Head of a woman, 1939
Pablo Picasso
Oil on canvas
I’m not sure if this is a portrait of Dora Maar, the Yugoslav woman who was Picasso’s lover for nine years; or his second wife, Jacqueline, who was his muse for the last nineteen years of his life. As in many of his heads, Picasso presents what seems like a monolithic rendition of his subject that looks like an Easter Island head carved out of stone and poised to cast a spell on the viewer. Her head is precariously perched on a landscape of geometric shapes that emphasize simultaneous viewpoints.
We see her face from different angles, but by dividing the portrait into large irregular, curved shapes that fit together like puzzle pieces, he creates a schizophrenic likeness of his subject. There is more to her than meets the eye!
Pablo Matisse 