Picasso and Braque

Cubism was essentially a revolution in the approach taken by an artist to space, both on the flat surface of a canvas and in sculpture. As noted by Laurie Adams (1997: 461), "the main European impetus for Cubism came from Cezanne's new spatial organization: building up an image from constructions of color. Other decisive currents of influence came from so-called 'primitive' cultures and the art of the Iberian peninsula."

Two of the most influential figures in the Cubism movement were Pablo Picasso from Spain and Georges Braque of France. This essay will consider the work of these two artists, comparing and contrasting their approaches to Cubism.

Michael Brenson (1989: 1) described Picasso and Braque as having been virtually inseparable in the early 1900s. A critical difference between the two is that Braque worked more slowly than Picasso and exhibited an ethical rigor rivaling that of Cezanne (Brenson 1989: 1). In contrast, Picasso worked rapidly and saw Cezanne's work as a source of inspiration. Brenson (1989: 2) views Braque as inventive and influential and as a forerunner of Abstract Expressionism while Picasso moved from the angular shapes and metallic colors of his early Cubist works to a more rhythmic and primordial approach.

Edward Fry (1988: 296) stated that Picasso's Cubism was concerned with the external world and with a more or less direct response to that world. Picasso is seen by this analyst as having become aware of a new way of thinking a

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ed the technique known as collage, "a kind of art that was neither painting nor a sculpture, but both at the same time" (Fiero 2006: 7). The collaboration between Braque and Picasso was intense. McKay, Hill, Buckler, Crowston, and Wiesner-Hanks (2008: 924) argue that whereas Picasso, in works such as "Three Musicians," blurred the line between various perspectives and incorporated multiple images to suggest music and musicians, Braque was more directly engaged in a form of analysis in which color was subordinated to a geometric exploration of three-dimensional space. Adams (1997: 463) says that "for several years, Braque worked so closely with Picasso that it can be difficult to distinguish between their output when both worked in the style known as Analytic Cubism." Braque's 1909 "Violin and Pitcher" is very like Picasso's paintings of the same time in that the individual shapes of the violin, the pitcher, and the room in which they are positioned lose parts of their outline, with edges dissolving into shared geometric shapes. The movement toward collage and Synthetic Cubism brought into the work of both Picasso and Braque what Adams (1997: 465) calls a greater normative influence of found objects or objets trouves taken

Category: Arts - P