The Maids of Honor (Las Meninas, after Velázquez) (Les Ménines, vue d’ensemble, d’après Velázquez)

During the summer of 1957, Picasso turned the third floor of La Californie, his house in Cannes in the South of France, into a studio. It was here the artist worked on a large series of fifty-eight canvases in near isolation, only allowing few visitors to see his work. Forty-four of these canvases were directly inspired by Diego Velázquez’s masterpiece Las Meninas (ca. 1656), which he had first seen as an adolescent at the Prado, often referencing the famous work of while portraying jesters and dwarfs. This horizontal painting, The Maids of Honor, is the first, largest, and most elaborate of the series. Additionally, it is the most faithful and accurate portrayal compared to the vertical composition created by Velázquez. All figures from the old master’s canvas are present: they assume the same roles and similar positions. While investigating the complex spatial organization of the composition, Picasso employs a more dramatic, fragmented, black, gray, and white palette to add structure to the space and the figures within. Additionally, Velázquez himself looms larger in Picasso’s version than in his own, while holding two palettes rather than one. Neither canvas reveals what the artist is painting, conveying a theme of mystery and wonder: most likely what Picasso felt while looking at the artist’s work in the Prado.
SKU: 47346
Creator: Pablo Picasso
Date: 8/17/1957
Original Medium: Oil on canvas
Location: Museo Picasso, Barcelona, Spain
© Succession Picasso 2012