Francis Picabia's Chameleonic Career Surveyed at Hauser & Wirth London

A five-decade survey of Francis Picabia's work, 'Expanding Horizons,' opened in May at Hauser & Wirth in London, featuring 32 works from 1902 to 1951. The exhibition traces Picabia's deliberate stylistic inconsistency—from impressionist landscapes and Fauvist daubs to mechanomorphic drawings, 'Transparencies,' and corny mid-1940s portraits—framing him as a precursor to appropriation art, Pop, Conceptualism, and 'bad' painting. Picabia (1879–1953) is best known for Dada, but the show includes an untitled 1902 landscape copied from postcards, anticipating his critique of originality. Key works include 'Espagnoles' portraits exhibited alongside machine-like images in 1920, and 'Transparencies' that influenced Sigmar Polke, David Salle, and Julian Schnabel. The latest piece is a combative drawing titled 'Dada' (1951). The exhibition omits his Cubist period and late dot abstractions. Picabia's family wealth from a sugar plantation allowed him to mock the market's demand for signature styles. The show runs through 1 August.