Tuesday, December 27, 2011

News at Eleven (Back Page): But Fernande [Olivier] said that [Pablo] Picasso

had been so impressed by Gertrude [Stein]'s massive head and body he wanted to paint her even before he knew her.

Like [Paul] Cézanne's Madame Cézanne with a Fan and [henri] Matisse's Woman with a Hat, his Portrait of Gertrude Stein represented the subject seated in a chair and looking down at the viewer. Picasso was jousting directly with his rivals. Gertrude was delighted by the outcome, writing some years later that "for me, it is I, and it is the only reproduction of me which is always I, for me."

from Smithsonian: An Eye for Genius: The Collections of Gertrude and Leo Stein

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