Once again, the "Picasso" series shifts back and forth between the mature Picasso in the Paris of the postwar years and his early struggles to find his voice as an artist in the early twentieth century.
The program also address the playboy's skills in juggling three women in his life: Françoise, Marie Thérèse, and Dora. The older Picasso clearly sees Françoise as his muse, inviting her to his home by the sea in Golfe-Juan.
But the more intriguing part of this episode is the connection the young Picasso forms with the art connoisseurs Leo and Gertrude Stein, as well as the French artist Henri Matisse, who is described as "a Donatello among wild beasts." The genius behind Picasso's innovative portrait of Gertrude Stein appears to derive from a squat Iberian Madonna figure he discovers in a small church. For the superstitious Picasso, the Madonna carving is "a sign." But Matisse believes that Picasso's portrait of Stein may have an element of the primitive African masks that Picasso in possession of Matisse. Picasso is offended that Matisse may believe that Picasso copied from him.
At moments, the mercurial and temperamental Picasso badly mistreats the women in his life. After Picasso threatens to throw Françoise in the river, she retorts that he is a "monster." As an artist, Picasso waxes philosophical about the delicate balance between creation and destruction. But, the major pair of opposites explored in this episode is that of the beautiful and the ugly.
Picasso and Fernande adopt an orphan from a nearby convent. The child's name is Raymonde. But in one of the saddest moments in the episode, the couple decides to return the child to the orphanage.
A turning point in the young Picasso's artistic sensibilities occurs when Braque informs him of the 1907 exhibit of primitivism at the Trocadéro Museum. Viewing the larger-than-life African masks, Picasso has an epiphany: "they were magic...weapons to protect against evil." For Picasso, his artist's brush will be his weapon in the creation of one of the most innovative paintings of the twentieth century: "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon."
After working at a feverish pitch, Picasso shows the completed painting to his friends. Both Fernande and Apollinaire are repulsed. Earlier in the episode, Picasso exclaims that he wishes to be "more offensive, more abhorrent' and to shock audiences. In the "Demoiselles," Picasso has truly discovered ugliness beneath the beautiful. Along with Matisse's "Le Bonheur de Vivre," the "Demoisses" is the cornerstone of modern painting.
The program also address the playboy's skills in juggling three women in his life: Françoise, Marie Thérèse, and Dora. The older Picasso clearly sees Françoise as his muse, inviting her to his home by the sea in Golfe-Juan.
But the more intriguing part of this episode is the connection the young Picasso forms with the art connoisseurs Leo and Gertrude Stein, as well as the French artist Henri Matisse, who is described as "a Donatello among wild beasts." The genius behind Picasso's innovative portrait of Gertrude Stein appears to derive from a squat Iberian Madonna figure he discovers in a small church. For the superstitious Picasso, the Madonna carving is "a sign." But Matisse believes that Picasso's portrait of Stein may have an element of the primitive African masks that Picasso in possession of Matisse. Picasso is offended that Matisse may believe that Picasso copied from him.
At moments, the mercurial and temperamental Picasso badly mistreats the women in his life. After Picasso threatens to throw Françoise in the river, she retorts that he is a "monster." As an artist, Picasso waxes philosophical about the delicate balance between creation and destruction. But, the major pair of opposites explored in this episode is that of the beautiful and the ugly.
Picasso and Fernande adopt an orphan from a nearby convent. The child's name is Raymonde. But in one of the saddest moments in the episode, the couple decides to return the child to the orphanage.
A turning point in the young Picasso's artistic sensibilities occurs when Braque informs him of the 1907 exhibit of primitivism at the Trocadéro Museum. Viewing the larger-than-life African masks, Picasso has an epiphany: "they were magic...weapons to protect against evil." For Picasso, his artist's brush will be his weapon in the creation of one of the most innovative paintings of the twentieth century: "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon."
After working at a feverish pitch, Picasso shows the completed painting to his friends. Both Fernande and Apollinaire are repulsed. Earlier in the episode, Picasso exclaims that he wishes to be "more offensive, more abhorrent' and to shock audiences. In the "Demoiselles," Picasso has truly discovered ugliness beneath the beautiful. Along with Matisse's "Le Bonheur de Vivre," the "Demoisses" is the cornerstone of modern painting.