Portrait of Pablo Picasso Through a Cubists Eye - Essay Example

One of the objectives of modern art is to express the artist’s thoughts and emotions by following what is deemed right by the artist wherein to cubists, form alone defines the subject thus, the use of geometric figures to bring out the form of the subject matter.

Juan Gris, a Spanish cubist artist portrayed a self-portrait of the benchmarker of the cubism period, Pablo Picasso, from the vantage point of their contemporaries with the same vision in his work entitled Portrait of Pablo Picasso (The Art Institute of Chicago). The general form of the painting shows a man seated and exhibits him to be well dressed though not very recognizable for a viewer to really be sure of what details one can decipher from the painting. As what would have been expected from a cubist, Gris used a lot of lines, cubes, and other geometric figures to bring out the three-dimensional view of his subject however, distorting the real appearance of the image. Being called analytical, the cubist painters were said to have analyzed their subject to come up with the products like the aforementioned artwork and among others, Mandolin and Clarinet by Pablo Picasso and Armored Train in Action by Gino Severini.

Appreciation of such kind of art may not come naturally to the untrained eyes of a novice so one has to look more closely at the painting before the individual could understand what the figure is all about and then appreciate the artwork. One of the great helps that would guide the viewer to ‘see’ the subject is the title of the piece of art, which could be deemed really important in the viewing of artworks, especially in such a category as cubism which usually uses dull or plain colors. In the Portrait of Pablo Picasso, the use of optical colors gives a definition to the beauty of the painting and brings out an interesting change in hues in the general form of the image. The use of similar colors alongside each other gives a different shade that sparks the interest of a viewer and more importantly, gives a more defined image of the geometric figures used in the painting. Consequently, this makes the image seem to be three-dimensional, accomplishing the objective of using geometric figures.

Truly art has no limitations and there could never be a right or wrong one because it is the expression of one’s mind and soul that is expressed in such works. Cubism may still have many critiques but one thing is for sure when cubists continue the passion of their leaders, people will see their passion in their works as seen in the love and respect Gris has for his subject in his painting mentioned earlier.