?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 5,000 - $ 8,000
PABLO PICASSO Le Bain.
Drypoint, 1905. 344x285 mm; 13 1/2x11 1/4 inches, wide margins. Edition of 250. Printed by Louis Fort, Paris. Published by Vollard, Paris. From Les Saltimbanques. A superb, dark impression of this early drypoint, with all the delicate horizontal wiping scratches distinct and with burr throughout.
The austerity and sentimentality of Le Bain is characteristic of Picasso's (1881-1973, see lots 220-248) Blue Period (1901-04). During his Blue Period and into his Rose Period, so-called for the principal color palettes that he utilized in his paintings at the time, Picasso's art explored the experiences of those on the fringes of society and those in the poor, bohemian neighborhoods of Spain and Montmartre, Paris, where the artist resided in the early 1900s. After rudimentary instruction in the art of printmaking and having completed just one other print in 1899, Picasso executed an ambitious series of 15 etchings and drypoints, Les Saltimbanques.
During his Blue Period, Picasso utilized Mannerist techniques in his execution of figures; the elongated forms and compositional tension of Mannerism highlights the isolation and austerity of Picasso's subjects. The flatness of the scene, the stylized figures and the organized composition indicate that this is not a scene taken from life, but an allegorical scene constructed from the glimpses into the lives of those living in poverty. This is the impact of the Symbolist aesthetic, which encouraged the evocation of emotions over realism and elevated quotidien scenes.
Though this plate was completed in 1905 and Picasso made some initial proofs, the artist wasn't in a position financially and hadn't yet attained the commercial success to entertain an edition. It wasn't published as an edition until 1913 when Picasso's art dealer, Ambroise Vollard, purchased the plate and steel-faced it, along with the additional plates for Les Saltimbanques created by Picasso between 1904-06. Bloch 12; Geiser 14.
