From: Cervantes: Bulletin of the Cervantes Society of America
12.1 (1992): 105-10.
Copyright © 1992, The Cervantes Society of America
A Possible Source for Picasso's Drawing of Don Quixote
ABLO Picasso's
insightful, sassy, ubiquitous, black on white drawing of Don Quixote has
to be considered a minor masterpiece (Fig. 1). It certainly
is one of the most popular graphic representations known of Cervantes's wondrous
character (the Cervantes Society has used it on its Newsletter). A black
nut and bolt statuette of our knight, five inches long and nine inches high,
very skillfully designed and welded by an unknown craftsman and sold in souvenir
stores in Spain (I bought mine in Barcelona) in the early fifties, should
rightfully deserve equal praise (Fig. 2). I am convinced
that Picasso, whose sharp, roving eye constantly searched for likely subjects
and was not hesitant to borrow from others, got the idea for his unique drawing
of Don Quixote from this metal artifact. The reader can judge for himself
or herself of the likelihood of this.
The drawing was made on August 10, 1955 for
the August 18-24 issue (No. 581) of Les LETTRES françaises,
a weekly French journal directed by Aragon, in celebration of the 350th
anniversary of the publication of Don Quixote, Part I. The journal
presented articles (p 1, 9-11) by José Bergamín, Jean Marcenac,
Antoine Adam, Alice Ahrweiler, and Pierre Darmangeat, and in
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Cervantes |
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| Fig. 1. from Les Lettres Françaises, Aug. 18-24, 1955,
p. 12 |
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A Possible Source for Picasso's Drawing |
107 |
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| Fig. 2. |
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A. G. LO RÉ |
Cervantes |
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a small headline on its first page proudly announced “Un document exclusif:
Don Quichotte vu par Picasso.” The drawing takes up an entire page (12),
and at the bottom appears this announcement: “Un tirage spécial
de ce dessin de Picasso sera mis en vente au stand des ‘LETTRES
françaises’ à la ‘fête de l'Humanité’
le 4 septembre à Vincennes, ainsi qu'aux prochaines ‘Six heures
du livre’ du Comité National des Ecrivains’.” Proceeds
probably went to help the Communist cause in France. Picasso had attended
a corrida on August 7 at Vallauris (the notice appears in the same journal
on page 8), and three days later (the drawing is dated), according to Timothy
Hilton (Picasso, New York, Praeger Publishers, 1975, 64) sketched
his Quixote for his friend, Pierre Daix, who “ran the magazine”.
Either there in southern France where he lived and worked, or in Spain, I
surmise Picasso saw (or had seen) and perhaps even purchased the striking
statuette which he can have used as a model.
The artist's rendering, evidently sketched
in a few minutes, is remarkable. Don Quixote and Sancho appear silhouetted
on a white background upon which shines a lop-sided sun. Several windmills
are seen on the horizon. The figure of Don Quixote sits, elongated, gaunt,
even somewhat deformed (this is not one of Picasso's cubist type works),
astride Rocinante. I say deformed because the knight's body parts, suggested
with heavy strokes of charcoal or paint, seem to have been changed once or
twice as the artist formed the torso, arms and shoulder. The knight's head,
capped by what would be Mambrino's helmet, is connected to his shoulders
by a neck made with a single, thin line, and it sports a pointed nose and
a long, equally thin goatee. He carries a lance in his right hand and the
reins and a circular shield apparently in his left. Rocinante is the bag
of bones described by Cervantes: long, thin forelegs, a haunch that looks
transparent for the right thigh can be seen behind the left, and with rough
lines and shading that suggest girth, loin, croup, and saddle. Sancho appears
to the left, a black mass vaguely defining his round body, and sitting on
Dapple who has a long, wiry neck and thin, long ears. Little attention seems
to have been paid to Sancho (for whom I know of no model), sketched in the
same vein, perhaps because Don Quixote is the center of attention. Though
the two figures seem to be standing still, the drawing is full of movement;
the lines are exuberant and the overall effect is catchy and one of bright
humor.
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As one turns to the statuette, one is struck
by the similarity of the stance and structure and the equally humorous bent
of the nut and bolt contrivance. Don Quixote's head is made of an oval-head,
non-slotted, wood screw which at the same time gives form to his beard. The
head of the screw becomes the top of Mambrino's helmet, while the body of
the screw is thrust through a large washer which becomes the brim of the
helmet. The washer is cut to form the indent of a barber's basin. The head
is finished off with an opened cotter pin which serves as the moustache.
The torso is made of a bolt which runs from Don Quixote's seat, a nut with
washer, to his neck which is welded along with another small washer to the
screw that forms the head. The shoulder is made with a small nut below which
are welded the arms, made of nails. The legs are of bent nails beginning
at the seat and ending in stirrups of washers welded to the saddle, a small
hinge. Rocinante's legs are of thin machine bolts welded at the elbows, while
his neck and tail are of nails attached to a device that looks like a long,
ribbed hinge which serves logically as his loin. His head consists of a wing-nut,
washer, and nut. The shield appears to be a metal cap, the reins of twisted
wire, the lance of two nails, a nut and a washer. The sculpture is a very
ingenious, effective, funny representation of our knight, and surely one
to catch the eye of any passer-by, not alone that of a keen observer like
Picasso who was always visiting shops, interested in the work of local
craftsmen.
Picasso, if he did use the statuette as a model
even from memory, deangularized the rigid metal forms, and with loose, carefree
lines which a little more closely follow human and equine forms, gave us
his memorable drawing, now readily available as a poster. The similarity
of the shapes of the two figures described and shown and the quite similar
moods established should be convincing enough, but most convincing, in my
view, is the fact that the style developed for this drawing is unique and
not to be found in any other of Picasso's drawings before or even after 1955.
The style seems to me a direct outcome of the metal sculpture. It is therefore
logical at least to assume that he gleaned his idea from the unknown artisan's
work, just as he had done with his “Meninas” taken from
Velázquez, his “Bacchanal” taken from Poussin, and his
“Massacre in Korea” from Goya, or his countless other borrowings.
Of course, this talented artist, considered one of the greatest of the twentieth
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century, was not copying or plagiarizing, but playfully toying with variations
of known artistic themes. Timothy Hilton in the quote mentioned above also
suggests that Picasso was perhaps thinking of Daumier.
| UNIVERSITY OF
NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL
HILL |
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Digitized with
the help of Contessa Marion |
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