Seated female nude 1910

This is Picasso’s Seated Female Nude, painted with oil on canvas, and hanging here at the Tate Modern. Look at how Picasso’s broken the figure down into these angular shards! He’s pushing and pulling at our perception, making us work to piece together what we’re seeing. The muted palette of greens, browns, and soft pinks adds to the sense of a world fractured and rebuilt. The way he’s layered the paint, thin in some areas and thicker in others, gives the piece a real sense of depth and texture. There’s a particular triangular shape right in the centre of the composition. Is it part of her breast, or just an abstract form? I love how Picasso leaves that open to interpretation. This piece reminds me of Cezanne, how he also tried to capture the underlying structure of things. But where Cezanne felt grounded, Picasso is all about movement and change, a constant conversation with form and perception. It’s a reminder that art isn’t about answers, but about asking better questions.