Tête de mousquetaire

'In Picasso's oeuvre, man always appears in disguise or playing a role. He is either the painter at work, the musketeer, or the matador and is portrayed with the attributes of his virility such as the long pipe, a saber or a sword. In 1966, a new figure emerges in the iconography of Picasso that eventually comes to dominate the period. It is that of the gentleman of the "Siècle d'Or", half-Spanish, half-Dutch, and dressed in colourful costume, with cap, boots and large feathered cap and collar (...). As Christan Gelhaar points out, the painter in his old age, feeling the gradual diminishing of his vital forces, seems to find a second youth in the gallant attire of these musketeers' (Marie-Laure Bernadac, 'Picasso 1953-1972', in Late Picasso, exh. cat., Paris, 1988, p. 43).

Tête de mousquetaire is one of the most finished and richest interpretations of this theme. The oil is thickly impasted on the paper, whilst the pastel is used to emphasise the baroque grandeur of the musketeer's collar and curls. Yet, in contrast with such an emphatic subject, the palette is sophisticatedly played around the metallic and pearly hues of grey, white, black and different shades of blue. If the archetype of this work is the splendid celebration of 17th century aristocracy through the portraiture of the Spanish and Dutch golden age, Picasso's reappropriation of the subject displays the master's usual biting and provocative tone. The musketeer is not the young gentleman in his full power attire, but an old man. The clin d'oeil is quick and immediate: the elegant apparatus disguises the strong, witty and powerful artist in his late 80s, his eyes fiercely piercing the spectator, his power of seduction still intact and defiant.