Guitare sur une table

Dating from the height of Pablo Picasso’s explorations of the Cubist language, Guitare sur une table of 1912 is a testament to the artist’s prowess as a draughtsman. Executed in clean, confident strokes, its combination of strong, angular planes and soft, curvilinear forms creates a rich interplay of balance and rhythm across the sheet.
Closely related to an oil, sand and charcoal on canvas of the same title (Zervos, vol. 2b, no. 373; Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College), the present lot employs a minimalist treatment of the subject, where the quotidian still-life elements are reduced to their most basic forms. The titular guitar is elegantly rendered in a series of interlocking and dissected planes, while the table is merely suggested as a discreet, anchoring outline. Employing a deliberately monochrome palette, devoid of collage, text, or colour, the composition succeeds in capturing the very essence of these objects, translating them into a simplified, nearly abstract vernacular. With just charcoal and the white expanse of the paper, the suggestion of strings and ingenious use of positive and negative space is as successful here as in the more literal cardboard, string and wire Guitar construction of the same period, now in the collection of The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
The quality of the present lot is demonstrated by its illustrious provenance: acquired by fabled avant-garde collectors Leo and Gertrude Stein, Guitare sur une table can be seen boldly hung in pride of place in the Stein’s Paris studio in a photograph taken by Man Ray in 1922. The work subsequently formed part of a series of distinguished private American collections, including that of Nelson A. Rockefeller and, more recently, that of Stanley J. Seeger. In fact, closely following Gertrude’s pioneering footsteps, Rockefeller not only owned the present lot, but also, as she did, the corresponding work now in the Hood Museum of Art – immortalised as Picasso’s first painting to incorporate sand.
Alongside its prestigious provenance, the present lot boasts distinguished exhibition history. Guitare sur une table was first exhibited at The Museum of Modern Art in New York in the landmark 1970 show Four Americans in Paris: The Collections of Gertrude Stein and Her Family. More recently, it was included in the critically acclaimed The Steins Collect show jointly held in collaboration with The Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, the Grand Palais, Paris and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.