L’enfant à l’orange

オレンジを持つ子ども

Year: 1951
Inscription: Dated “9.1.51.” on the reverse
Medium: Enamel on plywood
Dimensions: 108 × 89 cm

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Other views

Pablo Picasso《L’enfant à l’orange》1951 Enamel on plywood 108 × 89 cm　Framed — Framed

Pablo Picasso《L’enfant à l’orange》1951 Enamel on plywood 108 × 89 cm　Installation view — Installation view

Provenance

Claude Picasso, Paris
Galerie Gmurzynska, Zug, Switzerland
Private Collection (acquired from the above in 2006)

Exhibited

Rome, Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, Mostra di Pablo Picasso, May–July 1953, no. 113 (illustrated)
Milan, Palazzo Reale, Pablo Picasso, September–November 1953, no. 154 (illustrated)
Paris, Grand Palais, Hommage à Pablo Picasso, November 1966–February 1967, no. 221 (illustrated)
Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, Picasso, March–April 1967, no. 108 (illustrated in color on the cover)
New York, Museum of Modern Art, Picasso and Portraiture: Representation and Transformation, April–September 1996, p. 432 (illustrated in color; titled Paloma with an Orange); traveled to Paris, Grand Palais, October 1996–January 1997
Barcelona, Museu Picasso, Picasso: From Caricature to Metamorphosis of Style, February–May 2003, no. 207, pp. 198–199 (illustrated in color)

Literature

Aragon, Picasso: Deux périodes, 1900–1914 & 1950–1954, Paris: Maison de la pensée française, 1954, no. 28 (illustrated)
P. Daix, Picasso, New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1965, p. 201 (illustrated)
J. Leymarie, Picasso: The Artist of the Century, New York: Viking Press, 1972, p. 267 (illustrated)
P. Descargues, Picasso, New York: Felicie, 1974, p. 104 (illustrated in color)
C. Zervos, Pablo Picasso: Works from 1946 to 1953, vol. XV, Paris: Cahiers d’Art, 2013, no. 175, p. 104 (illustrated), p. 166

About This Work

A portrait of his youngest daughter, Paloma

Picasso painted Paloma, born in 1949, when she was about two and a half. The roundness of her cheeks echoes the orange she holds out to the viewer and the wheel-like forms of the background. Placing the figure at the very front of the picture plane gives the painting an immediacy suited to a toddler.

Entering the world of the child

In the early 1950s Picasso moved away from his more distant depictions of children and let their games and shifting emotions inform his art. The quick-fire marks that fill the background recall the unguarded drawing of small children, embodying his remark that it had taken him many years to learn to draw like a child.

Shown at major exhibitions

The painting was exhibited at the 1953 retrospectives in Rome and Milan, Hommage à Pablo Picasso at the Grand Palais, Paris, in 1966–67, the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, in 1967 (reproduced on the catalogue cover), and Picasso and Portraiture at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1996. Formerly in the collection of the artist’s son, Claude Picasso.