Pablo Picasso, father of Cubism, made a gigantic splash in world of art. But even before that, he kept tiny sketchbooks. Matchbook covers, postcards, restaurant napkins—the great Picasso practiced on them all.
A fall 2023 exhibit at Manhattan’s Pace Gallery in New York showed off Picasso’s sketchbooks. The exhibit reminds visitors that even the best artists need much practice to become masters. A stunning, complete self-portrait in pencil peeks out of a little book on display. Picasso made the sketch in 1918. He was in his 30s. Back then, he filled the bitty book with scenes from his house, the beach, and his town. He also sketched ideas for upcoming paintings. The self-portrait depicts Picasso’s deep and piercing eyes. It measures little more than three-by-five inches.
Picasso crafted paintings so large he needed a ladder to finish them. But his sketches capture fanciful monsters and clown-like figures in miniature. Others carefully document everyday objects such as guitars using patterns of dots and lines. With each sketchbook open to only one page, the gallery exhibit displayed additional pages in videos.
Young Picasso began to show drawing talent around age 10. He soon eclipsed his drawing-professor father. Pablo had his first art exhibit at age 13. His grandson, Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, was that age when the great artist died. Ruiz-Picasso remembers his grandfather always sketching until he had used “the last piece of paper available.”
A handful of Picasso quotes help viewers understand why some of his early sketches look so different from his unusual later productions. Picasso famously said, “It took me . . . a lifetime to learn to paint like a child.” “Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist,” is also attributed to him. Finally, “Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.”
Picasso helped create Cubism, a painting style showing objects from many angles at once.
Cubist artists came up with some bizarre creations! At first, Cubists broke down objects into basic shapes. Can you draw something made only of cubes, spheres, cylinders, and cones?
Cubism, of course, was just one in a long series of art “isms.” Classicism takes its cues from the straightforward art of ancient Greece and Rome. Romanticism adopts a more imaginative approach. Its artists emphasize emotion in idealized scenes. Artists of Modernism broke with past styles and started experimenting with new ones, including Cubism. Next, Postmodernism questioned the idea that any particular style was best and combined old styles with new ones.
Why? Picasso’s sketchbooks show us that even great artists must practice to hone skills and style.
