24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Home Artists How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

In this article you will learn more about the fascinating relationship between African art and
Picasso’s famous works of art.

Apr 30, 2022 • By Lisa Modiano, MA Art Gallery & Museum Studies, BA History of Art

T
he Spanish master Pablo Picasso is considered one of the greatest artists of the
20th century. His works have changed the course of art history forever. But how
much of Picasso’s modernism was built on art coming from the African diaspora,
and why is its indisputable influence on the artist’s work still not widely acknowledged?
Read on to learn more about the relationship between African art and Picasso’s pieces.

African Art and Picasso

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 1/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Frequently Read Together

Pablo Picasso – Did You Know?

Pablo Picasso, via The Atlantic

African Art: The First Form of Cubism

By the late 19th century and as a direct result of imperialism, thousands of African objects
had arrived in Europe. Far from being considered artworks, they were considered artifacts of
colonial conquests and held little to no economic value. But during the early 1900s with
Picasso leading the way, African art aesthetics became a source of profound inspiration for
the School of Paris, which had been searching for new and radical ways of representation.
Picasso saw in African figuration a religious depth and ritual purpose that both startled and
moved him. Its sophisticated use of flat planes and bold contouring was unlike anything the
artist had encountered before.

But while the impact African art had on Picasso, and on the birth of Cubism as a whole, has
been examined tirelessly, the works that inspired an entire movement are rarely examined in
their own right. Instead, non-Western art is often viewed as the tool that enabled European
artists such as Gauguin, Braque, and Picasso to bring forth a pictorial revolution, a tool that
was quickly disregarded as soon as this was achieved. African artisans had been abstracting
the human figure for centuries. So how much of what established Picasso as one of the
founding fathers of modern art was borrowed from a continent he knew very little about?

African Art in Europe: Intrigue and Contempt

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 2/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Ethnographical Galleries, British Museum, 1908. Photograph by Donald Macbeth, via The British Museum, London

Until fairly recently, the Western art world’s adaptation of traditional African visual culture
was referred to as Primitivism, a term which is now considered outdated due to its
problematic connotations. At the turn of the 20th century, the European elite believed Africa
and Oceania to be primitive lands rife with mysticism and savagery. At the same time, many
appropriated these cultures for their own artistic and social gain, fascinated by an exotic
fantasy of the non-Western. But very few had a sophisticated understanding of the cultures
and mostly nameless African artists that they were borrowing from.

Get the latest articles delivered to your inbox

Email Address Join!
Sign up to our Free Weekly Newsletter

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 3/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

The Palais du Trocadéro, seat of the Museum of Ethnography between 1878 – 1935. Postcard, circa 1900, via The
Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilizations

French colonies included French Sudan, Senegal, Ivory Coast, Dahomey, and Niger. Looted
objects from these territories were brought over and poorly displayed in the notoriously
dingy and run-down galleries of museums such as the Trocadero Museum of Ethnology, now
the The Musée de l’Homme, in Paris and the British Museum in London. The ceremonial
masks, sculptures and totemic carvings that were dispersed throughout Europe originated
from several regions spread across an entire continent but came to be generalized as tribal
art. They could be found at flea markets and in pawn shops, but little was known about their
makers or the meaning behind their creation.

Europe was both fascinated and shocked by African objects, viewing their spirituality with a
mixture of intrigue and contempt. It is important to note that unlike Western art, these
objects had been created with function, rather than art in mind. While their function varied
depending on region and religion, they played (and in many cases, continue to play) an
important role in ceremonies and rituals celebrating religion, social status, and rite of
passage.

Picasso’s African Art Encounter

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 4/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Henri Matisse’s purchase, a figurine created by the Vili people of the Congo, 19th–early 20th century, via BBC

In the spring of 1907, Henri Matisse was on his way to visit the American writer and
collector Gertude Stein in her Paris home when he stopped in what used to be referred to as
a ‘curio-shop’ to purchase a small African sculpture. Picasso, who was also visiting Stein
when Matisse arrived, was immediately captivated by the sculpture that was later identified
as a Vili figure from what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The artist, who was
known to be extremely superstitious, believed in the magical and transformative power of
objects. According to Max Jacob, French poet and lifelong friend of Picasso, the Spaniard
clutched the small sculpture in his hands all night, inspired by its elongated features,
streamlined forms and spiritual purpose.

