After experimenting with a variety of styles in the year following his arrival in Paris, Picasso developed a style properly his own in autumn 1901. He painted six canvases, all about the same size, with either a single figure or a couple seated at a café table, that together constitute one of the greatest achievements the twenty-year-old artist had yet accomplished. The paintings derive from the 1870s café scenes of Degas and Manet, as reworked by Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Lautrec in the 1880s and 1890s. For this one, Picasso borrowed the flowery wallpaper from the background of Van Gogh's La Berceuse (1889, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1996.435), which he would have seen at the Galerie Vollard.
Picasso revised the painting a great deal before settling on the final arrangement: he first depicted Harlequin without ruffs at the neck or cuffs; a large glass stood on the table where the match striker now appears; Harlequin's bicorne hat originally rested behind his right hand; and the floral wallpaper was more extensive and not hidden by the high banquette.
By 1901 Harlequin was a ubiquitous figure in popular culture. He usually carried a baton, or slapstick, and wore a black mask. However, Picasso gave his Harlequin a white face and ruffs: the attributes of Pierrot, the melancholy, cuckolded clown who inevitably loses his love, Columbine, to the nimble and lusty Harlequin. Many writers have suggested that the pensive mood of this picture and the series to which it belongs were the result of Picasso's brooding on the suicide of his friend Carles Casagemas, who, like Pierrot, was unrequited in love.
Inscription: Signed and dated (in red paint, lower left): Picasso/ 1901
[possibly William Uhde, Paris, until ca. 1906; sold to Suermondt]; Edwin Suermondt, Aachen (by 1906–1912 or 1913); [Der Neue Kunstsalon (Max Dietzel), Munich, by 1913; consigned in 1913 and sold by 1916 to Thannhauser]; [Heinrich Thannhauser, Munich, by 1916–at least 1918, and probably until 1922, stock no. 5041; sold to Rosenberg]; [Paul Rosenberg, 1922; sold in May 1922 for Fr 18,000 ($1,700) to Quinn]; John Quinn, New York (1922–d. 1924); his sister, Julia Quinn Anderson, New York (1924–30 or slightly later); her daughter, Mary Anderson, New York (until 1936; sold in May 1936, together with Seurat's "Les Poseuses," through Mrs. Cornelius J. Sullivan, to McIlhenny); Henry P. McIlhenny, Philadelphia (1936; in November 1936 to Wintersteen); his sister, Mrs. John (Bernice) Wintersteen, Villanova, Pennsylvania (1936; sold in December 1936, through Cesar M. de Hauke of Jacques Seligmann & Co., to Clifford); Mr. and Mrs. Henry Clifford, Radnor, Pennsylvania (1936–60; sold in July 1960, through M. Knoedler & Co., to MMA)
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Munich. Moderne Galerie Heinrich Thannhauser. "Ausstellung Pablo Picasso," February 1913, no. 6.
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Brooklyn Museum. "Special Loan Exhibition of Paintings by Modern French and American Artists," June 12–October 14, 1926, no catalogue.
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Cambridge. Harvard University. "Harvard Tercentenary Exhibition," June 5–October 7, 1936, no catalogue.
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Philadelphia Museum of Art. "Picasso: A Loan Exhibition of His Paintings, Drawings, Sculpture, Ceramics, Prints and Illustrated Books," January 8–February 23, 1958, no. 10.
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Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art. "Picasso and the School of Paris: Paintings from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York," September 14–November 24, 2002, no. 5.
Tokyo. Bunkamura Museum of Art. "Picasso and the School of Paris: Paintings from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York," December 7, 2002–March 9, 2003, no. 5.
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London. Courtauld Gallery. "Becoming Picasso: Paris 1901," February 14–May 27, 2013, no. 14.
Musée d'Orsay, Paris. "Picasso: Bleu et rose," September 18, 2018–January 6, 2019, unnumbered cat. (p. 61).
Basel. Fondation Beyeler. "The Young Picasso: Blue and Rose Periods," February 3–May 26, 2019, extended to June 16, 2019, unnumbered cat.
New York. Gagosian. "A Foreigner Called Picasso," November 10, 2023–February 10, 2024, unnumbered cat. (p. 51).
Hans Hildebrandt. "Die Frühbilder Picassos." Kunst und Künstler II (1913), p. 378.
[Maximilian] K. Rohe. "Pablo Picasso." Die Kunst für Alle 28 (1913), p. 377, ill.
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Waldemar George. Pablo Picasso. Rome, 1924, pl. VIII.
Carl Einstein. Die Kunst des 20 Jahrhunderts. Vol. 16, Berlin, 1926, pp. 70, 265, 561, ill.
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Christian Zervos. "Picasso: Oeuvres inédites anciennes." Cahiers d'Art 3, no. 5-6 (1928), p. 224, ill.
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Frederick A. Sweet. "Picasso: Forty Years of His Art." Bulletin of the Art Institute of Chicago 34 (February 1940), p. 22, ill.
"Picasso en Mexico." Nosotros 1 (August 5, 1944), p. 60 (installation photo).
