Three Musicians
'Three Musicians' is an oil on canvas painting with a size of 201 x 223 centimeters. Picasso painted it during the summer at Fontainebleau, France, in 1921 along with the other 'Three Musicians' painting (Boggs, 1980). It is now situated at the Museum of Modern Art, New York City.
This painting was painted in Synthetic Cubism style. The technique used to form the flat geometric shapes is cut-and-paste collage ("Review: Three Musicians," 2011), which is common in Synthetic Cubism style and Picasso used to apply this technique in his previous works. He chose a great combination of color and made a use from primary color: red, yellow, and blue, to create a focal point for the viewers. These bright colors together with other tone help comfort the mood.
The painting contains three musicians playing different musical instruments. There are the man on a white suit playing clarinet, the man with a diamond pattern costume playing guitar, and the man with black outfit singing while holding music sheet. Pierrot, Harlequin, and the monk are the identities of these men; respectively (from left to right). We can see that the figures are overlapping and it built the sensations of both continuity, of all three musicians; and discontinuity, within each character. Moreover, secretly under the table, the figure of a dog is present with its shadow casting on a background. All the figures seem to be contained in a box-like room or a small stage in the café.
The characters of the three musicians are believed to be Picasso and his friends. As in many of his paintings, he depicted himself as a harlequin. The other two figures are likely to be Guillaume Apollinaire and Max Jacob, who had been close poet friends of Picasso throughout 1910s (Internet Archive, n.d.).
It was said that this painting is "a farewell piece to Synthetic Cubism" (Internet Archive, n.d.). The meaning of the piece remains abstract. But there was an opinion from Gertrude Stein that it was meant to be a still life. People interpreted the meaning of the lacking sequence of the music sheet as the portrayal of the instability of the rhythms of music they are playing.
This painting was painted in Synthetic Cubism style. The technique used to form the flat geometric shapes is cut-and-paste collage ("Review: Three Musicians," 2011), which is common in Synthetic Cubism style and Picasso used to apply this technique in his previous works. He chose a great combination of color and made a use from primary color: red, yellow, and blue, to create a focal point for the viewers. These bright colors together with other tone help comfort the mood.
The painting contains three musicians playing different musical instruments. There are the man on a white suit playing clarinet, the man with a diamond pattern costume playing guitar, and the man with black outfit singing while holding music sheet. Pierrot, Harlequin, and the monk are the identities of these men; respectively (from left to right). We can see that the figures are overlapping and it built the sensations of both continuity, of all three musicians; and discontinuity, within each character. Moreover, secretly under the table, the figure of a dog is present with its shadow casting on a background. All the figures seem to be contained in a box-like room or a small stage in the café.
The characters of the three musicians are believed to be Picasso and his friends. As in many of his paintings, he depicted himself as a harlequin. The other two figures are likely to be Guillaume Apollinaire and Max Jacob, who had been close poet friends of Picasso throughout 1910s (Internet Archive, n.d.).
It was said that this painting is "a farewell piece to Synthetic Cubism" (Internet Archive, n.d.). The meaning of the piece remains abstract. But there was an opinion from Gertrude Stein that it was meant to be a still life. People interpreted the meaning of the lacking sequence of the music sheet as the portrayal of the instability of the rhythms of music they are playing.