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"Glass of Absinthe" (1914) is reproduced from
CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 10/27/2015

Picasso Sculpture

Featured image is one of six bronze casts editioned under the name "Glass of Absinthe," which Pablo Picasso produced at a Paris foundry in 1914. "With 'Glass of Absinthe,' Picasso set himself the seemingly impossible task of representing in sculpture things that are transparent," according to Anne Umland, co-curator and editor of MoMA's current blockbuster, Picasso Sculpture. "These works take as their subject a glass and its liquid contents. The latter is identified as absinthe, a clear liqueur, by the artist's inspired decision to incorporate a real-life metal absinthe spoon into his work of art. The perforations in these found spoons constitute one form of transparency; the diffuse polka-dot patters that Picasso painted on some of the casts supply another; and the cuts he made into his glasses' paradoxically opaque contours, revealing their interior views, represent a third. Here the revolution announced by Picasso's decision to open up the volumes of his 'Guitar' to light and shadow, incorporating a space as a sculptural material, is taken a step further. His 'Glass of Absinthe' sculptures swallow up real objects, transforming them from things of use into elements worthy of contemplation. This operation would remain a constant in Picasso's sculpture practice, the result of his exceptional openness to the sculptural potential of objects in the world."

Picasso Sculpture

Picasso Sculpture

The Museum of Modern Art, New York
Hbk, 9.5 x 12 in. / 320 pgs / 300 color / 200 b&w.





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