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Lot Essay
This work is sold with a photo-certificate from Claude Picasso.
Miguel Bosé is a Latin Grammy Award-winning musician and actor. Born in Panama to an Italian actress and a Spanish bullfighter, Bosé’s family friends included Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, and Luchino Visconti. He has had a successful singing career spanning over 30 years all over Latin America and Spain.
The works in this important collection of Picasso ceramics were acquired directly from the artist and provide a wonderfully unique glimpse into the personal relationship between Picasso and Miguel Bosé’s family. We would like to thank Miguel Bosé for kindly answering some questions about his remarkable experiences and his memories of Picasso.
Do you have any memories in particular about Picasso and what was your experience of him as a person? Did you visit his home or studio in the South of France and what was your recollection of those visits? Did you see him creating ceramics or other works of art?
I have infinite memories of Picasso. I knew him at the Chateau of Vauvenargues, in La Californie and in Notre Dame de Vie in Mougins. He used to let me and my sister, Lucia, paint in his studio and he´d change our drawings with his. We shared long conversations together, in those moments we understood nothing but of course with time they left their mark upon us. Regarding his ceramics, I was present when he created them. He used to paint them and then bake them in the kiln of his ceramics assistant.
Picasso was a big fan of your father as a bullfighter and this motif is a strong reference in his work. What was their friendship like and what, do you think, drew Picasso to the bullfight?
My father and mother had a very close relationship with Pablo. In some ways for Pablo the bulls were a link with a part of Spanish culture, he was totally fascinated by them. We used to spend our summers in his house in Mougins and during one of those summers together, my father and him, came up with the idea for a book that they created titled “Toros y toreros” with the text written by my father, Luis Miguel Dominguín and the illustrations by Pablo Picasso.
The pieces in this sale were in your family home, how did you display and interact with these works in your life? Do you have any particular recollections of them?
All of them changed constantly between the residence in Madrid and the houses in the countryside. I remember that they were always in the spaces around us. Above my bed I still have a drawing of a bull with four ears that he painted for me when I told him as a child that my father killed bulls with four ears instead of two.
There is a special story attached in particular to the unique plate in this sale, Plat aux oeufs, which Picasso made for you personally.
What was the story behind it and what do you feel it shows about Picasso’s character?
As I didn’t like fried eggs he made for me a breakfast plate with fried eggs and a fork, on top of which he would put real fried eggs and a fork. And so when I had eaten them, the surprise of the painted ones would appear. And he did this constantly with hundreds of objects from dolls to other sleeping companions to portraits in colour and essences of flowers. Everything was magic. Picasso was a normal human being with a normal attitude. With a tendency of normal habits and daily routines as any normal person. I believe that is the great memory that I treasure of him. To me he will always be and remain as Pablo. This is how I remember him.
Your home must have been full of treasures, both artistic and sentimental. What is your relationship with art now and how has your interest in art developed over time? What are your favourite pieces at the moment?
I collect art, what I like and what moves me becomes part of my collection. I have very important things and others that may, with time, become important and others that will never mean anything for the art market. But ultimately all of them excite me and for this reason
they are part of my life.
Miguel Bosé is a Latin Grammy Award-winning musician and actor. Born in Panama to an Italian actress and a Spanish bullfighter, Bosé’s family friends included Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, and Luchino Visconti. He has had a successful singing career spanning over 30 years all over Latin America and Spain.
The works in this important collection of Picasso ceramics were acquired directly from the artist and provide a wonderfully unique glimpse into the personal relationship between Picasso and Miguel Bosé’s family. We would like to thank Miguel Bosé for kindly answering some questions about his remarkable experiences and his memories of Picasso.
Do you have any memories in particular about Picasso and what was your experience of him as a person? Did you visit his home or studio in the South of France and what was your recollection of those visits? Did you see him creating ceramics or other works of art?
I have infinite memories of Picasso. I knew him at the Chateau of Vauvenargues, in La Californie and in Notre Dame de Vie in Mougins. He used to let me and my sister, Lucia, paint in his studio and he´d change our drawings with his. We shared long conversations together, in those moments we understood nothing but of course with time they left their mark upon us. Regarding his ceramics, I was present when he created them. He used to paint them and then bake them in the kiln of his ceramics assistant.
Picasso was a big fan of your father as a bullfighter and this motif is a strong reference in his work. What was their friendship like and what, do you think, drew Picasso to the bullfight?
My father and mother had a very close relationship with Pablo. In some ways for Pablo the bulls were a link with a part of Spanish culture, he was totally fascinated by them. We used to spend our summers in his house in Mougins and during one of those summers together, my father and him, came up with the idea for a book that they created titled “Toros y toreros” with the text written by my father, Luis Miguel Dominguín and the illustrations by Pablo Picasso.
The pieces in this sale were in your family home, how did you display and interact with these works in your life? Do you have any particular recollections of them?
All of them changed constantly between the residence in Madrid and the houses in the countryside. I remember that they were always in the spaces around us. Above my bed I still have a drawing of a bull with four ears that he painted for me when I told him as a child that my father killed bulls with four ears instead of two.
There is a special story attached in particular to the unique plate in this sale, Plat aux oeufs, which Picasso made for you personally.
What was the story behind it and what do you feel it shows about Picasso’s character?
As I didn’t like fried eggs he made for me a breakfast plate with fried eggs and a fork, on top of which he would put real fried eggs and a fork. And so when I had eaten them, the surprise of the painted ones would appear. And he did this constantly with hundreds of objects from dolls to other sleeping companions to portraits in colour and essences of flowers. Everything was magic. Picasso was a normal human being with a normal attitude. With a tendency of normal habits and daily routines as any normal person. I believe that is the great memory that I treasure of him. To me he will always be and remain as Pablo. This is how I remember him.
Your home must have been full of treasures, both artistic and sentimental. What is your relationship with art now and how has your interest in art developed over time? What are your favourite pieces at the moment?
I collect art, what I like and what moves me becomes part of my collection. I have very important things and others that may, with time, become important and others that will never mean anything for the art market. But ultimately all of them excite me and for this reason
they are part of my life.