HOW GOOD WAS PICASSO? The Washington Post

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Blue Picasso, pink Picasso, cubist Picasso, society Picasso, surreal Picasso, ceramist Picasso, late Picasso. Picasso in his underwear, Picasso in a bow tie. Harlequin Picasso, bullfight Picasso, the poets’ Picasso, the GIs’ Picasso. Anti-fascist Picasso, communist Picasso, peace dove Picasso. Prankster Picasso, heartsick Picasso, lecherous Picasso.

Yes, Pablo Picasso was all over the place. He died 50 years ago this month at 91, and we’re still trying to clean up his mess.

Where America’s celebrated postwar artists — Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Helen Frankenthaler, Roy Lichtenstein — had the good manners to settle on a tidy, signature style and stick to it, Picasso was the ultimate shapeshifter. As an artist — and as a man — he was so astonishingly manifold that we are left with little choice, it can seem, but to reduce him to a kind of sign. Picasso equals protean genius.

It’s no longer necessary that he connect in people’s minds with any actual art. It’s enough that he stands for that bigger thing: unfettered creativity. In fact, it’s better. A clear line connects Picasso’s description of his pictures as “a sum of destructions” and the capitalist mantra of “creative destruction” and the onetime internal Facebook motto “Move fast and break things.” Sublimating Picasso’s oeuvre into an essence of pure creativity certainly makes it easier for the marketing arms of corporations to invoke his name and for museums to sell tickets.

It’s no longer necessary that he connect in people’s minds with any actual art. It’s enough that he stands for that bigger thing: unfettered creativity. In fact, it’s better. A clear line connects Picasso’s description of his pictures as “a sum of destructions” and the capitalist mantra of “creative destruction” and the onetime internal Facebook motto “Move fast and break things.” Sublimating Picasso’s oeuvre into an essence of pure creativity certainly makes it easier for the marketing arms of corporations to invoke his name and for museums to sell tickets.

This year, in Europe and North America, around 50 exhibitions have been organized under the umbrella “Celebration Picasso 1973-2023,” an initiative with the support of the French and Spanish governments. Some will try to solve the problem of the Spaniard’s extraordinary productivity by focusing on one year in his life (“Picasso 1906: The Turning Point” at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid) or even just three months (“Picasso in Fontainebleau” at New York’s Museum of Modern Art). Others — too many to list — will tame him by matching his works with those of other artists (El Greco, Max Beckmann, Nicolas Poussin, Joan Miró), with writers (Gertrude Stein) or with lovers (Fernande Olivier, Françoise Gilot). In June, the Brooklyn Museum will mount a show, co-curated by the comedian Hannah Gadsby, looking at Picasso through a feminist lens, placing him beside such artists as Cindy Sherman, Ana Mendieta and Kiki Smith.

What will people see in all these shows? How will Picasso’s actual works affect them? How good will the Spaniard come out smelling? That last question sounds impertinent, but it’s worth asking if we care about art, as opposed to branding.

I was recently at dinner with a celebrated artist and his wife, a physician. Thinking ahead to this essay, I raised the subject of Picasso. “Obviously, he was amazing,” I said to the physician. “But are there any Picassos you really love? Any of his works that sit with you, that feel close to your heart? Because I sometimes struggle to think of any.” Her husband, the artist, overheard from across the room and said simply, “Dozens. There are dozens.”

He was right, of course. And it is artists, above all, for whom Picasso has been an endless source of ideas, envy and inspiration. A critic trying to question or undermine this is bound to sound foolish, presumptuous and glib.

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