Word: modernizations
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Picasso has been called "a volcano in constant eruption," and his continued volcanic - and unpredictable - activity has made him a phenomenon almost unique in the history of art. No other artist has ever commanded so wide a fame in his own lifetime. His name is almost a synonym for modern art. His works have set off debates in Levittown living rooms, rocked the cafes of Montmartre, built up pressures in Moscow. If a friend in need asks for help, Picasso can manufacture money simply by sketching a few lines on the back of a menu and adding his dramatic signature...
This week in Manhattan, to celebrate Picasso's 75th birthday, the Museum of Modern Art is opening the most comprehensive exhibition of Picasso's works ever collected under one roof. On view for a summer-long show that takes over three whole floors are 328 paintings, sculptures and drawings, selected from 95 collections. Included are 31 works owned by Picasso, which can be distinguished by the fact that the old man, with a peasant's shrewdness, never signs a painting until it is sold...
...criticism itself. The paintings -grown familiar in countless art books and reproductions - no longer shock. In retrospect, some seem to be failures. But there remains an overwhelming sense of endless vitality and prolific invention. Each painting bears the visual impact and unmistakable stamp of authority of the greatest of modern draftsmen. The overall impression is of a great painter who has painted few absolute masterpieces, because he seldom lingered long enough with any one work to bring it to perfection. But even his failures are monumental - testament of a man made in a larger mold than any other artist...
...painting done in 1907 depicting five dramatic salmon-pink nudes, their faces hideous as primitive African masks. On seeing the painting, French Painter Georges Braque gasped: "You are asking us to drink petrol in order to spit fire." Today, Demoiselles, which made primitive art an accepted fountainhead of modern art, has only the dated quality of yesteryear's manifesto. But it marked a significant break in art history, ushering in an age in which art is no longer the readily grasped reaffirmation of everyman's vision, but a special hierarchical world into Avhich initiation is required. Reported Gertrude...
Picasso's cubism radically affected the course of modern art, but it is now clear that it failed to establish itself as the Grand Manner of the 20th century. As an apparatus to carry the full weight of modern man's deepened and often troubled sensibility, it has proved inadequate. Picasso himself, no man to cultivate the hinterland after exploring a new area's boundaries, pushed on, leaving a generation of less gifted painters to work laboriously through its implications...