Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907) is a cubism and modern abstraction painting by Pablo Picasso. Pablo Picasso was one of the greatest and famous artists in the 19th and 20th century who painted about the rapid changing of the world. Born in Spain in 1881 he created many works and paintings in different forms.
This painting depicts 5 nude women made up of flat geometric shapes in a room. Their faces look like mask worn by African tribes in rituals. The image looks very jagged and broken. The colors don’t tend to blend but they add to the atmosphere of the jagged room. The colors, just like the lines, have a weird asymmetry about them that fits the painting. It has a very dull tone to it even with the mix of the cool blue and the warm red.
The first thing that really draws me in is the faces. The shape and abnormal design paired with some of them looking straight at you pulls the eyes to the details and shapes. After examining the faces, I’m draw to the rest of their bodies. Just like everything in the painting they have an abnormal design, but they are also depicted as nude. Also, I was so curious to know about what was the main reason or message behind posting a painting of naked women in a public place where adult and children can visit together. This is a three-dimensional representation of women shapes very realistic about women bodies and doers in this modern life we are living now.
This work reflects the aesthetic preferences associated with Modernism because the jagged image doesn’t show them as fully nude, but it gives the illusion. The use of lines shows off the curves and minor details, like a bust line, without pushing it too far. It seems like the lines exaggerate the female body without much details being given away. This is also shown with the fruit and how they are exaggerated, especially the watermelon.
My question is: why Picasso decided to draw a nude women bodies to express the change of the world when we all know that this change is not only at the level of women?