Discovery of Spain - British Artists and Collectors: Goya to Picasso

I finally made it through to Edinburgh to see the 'Goya to Picasso' exhibition. It's been on since July and it takes me till the last day of the exhibition, in October, to make it through but hey, at least I made it. It was definitely worth the wait, though I actually wish I'd gone sooner as I could definitely have done with more than one visit to take it all in.

There was so much to see that I'm just going to mention a few things that really stood out for me. Velázquez's 'An Old Woman Cooking Eggs' was stunning, having seen it in books and on postcards it was completely different to see it in real life. The details, colouring and shadows are all amazing and I could have looked at it for ages, but I didn't get there till about 3.30 and I knew I didn't have all that long till it closed so I moved on. I think my favourite artist, whom I didn't already know a lot about, was Arthur Melville, a Scottish painter who worked with and was an influence upon, The Glasgow Boys. I can't name a favourite of his as I loved them all, though there are two that particularly stick in my mind , 'The little bullfight 'Brave Toro!'' and 'The Contrabandistas' (1892). 'The little bullfight 'Brave Toro'!' is filled with bright colours expressively indicating people and movement, the dust swirls around the bull in the ring, and the overall effect of movement and energy is wonderful. 'The Contrabandistas' is such an unusual work, the figures are in the centre of the composition but are small and seem overwhelmed by the swirl of trees and hills around them and the vast expanse of sky above.

Arthur Melville, The Little Bull Fight, "Bravo Toro!", late 19th Century

©Victoria and Albert Museum, London

The other artist I discovered who I hadn't heard of before was John Frederick Lewis. There were a large number of his works in this exhibition but the ones that really impacted on me were his drawings of buildings and street scenes, the colours are muted and give the impression of the heat of the Andalusian sun, the detail is wonderful and the angles and viewpoint are often unusual. The only one I can remember the name of isn't one of these though, it's a wonderful vibrant painting 'Spanish Fiesta' (1836). I realised I must have heard his name before though as he features in one of the best books I've read in the past few years 'The Map of Love' by Ahdaf Soueif. Reviewing an exhibition 'The Lure of the East' at the Tate Britain in 2008 Soueif says of his paintings
"I find Lewis's work so attractive that it became a source of sustenance for the heroine, Lady Anna Winterbourne, of my novel The Map of Love: recently widowed, Anna visits the South Kensington museum and takes pleasure in "the wondrous colours, the tranquillity, the contentment with which [Lewis's paintings] are infused"... Lewis's truth, expressed in colour and brushstrokes, was a truth about the spirit of the place."
Ahdaf Soueif, Visions of the harem, The Guardian, 05/07/09

There were a number of versions of Picasso's 'Weeping Woman', which have a tremendous force and emotional intensity about them. Knowing more about the events surrounding their creation, after a visit to Malaga and the Picasso Museum earlier this year, I found seeing these again incredibly moving.

I am now looking forward to visiting the National Gallery in London to see 'The Sacred made Real'. This exhibition looks at work religious art works created in Spain in the 17th century, and includes the work of at least two of the artist in 'From Goya to Picasso' - Diego Velazquez and Francisco de Zurbaran. For the first time these painting are going to be shown alongside polychrome sculptures from the same period.

Picasso, Malaga and Guernica

Malaga, 2009
© Kathryn Mackenzie

I've just returned from a week's yoga holiday in the idyllic surroundings of Casa Mayor, a beautiful villa in the mountains of Andalucía, about 40 minutes drive from Malaga. I wouldn't have thought I could fit archives into a yoga holiday but I managed it with a visit to the wonderful Picasso Museum in Malaga.

I hadn't realised that Pablo Picasso was born in Malaga so it seems only fitting that there is a museum in his honour in the city. I had been told Malaga wasn't worth seeing but nothing could be further from the truth. It was a lovely old town with a really interesting history, lots of beautiful buildings and parks, and the Picasso Museum. I wish I'd remembered to take some photos of the outside of the building as it's a lovely building, and there were absolutely no photos allowed inside the building. The work in the collection was donated by Picasso's daughter-in-law, Christine Ruiz-Picasso and his grandson, Bernard Ruiz-Picasso.

View of Malaga from the Gibralfaro Castle, 2009
© Kathryn Mackenzie

There is a huge variety of work on display, reflecting the breadth of Picasso's talents and interests. The collection includes, in addition to paintings, sculptures, drawings, sketchbooks, ceramics, engravings, photographs of the artist at work on outdoor sculptures, and various forms of print-making. It was great seeing all his drawings and sketch books and getting an idea of how the creative process worked. For me it is as important and rewarding to see the sketchbooks and drawings as it is to see the finished work as without all this extra information there's no way of knowing how the finished work is arrived at. Though I guess you could take the view of the artist as 'genius', a creative mind working alone to create art, I would rather see how the ideas developed and who else was involved in the creative process (there is work by a number of artists with whom Picasso collaborated, including the sculptor Julio Gonzalez). It was also very useful to see that so much of the work was dated, even the sketchbooks in some cases. Dating his work was something he had been doing for a long time, maybe this has something to do with being so famous in his own lifetime - he was already aware of how well his art was and would be regarded and therefore could see the value in attributing works in time and space, creating his own archive as he went along.

Whilst at the Museum I bought a really interesting book Picasso's War: the destruction of Guernica, and the masterpiece that changed the world, by Russell Martin. I've still never seen Picasso's Guernica but one day I'll make the trip to Madrid. The book charts the history of the Spanish Civil War and Guernica, the place, and how it was that Picasso came to paint Guernica, and then goes on to discuss the reception of the painting at the time, and in the decades that followed. There are a couple of points from the book that stick in my mind. The first being that, as with other work, Picasso dated his sketches and development work for this painting, but in addition, for the first time, Guernica was also photographed at many stages of its development by Dora Maar, a photographer and artist who at that time was also the lover of Picasso.

Picasso entrusted Guernica to the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York in 1938 and it would stay in America, with short tours elsewhere, until 1981. MoMA weren't keen to return the work but the Government of Spain used archives to help secure its return to Spain. They provided assurances that the work would be safe, they gained the support of a number of Picasso's family members', and they used documents to prove that, in 1937, the Spanish government had paid Picasso for his materials for the painting (Picasso didn't want payment from the Government for painting the work as it was his way of supporting the cause of the Republican Government), and that Picasso had gifted the painting to Spain.