Pablo Picasso, James Bond and Some Art Thievery...

What does one do with a day off in London? In my case it involves a little shopping, a food trip to Selfridges and going to the new Tate exhibition with my lovely +1. I’d like to interject here and say that I was in no way dragging him along with me, but considering for our second date he took me to see Da Vinci it seemed fair to repay the favour. My turn came in the form of Picasso.

Pablo Picasso, Weeping Woman, 1937. Oil on Canvas

Now, don’t ask me why I feel this is true, but every now and again I manage to link two entirely different cultural figures together. In this case, James Bond and Picasso – weird huh? I don’t know whether Picasso was a fan of a good martini like Mr Bond, in fact I believe he preferred Absinthe, but they do share one common factor – the power of their names. The mere whisper of either conjures images of exotic places, beautiful women and decadent lifestyles. Along with Bond, whose character and image will be forever linked to things like an Aston Martin, a smoking gun and some great tailoring, Picasso too has some strong associations like Post-Impressionism, political iconography (in the shape of his piece Guernica) and holding the (somewhat dubious) honour of having created some of the most expensive artworks in the world…

Pablo Picasso, Nude, Green Leaves and Bust,1932. Oil on Canvas At 66m, this Picasso is renowned for being the most expensive painting of his ever sold. Can we ever forget the price tag though and enjoy it as an image?

Personally though, before we pottered down to the Tate Britain to see the new Picasso and Modern British Art show, I have to honestly say I wasn’t that enamoured of the great man. Like Bond before the Daniel Craig reinvention, I felt that things had become a little samey. I knew a lot of the images, I knew a little of the man, and I was kind of ambivalent to the dizzy heights of value that his pieces seem to inspire. The thing that has always got up my nose about Picasso, is that even his minor (and I’m not about to sugar coat it - bad) works have taken pride of place in museums over much better works by ‘less significant’ artists. So I know that it’s Picasso, but to me it would be better to have great work on show to inspire those who come to see art, rather than bad pieces which could irrevocably damage someone’s perspective. I mean, hello? A bad painting isn’t made better by having a famous name attached to it, in fact it’s often rendered worse…

Pablo Picasso, Nude Woman in Red Armchair, 1932. Oil on Canvas. Not one of my favourite images, but in the flesh it was absolutely stunning...

Okay, rant over… just. So what did we find when we stepped through those double doors into the exhibition? Well, we discovered that my +1 believes that jacking in banking and becoming an international art thief would be a good idea, that after all my misgivings I do really enjoy Picasso, and that both of us actively dislike crowds. The visual mixing of muse (Picasso) and artists whom he inspired created one of the most visually stimulating exhibitions I’ve seen at the Tate in a while. The perspective which the combination gives, not only to Picasso but to the British artists whose work is exhibited there, is the most interesting part – for the geeky such as myself – and the juxtaposition of the different painters provides a optical feast as well as an intellectual one.

This juxtaposition of 1933 (coin and musical instruments) by Ben Nicholson (top right) and Picasso's Guitar, Compote Dish and Grapes (right) from 1924 shows the influence the abstract forms used by the Spanish master (bottom right) had on his British near-contemporary.

So what were the highlights? Well, it entirely depends on what you like in your paintings and sculpture. For me I enjoyed the room entitled Picasso in Britain 1937-39, primarily for the political and social issues which it dealt with. Guernica was a piece which was commissioned for the Spanish Pavillion at the Paris Exhibition of 1937 and is Picasso’s most political artwork. It deals with the Nazi bombing of the Basque town of Guernica in April 1937, and is held as a world-renowned memorial to the civilian suffering and horrendous loss of life. For me it demonstrates a more serious side of Picasso as an artist, the fact that he could capture so vividly the emotional and physical spectrum of such a catastrophe, should give all those who write him off as being just a name pause for thought.

Pablo Picasso, Guernica, 1937. Mural

I was also particularly partial to the Francis Bacon and Picasso room. Now I love Bacon’s Three Studies for Figures at the Base of the Crucifixtion and have to say that besides Graham Sutherland’s Crucifixtion and Picasso’s Nude Woman in Red Armchair that is definitely the other one I would ask my newly thieving other half to procure for me. Whilst there are definite parallels between Bacon and Picasso, to me it wasn’t the influence of Picasso which made this work interesting, it was seeing it in the context of another surrealist artist. Now I’m not about to deny Bacon doesn’t disturb me somewhat, but now I realise that this was only in isolation – studying the work beside that of Picasso who also favoured extended bodies and polyp-like heads reminded me of something which Bacon said of his own work when he admitted that he saw the scene as "a magnificent armature on which you can hang all types of feeling and sensation". I can now look at Bacon’s contribution and see that it was about the way in which we as humans experience the world around us; a physical depiction of an emotional expression.

Francis Bacon, Three Studies for Figures at the Base of the Crucifixtion, 1944. Oil on Board

Is it worth it? Of course it is. Even if like me Picasso still comes across somewhat of a rogue and an arrogant master of paint, there really is no doubt that this is a brilliant feast for the art lover. Picasso was a  brilliant painter, and those who hang beside him are his equal in every way. For those who aren't art lovers, well, save your pennies and enjoy a dry martini instead…