Picasso Landscapes: Out of Bounds
Audio Exhibition
The Cubist Landscape
Hello, I am Elza Corrill, a gallery attendant at the museum. I will be reading an introduction to “The Cubist Landscape” section of Picasso Landscapes: Out of Bounds.
For much of his career, Picasso spent winters in town, painting in his studio, and summers in the countryside, where he could paint the sea or the mountains en plein air (outside). In this, Picasso followed a seasonal rhythm adhered to by many nineteenth-century painters, even as his style diverged, sometimes radically, from those of his predecessors.
As he developed Cubism alongside Georges Braque (1882–1963), Picasso made many compositional innovations during his sojourns away from Paris. He took notable trips during the summer of 1908 to the Île-de-France region, especially the village of La Rue-des-Bois, and in the following summer to the hill town Horta de Ebro (now called Horta de Sant Joan) in southern Catalonia, Spain.
Made in those two formative years, the five paintings in this section are characterized by simplified forms and experiments with depth and planar elements. These qualities would become hallmarks of Cubism and represent a radical break with the history of representation. However, the new style also drew on the work of modernists from Picasso’s father’s generation, especially Henri Rousseau and Paul Cézanne.
Pablo Picasso (Spanish, active in France, 1881–1973), The Reservoir, Horta de Ebro, Horta De Ebro, Summer 1909, oil on canvas, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. David Rockefeller, 81.1991 © 2023 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society, (ARS), New York, Courtesy American Federation of Arts, 24 1/8 x 20 1/8 in. (61.3 x 51.1 cm)
Verbal Description
Hello, I am Elza Corrill, a gallery attendant at the museum. I will be reading a description of the painting The Reservoir, Horta de Ebro, in Picasso Landscape: Out of Bounds.
Pablo Picasso, a Spanish artist who lived from 1881 to 1973, painted The Reservoir, Horta de Ebro in oil on canvas in the summer of 1909 in Horta de Ebro, Spain. It was a gift of Mr. and Mrs. David Rockefeller to the Museum of Modern Art, New York, where its reference number is 81.1991.
The Reservoir, Horta de Ebro, is a vertically oriented painting measuring 24 and one-eighth by 20 and one-eighth inches or about 61 by 51 centimeters. In this scene, the artist uses the angular, blocky, and faceted Cubist style for which he is known. In the background, a triangular grouping of tan, orange, and gray stucco buildings rises into an almost mountain-like form against a brushy gray, green, and blue sky. This mass of buildings reaches into the midground. A grey circular shape, the reservoir mentioned in the title, surrounds a small expanse of bright green. Additional faceted structures rise on either side of the reservoir.