Woman Sitting in a Garden [verso]

1901

Pablo Picasso

Artist, Spanish, 1881 - 1973

Pablo Picasso

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on cardboard

  • Credit Line

    Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

  • Dimensions

    overall: 68.5 x 95.7 cm (26 15/16 x 37 11/16 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1996.129.1.b

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Zervos, Vol. 6, no. 332

  • Copyright

    © 2012 Estate of Pablo Picasso/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Associated Artworks

A young man and boy look at a man laid out on a bed in this horizontal composition. All three people have white-colored skin and are loosely painted, as is the incomplete setting. The man lies with his eyes closed on the bed with his head to our left and feet to our right. He is on a baby-blue field, perhaps a blanket, and his head is propped up on a thick white pillow. He has black hair and delicate features, and his hands are together in prayer over his belly. The white ruffled collar and a diamond made up of smaller red, blue, yellow, and black diamonds are painted on his shoulder. The rest of his body is blocked in loosely with lapis blue except the cuff we can see, which is bright white. The young man and boy look on from near the man’s shins on the far side of the bed. Both have close-cropped hair. The young man cranes his neck forward, and his head and shoulders are surrounded by a white field against the brown cardboard on which this is painted. His garment is white over the shoulders and red on the torso. Only the head and neck of the boy are visible beyond the prone man. The artist signed the work in black in the lower right corner, “Picasso.”

The Death of Harlequin [recto]

Pablo Picasso

1905

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Purchased from the artist by Wilhelm Uhde, 1906; (Galerie Caspari, Munich); sold 1915 to Hertha Koenig [1884-1976], Munich; [1] sold 1950 to (Justin K. Thannhauser, New York); [2] W. Somerset Maugham, St.-Jean-Cap-Ferrat (his sale, London, Sotheby's, 10 April 1962, no. 26); purchased by (Hector Brame) for Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, Upperville, VA; gift to NGA, 1996.
[1] Christian Geelhaar, Picasso. Wegbereiter und Foerderer seines Aufsteigs 1899-1939, Zurich, c. 1993, pp. 73-75.
[2] Correspondence in the Thannhauser files at ZADIK [Zentralarchiv des Internationalen Kunsthandels, Cologne], transcriptions in NGA curatorial files.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1901

  • Galerie Ambroise Vollard, Paris, 1901 (verso only).

1913

  • Galerie Thannhauser, Munich, 1913.

1966

  • French Paintings from the Collections of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon and Mrs. Mellon Bruce, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1966, no. 194 (recto only).

1978

  • Aspects of Twentieth Century Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1978-1979, 21, 116, no. 8 (recto only).

1980

  • Picasso, The Saltimbanques. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1980-1981, 15, 55, 87, pl. 7, fig. 72, cat. no. 38 (recto only).

1997

  • Picasso: The Early Years, 1892-1906, National Gallery of Art, Washington; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1997-1998.

2001

  • A Century of Drawing, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2001-2002, no. 8, as The Death of Harlequin.

Bibliography

1932

  • Zervos, Christian. Pablo Picasso. 33 vols. Paris, 1932-1978.

Inscriptions

lower right in blue paint: Picasso; lower right verso in pen and black ink: Picasso

Wikidata ID

Q64618764

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