Impressionist & Modern Art

Paris​during​the​war,​and​continued​to​work​in​his​studio​at​7, rue​des​Grands-Augustins.​By​this​point​in​his​career,​Picasso was​a​celebrity​and​financially​secure.​As​he​did​not​have​to worry​about​selling​his​work,​the​paintings​from​this​period remained​in​his​studio​(fig.​2),​only​to​be​exhibited​after​the war.​rather​than​a​vehicle​for​documenting​the​destructive reality​that​surrounded​him,​painting​was​for​him​a​world​of creativity​into​which​he​could​escape.​While​some​of​his contemporaries​ criticised​ Picasso​ for​ the​ lack​ of​ open political​engagement​in​his​art,​others,​such​as​Alfred​Barr, deemed​his​activity​heroic.​Barr​wrote:​'He​was​not​allowed to​exhibit​publicly​and​he​made​no​overt​gestures​but​his very​existence​in​Paris​encouraged​the​resistance​artists, poets​and​intellectuals​who​gathered​in​his​studio​or​about his​café​table'​(A.​Barr,​quoted​in​Picasso and the War Years:

1937-1945​​ (exhibition​catalogue),​California​Palace​of​the Legion​of​Honor,​San​Francisco​&​Solomon​r.​Guggenheim Museum,​New​york,​1998-99,​p.​118).​​ ​ rances​Morris​analysed​the​symbolism​of​Picasso's​still-lifes F of​the​early​1940s:​'above​all​it​was​the​still-life​genre​that Picasso​developed​into​a​tool​capable​of​evoking​the​most complex​blend​of​pathos​and​defiance,​of​despair​to​hope, balancing​personal​and​universal​experience​in​an​expression of​extraordinary​emotional​power.​The​hardship​of​daily​life, the​fragility​of​human​existence​and​the​threat​of​death​are themes​that​haunt​Picasso's​still-life​paintings​of​the​war​and Liberation​ periods'​ (F.​ Morris,​ Paris Post War, Art and Existentialism 1945-1955​​(exhibition​catalogue),​Tate​Gallery, London,​1993,​p.​155).​