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PICASSO'S PORTRAITS OF INÉS In the whirlwind of Picasso's ever-changing sentimental landscape, only one woman was capable of staying by his side, loyally respected and loved, for more than fifty years: Inès Sassier. In January 1937, Picasso welcomed Dora Maar into his Parisian apartment in the rue de la Boétie. Following the sudden (and short-lived) departure of Jaime Sabartès, his secretary and factotum, the artist urged Dora to employ the two sisters from Mougins, whom the couple had met the previous summer, when their affair had blossomed passionately on the Côte d'Azur. Inès, née Odorisi, was the youngest of the two sisters of Italian descent who left the South of France for the capital. She was sixteen years old when she joined the turbulent Picasso household as a chambermaid, thus becoming a permanent and fundamental presence in the master's world: his muse and confidante, a point of stability for the family, cherished by the children, accepted by the women, always following Picasso to his new homes and ateliers, from Paris to Provence, from la Gauloise to La Californie. To this day, the artist's children have the fondest memories of her: Maya Widmaier-Picasso, the artist's daughter with Marie-Thérèse Walter, remembers: 'Mon père, comme pour son ami Sabartès, avait une confiance illimité pour Inès. Elle est un merveilleux souvenir de jeunesse pour moi. Elle était un véritable rayon de soleil pour nous, toujours de bonne humeur, toujours gracieuse' [My father had unlimited trust in Inès, like he has in his friend Sabartès. She is for me a wonderful memory from my youth. She was a true ray of light for us, always happy, always gracious' (Maya's comment on the reverse of the photo-certificate for the present work)]. At the beginning of the war, Inès moved back to Mougins and married a young man named Gustave Sassier, with whom she had a child, Gérard. In 1942, the couple returned to Paris, and they moved into a small apartment below Picasso's at the rue des Grands-Augustins. From then on, she never left the artist, staying through the stormy end of his affair with Dora, the intense years with Françoise Gilot, and the reign of his last queen, Jacqueline Roque. Inès' small apartment became a shrine to Picasso's art, full of the etchings, gouaches and portraits of her painted as birthday gifts, testimonies to one of the few longlasting relationships in his life.

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

Inès assise

Details

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)
Inès assise
signed, dedicated and dated 'Pour Inès Picasso Le Vallauris le 23 juillet 1954' (upper right)
pencil on paper
12 5/8 x 9 3/8in. (32 x 23.9cm.)
Drawn on 23 July 1954 in Vallauris

Provenance

A gift from the artist to Inès Sassier, Vallauris, 20 June 1954.
Heinz Berggruen & Cie., Paris, by 1973.
Private Collection, Japan.

Special notice

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price plus buyer's premium.

Sale room notice

Please note that this work is recorded in the Wildenstein Institute Archives as no. '99.06.15 6421'.

Lot Essay

This work is sold with a photo-certificate from Maya Widmaier-Picasso dated Paris le 30 mars 2002.

This outstading portrait was executed in Vallauris, at La Gauloise, in July 1954. Maya Widmayer Picasso recognised the exact corner of the villa chosen by her father for his homage to Inès': the artist asked her to pose against the inlaid Moorish chest of drawers traditionally cherished by his children as a backdrop for the family's Christmas tree.
Here, Inès is caught in the summer light, dressed à la Tropézienne, sitting in the same casual, intimate pose as Jacqueline (fig. 1), the artist' wife, portrayed by Picasso a few months later.

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