2023-10-02 22:48:24
Pablo Picasso claimed that his entire creative life had been “a continuous fight against the death of art”. The formidable new temporary exhibition at the Picasso Museum Málaga, ‘The Echo of Picasso’, shows that the man from Malaga, once again, won in his endeavor: the exhibition demonstrates that the genius of La Merced, with his obsessions and his advanced creative solutions, knew how to keep alive the eternal continuum that is art, an infinite chain punctuated by proper names, isms, inspirations and tendencies that serve a greater purpose, that of art itself, that, in Picasso terms, “to make others see the inner meaning of things”. So these days at the Buenavista Palace Picasso, face to face, 50 years after his death, with colleagues, some of whom were born in 1992. A show.
The exhibition, which opens its doors today and will remain on poster until March 2024, is a stimulating cartography of contemporary art through 85 pieces by 55 artists, talents ranging from De Kooning, Basquiat, Bourgeois, Koons, Bacon y Kippenberger, the surnames that redefined modernity at the end of the 20th century, as new as Jameson Green o Thomas Houseago, those who sustain creativity in the right now. All, components of that eternal continuum, of that infinite drone that has in Pablo Ruiz Picasso one of its great and most tireless instigators.
The curator of the exhibition, Eric Troncy, remembers Roland Barthes’ popular phrase to describe ‘The Echo of Picasso’: ““You don’t go to the zoo to see elephants and lions, but to see elephants and lions together, in the same space.” So the exhibition he has designed entails, in his words, “a poetic and wild journey” starring the elephants and lions of that modern creation that has been supervised, inspired or, directly, influenced by the artist from Malaga. Because Picasso’s magnetic eyes not only managed to penetrate the viewer’s mind, forever redefining his view of art and things, but also of practically all creators, also today. “I’m not making this up, today’s artists are obsessed with Picasso,” says the curator. And Marina Faust, one of the artists included in the exhibition, sums it up perfectly in the catalog: “No matter what happens, sooner or later, there is a Picasso epiphany in the life of every artist.”
Eric Troncy acknowledges that “practically everything could fit” in ‘The Echo of Picasso’. “The truth is that I am obsessed with Picasso and I see Picasso everywhere, so this exhibition is a fantasy of its own. But I hope that the visitor leaves the Picasso Museum Málaga sharing that obsession with me”, the commissioner acknowledged. Some of the selected pieces show the direct influence of the author of ‘Guernica’, especially those by George Condo or Brian Calvin; others start from somewhat more subtle, perhaps imperceptible, inspirations; There are also copies like that singular ‘Copy of a Picasso’ by Cy Twombly whose title is not exactly whimsical. So the temporary rooms of the Buenavista Palace host new, unheard conversations between works and artists who seek to transcend the mere chapter of influence to inhabit the spirit of an unrepeatable creator. In reality, that word, ‘influence’, does not enter the commissioner’s vocabulary: “That’s not what it’s about in this case. Because Picasso is inevitable for artists.”
Although let’s not get all fancy about these curatorial matters either. Because Pablo Picasso himself said it: “When art critics meet they talk about form, structure and meaning; When artists get together, they talk about where you can buy cheap turpentine.”
“Pleasure”
So, regardless of selection criteria, above all In ‘The Echo of Picasso’ what should always matter prevails: emotion and astonishment. “In reality, it is an exhibition about pleasure, because “it is impossible not to be moved by having a work by Picasso in front of you and another by Bourgeois next to it.” And then there is the discovery, having before us the creators who reformulate the present of art and who are part of that Picasso echo. For example, It is moving to contemplate the reinterpretation of ‘The Korean Massacre’ by Jameson Green and daunts and distresses that 4-meter minotaur raised by Thomas Houseago (Today’s artists who were invited to lend works to be included in the exhibition preferred to create pieces expressly for dialogue with the genius).
Almine Rech, co-president with Bernard Ruiz Picasso of the Almine and Bernard Ruiz Picasso Foundation for Art, is right when she assures that by attending these conversations between an artist who was born in 1881 and colleagues who did so a hundred years later one does not perceive interference or different dialects: “This exhibition shows how Picasso is still alive and is now in the DNA of the 21st century, even though he died fifty years ago, and this is something extraordinary. It seems as if his works had been done the day before yesterday.”
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