​The encounter ignited something profound in the twenty-five year old Picasso, who had
recently come out of his Blue and Rose periods and was earnestly searching for a source of
inspiration that would catapult him to the forefront of the avant-garde. A few days after
discovering the Vili sculpture, the artist visited the Trocadero Museum with fellow artist and
friend André Derain.

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 5/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Picasso would later acknowledge this visit as a pivotal turning point in his artistic trajectory:
“A smell of mold and neglect grabbed me by the throat. I was so depressed that I would have
chosen to leave immediately,” Picasso said of the Trocadero. “But I forced myself to stay, to
examine these masks, all those objects that people had created with a sacred and magical
purpose, to serve as intermediaries between them and the unknown and hostile forces that
surrounded them, thereby trying to overcome their fears, giving them color and shape. And
then I understood what painting really meant. It is not an aesthetic process, it is a form of
magic that stands between us and the hostile universe, a means of taking power, imposing a
form on our terrors as well as our wishes. The day I understood that, I found my way.”

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon & Cubism

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon by Pablo Picasso, 1907, via MoMA, New York

Any art historian will tell you that Picasso’s iconic 1907 Les Demoiselles d’Avignon was
seminal for the development of Cubism. Soon after the artist visited the Trocadero, he
revisited a composition he had been working on in his Montmartre studio. The work-in-
progress portrayed nude sex workers in a brothel he frequented on Carrer d’Avinyó in

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 6/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Barcelona, Spain. The final oil painting, which stands nearly two and a half meters high and
just over two meters wide, depicts five women with faceted, angular bodies who appear to be
almost unaware of each other’s presence.

The faces of the two central figures were inspired by Picasso’s interest in the frozen, archaic-
like sculptural busts of his native Iberia, while the woman in the top right corner resembles
the heavily stylised masks of the Dan tribe of the Ivory Coast. Typically used for protection
and as a way to communicate with spirits, Dan masks are considered sacred and can be
distinguished by their high foreheads, pointed chins, and pouting mouths. In the lower right
of the painting, Picasso paints a woman whose face is defined by its triangular nose and
inverted eyebrows. Her geometric features show striking resemblance to a Mbuya Mask of
the Pende people, typically used to signify the end of circumcision rituals.

Frequently Read Together

Fascinating Facts About French Artist Paul

Gauguin

6 Interesting Facts About Georges Braque

You Need to Know

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, 1907, detail of top right woman’s face, via MoMA, New York; next to Wooden Dan face mask,
19th-mid 20th century, via The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; next to Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, 1907, detail of
bottom right woman’s face, via MoMA, New York; and Mbanga mask, Central Pende, Bandundu, Democratic Republic of
Congo via Apollo Magazine

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 7/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon signified a radical break from the naturalism that had defined
Western art since the Renaissance, derailing notions of what art was supposed to look like.
Picasso’s two-dimensional women were seen as unfeminine, their confrontational demeanor
a complete departure from the traditional depiction of female beauty. The work was received
negatively by artists and critics alike, and its menacing sex workers were seen as promiscous
and unfit for Paris salons. Picasso rolled up the canvas, considered scandalous even amongst
his innermost circle, and stored it in his studio for years to come.

Over the next few years, Picasso continued to borrow from African art, producing a series of
drawings, watercolors and sculptures in which he kept reducing facial features to simple
geometric shapes in the style of Western and Central African aesthetics. In Head of a Woman
(Study for Nude with Drapery), for example, he heavily contoured the subject’s face and
created volume by using heavy, shadowed cross-hatching in several directions.

These experiments led Picasso, along with George Braque, to Cubism — the radical
movement that emphasized the distinction between painting and reality. African art’s use of
simplified forms and fragmented perspectives inspired the artists to abandon the realistic
modeling of figures, refuting long-standing notions that art’s purpose was to imitate the
natural world. Cubism was monumental in its impact, and became the starting point for
many abstract movements such as Futurism, Constructivism, and Neo-plasticism.

