Modele et Grande Tete Sculptee, I - from La Suite Vollard

Pablo Picasso

The Vollard Suite was a turning point in several ways for Pablo Picasso: his professional relationship with the art dealer Ambroise Vollard, which began when the artist was nineteen and had been a successful pairing for nearly a decade, largely ended in 1910 when Picasso made it clear that he was going to continue with his exploration of Cubism, which Vollard disliked. However, by 1930, the star of Picasso's career was ever-brightening, and Vollard, who had been a champion for Picasso's printmaking from the start, approached him with a proposal for a suite of etchings based on neo-classical themes. From 1930 to 1937, the suite became Picasso's outlet of imagination steeped in Greek mythology as the world turned upside down.

These seven years were among the most turbulent times for artists who went against the status quo as Nazi Germany gained power. Meanwhile, Picasso's marriage to ballerina Olga Khokhlova was disintegrating as his fame rose, and by 1931 he had been pursuing the teenager Marie-Therese Walter, nearly three decades his junior, for some time. In 1935, the same year that Walter became pregnant, Picasso began yet another affair with French artist Dora Maar. Finally, in 1936, the Spanish Civil War would alter Picasso's view of the world, of politics, and of himself, and would inspire some of his most powerful work, including "Guernica". Through all of this he worked on the copper plates given to him by Vollard, with each of these events appearing in some form in the suite's imagery. In 1937, he finally completed the plates and turned them over to Master Printer Roger Lacourier in Paris.

Unfortunately, Vollard died in a car crash in 1939, with no written plans outlining his intention for the suite (it is thought they were meant to accompany two poems written by Andre Saures in a folio or book).

The suite features five major themes, loosely known as The Battle of Love, Rembrandt, The Minotaur, Blind Minotaur, and The Sculptor's Studio, in addition to three portraits of Vollard -- a built-in requirement the dealer demanded from every major artist he worked with. The suite shows the evolution of Picasso's printmaking prowess under Lacourier's guide, from simple, if elegant, line etchings that Picasso completed in one state to more complex compositions using sugar-lift and drypoint, some of which could take up to fourteen states to complete.

"Modele et Grande Tete Sculpteur I" is a part of the theme of the Sculptor's Studio, depicting his lover Marie-Therese as a nude model standing beside a large sculpture of a male head, a symbol of the artist himself. The sculpture appears to covertly eye the model who stares definatly back with her arms crossed. The images from the Sculptor's Studio theme are sometimes considered the most humorous of the suite, with the relationship between the artist and muse still relatively new.