{"id":3608,"date":"2017-11-17T14:42:00","date_gmt":"2017-11-17T14:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/courses.suzannechurchill.com\/eng394-f17\/?p=3608"},"modified":"2017-11-17T14:42:00","modified_gmt":"2017-11-17T14:42:00","slug":"francis-picabia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/courses.suzannechurchill.com\/eng394-f17\/2017\/11\/17\/francis-picabia\/","title":{"rendered":"Francis Picabia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Francis Picabia [1879- 1953] was an eclectic Avant-Garde artist. The French-born painter was most famous for his work in Cubism and Dadaism but his creations were not restricted to just those movements (Camfield 21). Some of his most famous paintings and sketches included La Source<\/em>, Udnie, <\/em>and La Saint Vierge (The Blessed Virgin).<\/em><\/p>\n

Picabia was born in Paris on January 22nd, 1879 to Cuban-born Spaniard Francisco Vicente Martinez Picabia and French native Marie Cecile Davanne (Camfield 1). His art career truly began in 1897 when he studied at the \u00c9cole des Arts Decoratifs, where other famous artists such as Vincent van Gogh\u00a0and\u00a0Henri Toulouse-Lautrec also studied (\u201cFrancis Picabia Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works\u201d).<\/p>\n

Picabia married writer, Gabrielle Buffet, in 1909 (Camfield 3). Shortly after his marriage, beginning with his honeymoon visit to Spain, Picabia faced an artistic identity crisis that steered him towards the avant-garde (Camfield 17).<\/p>\n

Although impressionism and landscape paintings, in particular, were what originally earned him his fame, cubism and abstract art were both dominant parts of Picabia\u2019s early artistic forthcoming. In 1911, he became affiliated with the Cubist group \u201cPuteaux\u201d, which is where he met lifelong friend, Duchamp (Rosenthal 269).) After Puteaux, the two were both involved in the organization known as the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Normande de Peinture Moderne in the fall of 1911, and were a part of the Armory show as well (Camfield 21).[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

Not only did Picabia and Duchamp become close friends, but the two helped to found Dada art and the Dadaist movement itself (Hopkins 15). La Saint Vierge<\/em> is often seen as the groundbreaking piece of art that really started Dadaism or helped to bring the movement to the public eye (Hopkins 15). Towards the second half of his time within the Dada movement, in 1915 (in the wake of the American Industrial Revolution), Picabia became fascinated with mechanics and machinery. He loved to draw parallels between the human body and its representation and technology.<\/p>\n

Picabia, despite not truly being a household name, was the \u201cleading spokesperson for the avant-garde movement on American soil\u201d (Umland).\u00a0 But beyond New York City, with Dada, in particular, Picabia really made a significant impact with not only spreading it to Zurich, Barcelona, and Paris but also by being one of the first artists to really test the limits and define what Dadaism was.<\/p>\n

During World War I Picabia sought refuge in Barcelona, Spain, generating yet another chapter in his art career. Picabia became inspired by \u201cSpanish subjects, Romanesque and Renaissance sources\u201d (\u201cFrancis Picabia Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works\u201d), which eventually translated into his works in the 1920s referred to as The Transparencies<\/em>. The Transparencies<\/em> were a collection of works \u201cin which outlines of figurative images from ancient Catalan and renaissance art are overlaid with animal, floral and cosmological references\u201d (Francis 243).<\/p>\n

Picabia\u2019s art career, which lasted around 50 years, was \u201cmarked by a consistent inconsistency\u201d (Dup\u00eacher). Because he often struggled with his own identity and beliefs, it showed in his art, which is why we see him dabble in so many different art forms through various passages of his life. Picabia died in 1953, in the same home he was born in Paris (\u201cFrancis Picabia: Biography\u201d).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Bio Template: <\/u><\/strong>\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n