new perspective

Thought behind the thought:

Recently I went to a nearby Yoga class, to enquire about one of their programmes. As I passed the exercise area there were a bunch of women, each at a different stage, of attempting to do the Shirshasana. The Shirshasana is a Yoga pose, where the person needs to rest their head on the ground and raise their legs to the skies, either in a supported or unsupported way and assume a completely inverted position. The struggle that the ladies were undergoing was both awe inspiring and humorous, if I may say so! It must be a weird feeling when everything literally turns upside down in front of us! How out of sorts we would become. It’s interesting how the world would start looking totally new and different to us from this angle. We need to perform a mental Shirshasana on most things in life that we are dogmatic about. At least that way we might finally get a fresh perspective on things!

About the art:

Camera or a canvas normally captures the subject from only one viewing angle. We get to see the story from only one side. That is true about life as well. What that we think and perceive is based only on what we look at, so our angle of perception becomes vital in our making judgements about the same. In Cubist paintings objects are studied, broken into parts and reassembled in an abstracted form. Cubism allows the subject to be depicted from a multitude of viewpoints. Cubism was a movement that talked about breaking away from the single perspective style of painting that dominated the art world since the Renaissance period. Here the subject matter was not delivered on a platter but dissected and presented in such a way that each time you looked at the painting you discovered a new angle or nuance to it. Cubism was a path breaking style and its proponent Picasso, needless to say, was a master artist. 

Picasso was influenced by the artists like Paul Cézanne and Henri Rousseau’s in his early days. They, along with the inspirations that he drew from of archaic and tribal art led Picasso to start adding more weight to figures in his paintings. This personally evolved style set him on the path towards Cubism that revolutionized practically all of modern art forever. One could dedicate an entire blog to Picasso and still only scratch the surface so we will take a look at only three paintings of his that fall in line with what is expressed in our quote for the day.

Portrait of Gertrude Stein

This painting belongs to the time Picasso was evolving his own style between 1905 and 1906. Influenced by the archaic Iberian sculpture, Picasso treated the facial features in the painting in a very specific way. The face has very simple masses, seems sculpted and the eyes are heavy lidded like in masks. One can see how the face is represented as a series of flat planes. The painting has echoes of Cubism that followed in his subsequent works. Gertrude Stein was an author and a close friend of the artist. Picasso’s growth is attributed to the association and patronage of Gertrude Stein.

A bit of trivia about the painting is that she supposedly sat ninety times for the artist. He abandoned the project saying "I can't see you any longer when I look"! He is supposed to have completed it a while later without the model in front of him.

Bowl of Fruit, Violin and Bottle 

This painting belongs to his Synthetic Cubism style. One can see the use of variety of elements in the painting like painted dots, silhouettes, grains of sand to highlight the depicted objects. First the objects at hand are mentally dissected and the new whole objects are synthesized along with colour and texture. The precursor to Cubism was Analytical Cubism where colour took a backseat and forms and volumes of objects were concentrated upon. This combination of painting and mixed media shows how the artist handled the colour and textural aspects of the painting. Once again the treatment brought about a new way of handling these elements in painting. The subject of the painting talks about the Parisian life for the artists and how simple objects placed on the table could be perceived in such a unique manner.

The Three Musicians 

The said musicians in the painting are Picasso in the centre, as the Harlequin, masked and dressed in a diamond-patterned costume. His old friends Guillaume Apollinaire and Max Jacob sit on either side of the artist. Everything in this painting is made up of flat shapes like the brown stage on which the three musicians are performing. The musicians are made up of overlapping shapes that resemble a single paper cut out and it’s difficult so clearly say where one musician starts and the other ends. Again a very different interpretation of human forms is seen here. Lively colours, angular shapes, and flat patterns are the highlights of the painting. Actually the whole idea of making live objects seem like still life was a new approach which shook the art world. Gertrude Stein is supposed to have joyfully announced on seeing the painting that she had at last understood what it represented. The Three Musicians was meant to be a still life!

Credits:

http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/488221

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/picasso-bowl-of-fruit-violin-and-bottle-l01895

http://www.pablopicasso.org/three-musicians.jsp

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pablo_Picasso

http://www.theartstory.org/artist-picasso-pablo.htm