Denying African Influences and Picasso’s Art

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 8/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Study for the Head of Nude with Drapery by Pablo Picasso, 1907, via Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, next
to Fang Ngil mask, Gabon, via Christie’s; next to Bust of a Woman by Pablo Picasso, 1932, via MoMA, New York; and
Lwalwa Mask, Democratic Republic of Congo, via Sotheby’s

According to the Nasher Museum of Art, Picasso started collecting African masks, sculptures
and musical instruments soon after his first visit to the Trocadero, amassing over one
hundred works by the time of his death. A photograph taken by his son Claude in 1974, a
year after the artist’s death, shows the extent of his African art collection. This collection was
later dispersed to various family members, sold at auctions, and donated to museums.

While art historians tend to agree that there are striking similarities between Picasso’s work
and art coming from the African continent, many retain that his borrowing from these
cultures was not necessarily intentional. While Picasso acknowledged the initial impact
African art had on his vision as an artist, he later denied that his work was inspired by it.

When it came to explaining the stylistic choices he made when painting the Les Demoiselles
d’Avignon, for example, Picasso made sure to emphasize the Iberian, rather than African,
nature of the work. While this was partly due to the artist’s extremely patriotic nature, it also

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 9/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

begs the question: did Picasso merely appropriate African visual culture for his own artistic
gain, with little to no regard for the cultures he was drawing inspiration from?

Picasso in 1908 in his workshop in Montmartre, Paris, via The Guardian

According to the postcolonial scholar Simon Gikandi, Picasso was infatuated with the idea of
what he considered primitive and tribal, but there is very little evidence that he showed
interest in Africans as people and producers of culture. Although the artist was open about
the spiritual force he experienced when he first encountered African objects at the Trocadero,
he also expressed his irritation at the influence the continent had on him.

Gikandi argues that while art history acknowledges Africa played a part in the development
of modernism, it is just as quickly “dispatched to the space of primitivism, a place where it
poses no danger to the purity of modern art.”

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 10/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

The contribution Picasso made to the development of Cubism and Modernism is undeniable.
But when we examine these critical moments in the history of art, it is crucial to
contemplate the countless ways in which African artisans provided unprecedented ingenuity
and monumentality to the artist’s work. Picasso’s radical use of two-dimensionality, fierce
geometry, and flat planes was only possible because African sculptors and carvers had been
mastering the art of abstraction for centuries. Rather than study Europe’s adoption of
Africanicity as merely another avant-garde gesture in the timeline of Western art history,
perhaps it is time we let the artworks that inspired a movement take the center stage.

Cite this Article

READ NEXT:
Pablo Picasso – Did You Know?

 Share  Tweet  Share  Share  Share  Copy  Email

By Lisa Modiano
MA Art Gallery & Museum Studies, BA History of Art

Lisa is an arts professional based between Lisbon, London and Rome. She holds an MA in Art
Gallery & Museum Studies and a BA in Art History from the University of Leeds. Lisa has worked in
numerous art organizations and collections across the sector, such as the Villa Lena Art
Foundation and the Deutsche Bank Art Collection. She is particularly interested in socially engaged
artist practices and feminist art theory, and is passionate about making art accessible to as wide
an audience as possible.

Read more by Lisa Modiano

Self Portraits of Zanele Muholi: All Hail the Why Is Paula Rego’s Abortion Series Still
Dark Lioness Relevant Today?
By Lisa Modiano, in Art By Lisa Modiano, in Art

Popular Articles in Artists

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 11/12
24/08/2023 16:44 How Much Does Picasso Owe to African Art?

Barnett Newman: Spirituality in Modern Art Get to Know Constantin Brancusi: Patriarch
of Modern Sculpture
By Truman Chambers, in Art By Stella Polyzoidou, in Art

FOLLOW US TOPICS ABOUT CONTACT

       Ancient History About Us Write for Us

102-7575 Trans-Canada Art Authors Media Relations
Highway Artists Staff Advertise with Us
Montreal, QC H4T 1V6 Philosophy Corrections
Canada Stories Contact Us
Answers
hello@thecollector.com Collecting
News

Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Copyright © 2023 TheCollector

Page generated 1 day ago on yesterday at 8:30 AM .

https://www.thecollector.com/picasso-and-african-art/ 12/12