Conservators at the Guggenheim Museum in New York discovered a small dog hidden beneath the surface of a Pablo Picasso painting, informs CNN.
A hidden dog was discovered in an early masterpiece by Pablo Picasso more than a century after the painting was painted. The animal was hidden under a thin layer of dark paint in a work called Le Moulin de la Galette, which was completed in 1900. This was when the Spanish artist was only 19 years old.
The image of a charming dog with a red bow was revealed by museum experts during a technical analysis of the Spanish artist’s painting “Le Moulin de la Galette” ahead of an exhibition of his early works.
Museum reveals small dog hidden in early Picasso painting
Photo: PICASSO/GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM
The painting is on display at the Guggenheim Museum in New York as part of the “Young Picasso in Paris” exhibition. On display are 10 paintings and drawings that Picasso created after his arrival in Paris in 1900. One of these works is “Le Moulin de la Galette”, which depicts a lively scene in a famous Parisian ballroom, which was also painted by other artists, including Pierre-Auguste Renoir. The painting depicts many dancing couples with delicate hats, quickly painted with a brush, and three figures seated at a table in the foreground.
It was rediscovered because modern imaging technology allowed experts to see the original outline that lay beneath.
Julie Barten, chief conservator of paintings at the museum, said: “If you look closely (at the painting), you can see that there is this lingering dog spirit.
“In some areas, the red color shows through, and if you look really closely, you can see eyes and ears.
Conservators were able to create an image of what the dog originally looked like using X-ray fluorescence, an imaging technique that maps the chemical elements in a painting, including pigments, according to the Guggenheim’s senior conservator of paintings, Julie Barten.
“You can see that when he was hiding it, he actually left the outline of the head still visible.
Barten said she always had a strong feeling that something was hidden beneath the painting.
“We know that in many cases Picasso painted aspects of a composition and then erased them and transformed them into other compositional elements.
“It was really part of his practice,” she added.
Roberta Smith, chief art critic at The New York Times, described the exhibition as a look at “Picasso before he was Picasso”.
“Completeness and comprehensiveness – an amazing growth spurt – Le Moulin de la Galette cannot be underestimated. It is one of the first paintings that Picasso completed in Paris – the masterpiece of that initial two-month transformative immersion,” the critic added.
Megan Fontanella, the Guggenheim’s curator of modern art, said: “It completely changes the way one would encounter this painting.
“You would see this really adorable dog in the foreground looking almost directly at the visitor with this beautiful red bow.”
She said she was open to speculation as to why Picasso covered up the dog, but suggested it may have been because it would draw the viewer’s eye away from the main subject of the painting.
Source: eurozpravy.cz
