's, Paris, 3rd December 2008, lot 34)
Purchased at the above sale by the present owner

Venice, Centro di Cultura di Palazzo Grassi, Picasso, Opere dal 1895 al 1971 dalla Collezione Marina Picasso, 1981, no. 276, illustrated in the catalogue
Munich, Haus der Kunst; Cologne, Josef-Haubrich-Kunsthalle; Frankfurt, Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut & Zurich, Kunsthaus, Collection Marina Picasso, 1981-82, no. 229, illustrated in the catalogue
Tokyo, National Museum of Modern Art & Kyoto, Municipal Museum, Picasso, Masterpieces from Marina Picasso Collection and from Museums in U.S.A. and U.S.S.R., 1983, no. 178, illustrated in the catalogue
Bielefeld, Kunsthalle, Picasso: Todesthemen, 1984
Melbourne, Art Gallery of Victoria & Sidney, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Picasso, 1984, no. 144, illustrated in colour in the catalogue
Munich, Galerie Thomas, Picasso bei Thomas, 1986
London, Tate Gallery, Paris Post War - Art and Existentialism 1945-1955, 1993, no. 91, illustrated in the catalogue
Savonlinna, Retretti Art Center, Picasso and Cubism, 1994, no. 23, illustrated in the catalogue
Geneva, Musée Rath, 1945, Les Figures de la liberté, 1995-96, no. 13, illustrated in the catalogue
Geneva, Musée Barbier-Mueller, Picasso l'Africain, 1998, no. 30
Liverpool, Tate Liverpool; Vienna, Albertina & Humlebæk, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Picasso: Peace & Freedom, 2010-11, no. 16, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

The Picasso Project, Picasso's, Paintings, Watercolors, Drawings and Sculpture. Liberation and Post-War Years 1944-1949, San Francisco, 2000, no. 46-030a, illustrated p. 66

The panel is sound and laid down on canvas. Apart from some lines of retouching associated to the a few horizontal seams in the panel and a couple of spots of retouching visible in the background visible under ultra-violet light, this work is in good condition. Colours: Overall fairly accurate in the printed catalogue, although slightly less red in the original.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Tête de mort et livre is one of a famous series of still-lives with skulls painted by Picasso from 1943 until the years immediately following the end of the war. Constructed around the universal and historic symbol of the skull, these striking compositions appear as poignant meditations on the meaning of life in a time of war. The stark intimacy of the subject, at odds with the large scale of the chosen format, allows the artist to explore the modernisation of the still life that had begun with Cézanne (fig. 2). Tête de mort et livre is a devastating comment on the war, and at the same time it continues the dialogue between Picasso and several generations of great masters of painting. The series of still-lives featuring skulls mark a crucial era in the artist's œuvre, the period of the Second World War, bookended by the two monumental compositions Guernica (1937) et Le Charnier (1945). Their sheer symbolic force and the emotional charge provided by the historical context lead Pierre Daix to consider this series of vanitas as a 'requiem for the victims of what Picasso termed fascism, thus linking Franco with Hitler' (P. Daix, 'Le Charnier', in Dictionnaire Picasso, Paris, 1995, p. 184). Tête de mort et livre is a highly personal work Picasso painted and was always kept by the artist with three other still-lives with skulls, two of which are today housed in the Musée Picasso in Paris (fig. 1).

The composition of Tête de mort et livre is strikingly pure, only three objects, a jar and a skull placed upon an open book, appear against an abstract background comprised of vibrant patches of black, grey and pale yellow. There is no table, no drawer or window to suggest a particular décor. Arranged from right to left, the jug acts as a symbol of life opposing the memento mori across the open pages of a book. The skull and the ewer counterbalanced by the decorative elements reflected in each other: the two eye sockets are mirrored by the jug's handle and aperture and the cranial indentations are matched by the quatered drum of the vessel.

Tête de mort et livre was painted in Picasso's wartime studio-home at 7 Rue des Grands Augustins. The building was haunted by several historical and literary ghosts: Balzac, among others, had lived there. It was there, in the large high-ceilinged room adorned with wooden beams, that the artist painted Guernica. The objects of Tête de mort et livre are placed in an abstract space which is a continuation of the space of the Rue des Grands Augustins: the viewer's gaze remains enclosed between the ceiling, the walls and the floor. When the end of the war drew near, four months after the liberation of Paris in August 1944, Picasso seemed to plunge into a meditation on the meaning of death and imprisonment. From the beginning of 1945, he devoted several months to this theme, even though the war was certainly not over in a large part of Europe at this time. Even in Paris, restrictions were still causing suffering. It was at this time that Picasso truly began to create the series of still lives with skulls, which he finished in February 1946, and of which Tête de mort et livre represents the brilliant conclusion.

Whether or not we associate it to a macabre symbolism or to a dramatic historic context, the skull is a recurring motif in Picasso's œuvre. Throughout one phase of preparatory studies for Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, the composition included a medical student appeared holding a skull in his hand. Most importantly, in 1907, Picasso painted the extraordinary Composition à la tête de mort (fig. 3), 'the most striking of all the youthful still lives in Picasso's œuvre [...] a memento mori dedicated to artistic genius in general and to that of Paul Cézanne in particular' (Jean Sutherland Boggs, in Picasso et les choses, Les Natures mortes (exhibition catalogue), Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, 1992, p. 54). This important picture already included a skull placed upon a book, perhaps inspired by still-lifes by the Old Masters such as Zurbaran. The spontaneous violence of the composition of Tête de mort et livre evokes that of Composition à la tête de mort: the oil paint is applied in such a delicate coat that the support is visible in places, revealing thin areas of raw wood whose colour is echoed in certain parts of the jar. The similarity between these two pictures painted forty years apart enables us to establish the permanence of the underlying motifs in Picasso's œuvre, from the era of the Demoiselles d'Avignon right up until his years on the rue des Grand Augustins. However, the horizon had darkened in the intervening years and times had irrevocably changed, replacing the bright reds and pinks of 1907 with the sombre greys, blacks and ochres of the Tête de mort et livre, which magnificently illustrates the obsession with the motif of the skull that Picasso would harbour throughout his career. Discussing the artist's perspective on mortality Gary Tinterow stated:  'Picasso saw death as a reality, without fear or resignation' (G. Tinterow in ibid., p. 301).