Picasso as Foreigner: Two Exhibitions in Milan and Mantua Reveal Untold Story
Annie Cohen-Solal, the curator, offers a fresh insight into Pablo Picasso with two simultaneous exhibitions in Italy, located at Palazzo Reale in Milan and Palazzo Te in Mantua. These exhibitions, featuring 130 artworks and documents, are a collaboration with the Musée national Picasso-Paris, the Musée National de l’Histoire de l’Immigration, and Picasso's family. The Milan showcase emphasizes Picasso's status as an immigrant and includes "Les Saltimbanques" (1905), while the Mantua exhibit centers on his interpretations of Ovid's "Metamorphoses." Notably, Picasso was denied French citizenship in 1940 and declined the Legion of Honor in the 1960s. Cohen-Solal's biography, "Picasso. Una vita da straniero" (Marsilio, 2024), complements the exhibitions, which will continue until 2025.
Key facts
- Two exhibitions on Picasso as a foreigner open at Palazzo Reale in Milan and Palazzo Te in Mantua.
- Curator Annie Cohen-Solal presents new research from archives including 4,000 letters from Picasso's mother.
- Picasso was denied French citizenship in 1940 despite support from influential politicians.
- He never became French and refused the Legion of Honor offered by André Malraux in the 1960s.
- The Milan exhibition features 'Les Saltimbanques' (1905) and documents Picasso's immigrant status.
- The Mantua exhibition focuses on Picasso's poetry and his 1931 illustrations for Ovid's 'Metamorphoses'.
- Cubism was attacked by French nationalists as 'Kubismus' and 800 Cubist works were seized and auctioned as war booty between 1921 and 1923.
- Alfred Barr acquired 'Les Demoiselles d'Avignon' for MoMA in 1939 after the Louvre rejected it.
- Picasso became a poet in 1935 during a personal and political crisis.
- Cohen-Solal's biography 'Picasso. Una vita da straniero' is published by Marsilio in 2024.
Entities
Artists
- Pablo Picasso
- Annie Cohen-Solal
- Jacques Derrida
- Jean-Paul Sartre
- Diego Velázquez
- Rainer Maria Rilke
- Guillaume Apollinaire
- Giulio Romano
- Ovid
- Henri Matisse
- Gertrude Stein
- André Breton
- Jacques Doucet
- Albert Skira
- Erving Goffman
- André Malraux
- Georges Salles
- Daniel-Henri Kahnweiler
- Sergei Diaghilev
- Leo Castelli
- Alfred Barr
- Pep Fondevila
- Claude Picasso
- Paloma Picasso
- Felipe IV
- Jean-Jacques Neuer
Institutions
- Palazzo Reale di Milano
- Palazzo Te
- Musée national Picasso-Paris
- Musée National de l’Histoire de l’Immigration
- École normale supérieure de Paris
- MoMA
- Louvre
- Bocconi University
- Marsilio
- Artribune
Locations
- Milan
- Italy
- Mantua
- Paris
- France
- Algeria
- Cortona
- Gósol
- Spain
- Pyrenees
- Mougins
- Washington
- United States
- Russia
- Germany