Les déjeuners 1961

Picasso made this picture using crayon and gouache. It is all about colours and shapes, applied with what seems like haste, but I bet was not! I can imagine him shuffling around in his studio, maybe in his slippers, trying to figure out how to capture a feeling, a mood, using just a few lines and colours. I feel his mind working. I see the blue marks that define a seated figure, and they remind me of Matisse, who he knew well of course. The green, the yellow, the black, the brown, they’re all so vibrant. The green figure on the right is especially striking. What is he saying? Or listening to? And those hands, how strange and wonderful they are. A shorthand for a feeling. And I can see how a painting like this could influence so many other artists, it has influenced me for sure. It is all an ongoing conversation.