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Alfred H. Barr Jr. Picasso: Fifty Years of His Art. New York, 1946, pp. 19, 21, ill.
Alexandre Cirici-Pellicer. Picasso antes de Picasso. Barcelona, 1946, p. 107, pl. 76.
Joan Merli. Picasso, el artista y la obra de nuestro tiempo. 2nd ed. (1st ed.,1942). Buenos Aires, 1948, p. 598, pl. 64.
William S. Lieberman. Pablo Picasso: Blue and Rose Periods. New York, 1954, pl. 13.
Walter Hess. "Picasso und die anderen." Das Kunstwerk 9, no. 3 (1955–56), p. 11, fig. 5.
Frank Elgar and Robert Maillard. Picasso: A Study of His Work. New York, 1956, pp. 17, 271, ill.
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Raymond Cogniat. Picasso: Figures. Lausanne, 1959, pp. 9, 16, 52, ill.
Anthony Blunt and Phoebe Pool. Picasso, the Formative Years: A Study of His Sources. London, 1962, pp. 13, 18.
Charles Sterling and Margaretta M. Salinger. French Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 3, XIX–XX Centuries. New York, 1967, pp. 228–29, ill.
Pierre Daix and Georges Boudaille. Picasso: The Blue and Rose Periods: A Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, 1900–1906. Greenwich, Conn., 1967, pp. 48–50, 200, no. VI.22, ill.
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Theodore Reff. "Harlequins, Saltimbanques, Clowns, and Fools." Artforum 10 (October 1971), pp. 31–32, fig. 2.
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Donald E. Gordon. Modern Art Exhibitions, 1900–1916: Selected Catalogue Documentation. Vol. 2, Munich, 1974, pp. 593 (Cologne 1912, no. 209), 663 (Munich 1913, no. 6).
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Carter Ratcliff. "Picasso's 'Harlequin': Remarks on the Modern's 'Harlequin'." Arts Magazine 51 (January 1977), p. 124.
Judith Zilczer. "The Noble Buyer:" John Quinn, Patron of the Avant-Garde. Exh. cat., Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution. Washington, 1978, p. 176.
Ronald Christ. "Picasso's Hands: The Mutability of Human Form." ArtsCanada no. 236–37 (September–October 1980), pp. 20–21, ill.
E. A. Carmean Jr. Picasso: The Saltimbanques. Exh. cat., National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. Washington, D.C., 1980, pp. 26–27, 86, 93, no. 19, fig. 14.
Josep Palau i Fabre. Picasso: The Early Years, 1881–1907. New York, 1981, pp. 267, 536, no. 670, ill.
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Gary Tinterow et al. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 8, Modern Europe. New York, 1987, pp. 112–13, colorpl. 88.
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Anatoli Podoksik. Picasso: La Quête perpétuelle. Paris, 1989, p. 148, ill.
Pablo Picasso, "Au Lapin Agile," The Property of Mrs. Vincent de Roulet. November 15, 1989, no. 31.
John Richardson with the collaboration of Marilyn McCully. A Life of Picasso. Vol. 1, 1881–1906. New York, 1991, pp. 215, 217, ill.
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Thomas Kellein. Pierrot: Melancholie und Maske. Exh. cat., Haus der Kunst München. Munich, 1995, pp. 70–72, fig. 54.
John Richardson with the collaboration of Marilyn McCully. A Life of Picasso. Vol. 2, 1907–1917. New York, 1996, p. 469 n. 72.
Ferit Edgu. "EL." P: sanat, kültür, antika 2 (1996), p. 33, ill. (detail).
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Impressionist and Modern Art: Evening Sale. Christie's, New York
. November 3, 2004, under no. 9.
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Michael FitzGerald. Picasso and American Art. Exh. cat., Whitney Museum of American Art. New York, 2006, pp. 113, 116, fig. 52.
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et al. The Mirror and the Mask: Portraiture in the Age of Picasso. Exh. cat., Kimbell Art Museum. Fort Worth, Texas, 2007, pp. 164–65, ill.
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Gary Tinterow inPicasso in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Gary Tinterow and Susan Alyson Stein. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2010, pp. 3, 8, 45–48, no. 17, ill. (color).
Holland Cotter. "All the Picassos in the Cupboard." New York Times (April 29, 2010), p. C25, ill. p. C23 (installation photo, Exh. New York 2010).
Shawn Digney-Peer inPicasso in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Gary Tinterow and Susan Alyson Stein. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2010, p. 49, figs. 17.3 (Infrared reflectogram), 17.4 (X-radiograph).
Eduard Vallès inYo Picasso. Self-Portraits. Exh. cat., Museu Picasso. Barcelona, 2013, p. 84.
Kathryn Calley Galitz. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Masterpiece Paintings. New York, 2016, p. 518, ill. (color), colorpl. 420.
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Actor Telly Leung, known for his work on Glee and star of the upcoming Broadway production of Allegiance, takes visitors on a tour of his favorite works of art in the Museum as he gains inspiration for his performance at the Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month Celebration on May 22.
Pablo Picasso (Spanish, Malaga 1881–1973 Mougins, France)
1921
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