From the Inside Flap
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1932 was an extraordinary year for Picasso, even by
his own standards. His paintings reached a new level of
ity and he cemented his status as the most influential
artist of the time. Over the course of this year he created some
of his best-loved works, from colour-saturated portraits to
surrealist drawings, developing ideas from the voluptuous
sculptures he had made at his newly acquired country estate.
In his personal life, throughout 1932, Picasso kept a delicate
balance between tending to his wife Olga Khokhlova and their son
Paulo, and his passionate love affair with Marie-Therese Walter,
twenty-eight years his junior. This publication will bring these
complex artistic and personal dynamics to life. It was also a
year of invention and reflection. Having recently turned fifty,
Picasso embarked on the first volume of what remains the most
ambitious catalogue of an artist's work ever made.
Meanwhile, the first ever retrospective of his work was staged, a
show that featured new paintings alongside earlier works in a
range of different styles. Picasso's journeys between his homes
in Boisgeloup and Paris capture the contradictions of his
existence at this pivotal moment: a life divided between
countryside retreat and urban bustle, established wife and recent
lover, painting and sculpture, ity and darkness. The year
ended traumatically when Marie-Therese fell seriously ill after
swimming, losing most of her iconic blond hair. In his final
works of the year, Picasso transformed the event into scenes of
rescue and rape, a dramatic finale to a year of love, fame and
tragedy that pushed Picasso to the height of his creative powers.
This lavishly illustrated publication will explore the major
themes and concerns of 1932, in essays, artworks and archive
photographs. It will strip away common myths to reveal the man
and the artist in his full complexity and richness.
From the Back Cover
-------------------
1932 was an extraordinary year for Picasso, even by
his own standards. His paintings reached a new level of
ity and he cemented his status as the most influential
artist of the time. Over the course of this year he created some
of his best-loved works, from colour-saturated portraits to
surrealist drawings, developing ideas from the voluptuous
sculptures he had made at his newly acquired country estate.
In his personal life, throughout 1932, Picasso kept a delicate
balance between tending to his wife Olga Khokhlova and their son
Paulo, and his passionate love affair with Marie-Therese Walter,
twenty-eight years his junior. This publication will bring these
complex artistic and personal dynamics to life. It was also a
year of invention and reflection. Having recently turned fifty,
Picasso embarked on the first volume of what remains the most
ambitious catalogue of an artist's work ever made.
Meanwhile, the first ever retrospective of his work was staged, a
show that featured new paintings alongside earlier works in a
range of different styles. Picasso's journeys between his homes
in Boisgeloup and Paris capture the contradictions of his
existence at this pivotal moment: a life divided between
countryside retreat and urban bustle, established wife and recent
lover, painting and sculpture, ity and darkness. The year
ended traumatically when Marie-Therese fell seriously ill after
swimming, losing most of her iconic blond hair. In his final
works of the year, Picasso transformed the event into scenes of
rescue and rape, a dramatic finale to a year of love, fame and
tragedy that pushed Picasso to the height of his creative powers.
This lavishly illustrated publication will explore the major
themes and concerns of 1932, in essays, artworks and archive
photographs. It will strip away common myths to reveal the man
and the artist in his full complexity and richness.