Portrait of Françoise (Buste de Femme)
Pablo Picasso
Description
March 28, 2009
During the final years of World War II, Pablo Picasso began a relationship with a young painter named Françoise Gilot (born 1921). The couple had two children together before Gilot left Picasso in 1953. Portrait of Françoise—executed in long, linear strokes and concentrations of pigment—is one of a series of portraits of her in a variety of media made over the course of a year. Gilot had a strong character; she once asserted that Picasso’s portraits of her were “not boxes in which I fit. I’m not a prisoner of them.” Here her forceful nature is conveyed by the intensity of her gaze and the erectness of her posture.
Subject Matter:
Portrait by Picasso of his lover, Françoise Gilot. The portraits of her usually depict Gilot with a sharp, narrow face that recalls portraits of Spanish princesses by Diego Velasquez. Completed on February 28, 1949, one month before the birth of Picasso and Gilot’s second child, Paloma.
Physical Description:
Bust portrait of woman. Her hair is brown, shoulder length, and curls at the bottom. Her high-collared blouse has off-white and light blue vertical stripes. She looks directly at the viewer
Usage Rights:
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