Final Freedom
For a long time, this "last period" was scorned by critics and art historians alike, up until recently, when a more nuanced analysis shows the extent to which, for the artist, it was another one of his endless new beginnings, a rejuvenating boost of vitality, a return to his sources, to his earliest sensory experiences, unprecedented and exhilarating. This series is a summary of sorts, a conclusion of the themes that were closest to his heart, of his sources of inspiration, of his personal and artistic path. Certain characters become more schematic and lose their substance, while others, rendered with thick lines and colors, flood the surface of the paper. His nudes are simple, and some have been released from the torments of passion. Through his models, the artist emerges as an astounding portraitist, "moving towards the irrational pursuit of a portrait of painting that nothing can finish or extinguish," as Anne Baldassari writes in the catalogue for the Picasso and the Masters exhibition. Black and white structure space, while bursts of color cancel out the frame with absolute freedom of style. We see the weightless, luminous lines, up until February 4, the date when Picasso finished the series. Like the words "THE END" closing a film, he concluded his work with the date, written three times on the back of the last drawing.
Picasso drew his energy from a final reflection about the history of art. He produced fifty-seven drawings stripped of all artifice and constraints, founded on the expression of a fantastical, intimate, and obsessive universe, an intentionally brutal aesthetic, laying bare the materiality of his work.
One last piece ended up completing the museum's collection: two days before her tragic death and six years after Picasso's, Jacqueline visited Jean-Maurice Rouquette and his wife. She brought them a painting for the museum, carefully wrapped in newspaper: it was the portrait of María López, a piece with which Picasso had never parted. According to Michèle Moutashar, "what the portrait of María shared with the original donation was the remarkable strength of its line, which was especially apparent in the works from the Antibes period, and more broadly in the portraits from the preceding months [...]". Picasso never concealed his deep attachment to his mother, whose name he took on. This affectionate portrait is the second one the artist painted in the summer of 1923, when Doña María visited Antibes, and which he was not to reveal until 1953, on the occasion of the Rome and Milan retrospectives. The gift bears witness to Jacqueline's attachment to the town of Arles, to its museum, and to the Rouquettes, given her awareness of how much Picasso cared about this work. Her choice was hardly gratuitous.
Jean-Maurice Rouquette, who continues to live in Arles, left the museum in August of 1996. The Musée Réattu continues his efforts under the direction of Pascale Picard and a reprinted version of the catalogue is again available to the public.
We would like to thank Jean-Maurice Rouquette and his wife Jacqueline for their warm welcome and for sharing their memories with us.
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Summary