Mousquetaire et petit personnage

In the last years of Pablo Picasso’s life, the artist turned his eye toward the figure of the musketeer—the dashing, debonair hero who would become the defining subject of his late work. The character first appeared in Picasso’s oeuvre in 1966: while convalescing after a medical procedure, he entertained himself by re-reading classic works of literature, including novels by Honoré de Balzac and Charles Dickens. It was Alexandre Dumas’s Three Musketeers, however, that most enchanted him, and he was drawn into a world of daring exploits and great courage. The spirited quests of Athos, Porthos, Aramis, and D’Artagnan likely appealed to Picasso who had recently become aware of his own mortality, and these characters offered the artist the pictorial opportunity to adventure once again.
Set against an impastoed ground, the frontally-posed musketeer in Mousquetaire et petit personnage stares brazenly outward, confronting the artist and thus the viewer with his steadfast gaze. He wears an extravagant cravat and an elaborate doublet articulated by white stripes and swirls. His hair is a regal purple that curls decadently down his back. To the right stands a smaller figure, the petit personnage referenced in the painting’s title. He, too, is dressed in the chivalric attire of the musketeer and looks with admiration at his counterpart. Despite the fact that both appear seated, there is a sense of Dumas’s swashbuckling world in Mousquetaire et petit personage, underscored by Picasso’s exuberant brushstrokes which seemingly mimic the thrust and parry of a rapier.
Picasso’s painterly enthusiasm conveys his great affection for this merry band of rabblerousers to whom he often ascribed various personalities and temperaments. The musketeers took on many guises, with the artist treating them like autonomous beings. Christian Zervos wrote that “these musketeers, he said to us, are us. They reveal the secret depths of men who, from solitude to solitude, act of courage to act of courage, disappointment to disappointment, know themselves as brothers” (“Pablo Picasso: 1969-1970,” 1970; reprinted in Picasso: Mosqueteros, exh. cat., Gagosian, New York, 2009, p. 293). As he had done throughout his career, Picasso saw his musketeers—who, for centuries, epitomized masculinity, virility, and wit—as visual substitutes for his own self. The musketeer, celebrated for his courage, confidence, and amorous feats, provided an ideal counterpart for Picasso as he faced down the last years of his life.
For one whose career was defined by transformation and innovation, Picasso was conscious of the significance of a “Great Late Phase,” an accolade offered up to only the most worthy of artists (J. Richardson, “Great Late Picasso,” ibid., p. 15). He had, for a time now, begun to visualize his place among the canon of art history, aligning himself with the artists he so admired by reimagining iconic works such as Diego Velázquez’s Las Meninas, whose influence can be seen in the petit personage of the present work: the small figure references Nicolás Pertusato, a court jester who was part of the royal household. “In old age,” John Richardson wrote, “Picasso would admit to being very conscious of old masters breathing down his neck. Far from being bothered by this, he was so secure in his genius that he conjured master after master into the heart of his work and had his way with them” (A Life of Picasso: The Early Years, London, 1992, vol. I, p. 185). More than Velázquez or any of the other titans of art history, it was Rembrandt with whom Picasso entered into the closest dialogue throughout the 1960s. Picasso increasingly identified with the Dutch artist who also had enjoyed a long and successful career, and was always eager to insert himself into his painted worlds. Picasso appreciated Rembrandt’s graphic oeuvre, and Jacqueline Roque, his wife, noted that it was this art that had formally inspired the musketeers.
But even as he associated himself with Rembrandt, Picasso continued to reference a range of artists and movements, showcasing his abilities and making clear that he was not ready to be consigned to the great pantheon of artists past just yet. This dynamic is alluded to in Mousquetaire et petit personage, in which the musketeer is dutifully attended to by the smaller figure. Here, Picasso is the self-proclaimed leader, the master of his domain, but he may also be recalling his many former selves. As Simonetta Fraquelli has argued, the musketeers may represent “many of the possible ages of the artist, ranging from a child genius to an important old man” (“Looking at the Past to Defy the Present: Picasso’s Painting 1946-1973” in Picasso: Challenging the Past, exh. cat., National Gallery, London, 2009, p. 146).
Regarding this need to garner attention, Richardson wondered, “Why did Picasso lock horns with one great painter after another? Was it a trial of strength—arm wrestling? Was it out of admiration or mockery, irony or homage, Oedipal rivalry or Spanish chauvinism? … You identified with someone; you cannibalized them; you assumed their powers. How accurately this described what Picasso was up to in his last years” (“The Catch in the Late Picasso” in The New York Review of Books, 19 July 1984; accessed 15 October 2024). Whether mockery or homage, such artistic appropriation allowed Picasso to connect directly with his predecessors. It was a gesture that emerged out of reverence for the past and for keeping that history alive in the present. As the artist himself noted, “To me there is no past or future in art… The art of the Greeks, of the Egyptians, of the great painters who lived in other times, is not an art of the past; perhaps it is more alive today than it ever was” (quoted in M. Zayas, “Picasso speaks” in A.H. Barr, ed., Picasso: Forty Years of His Art, exh. cat., The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1939, p. 11).