Old Jew and a Boy
Creation period
1903
Dimensions
125x92 cm
125x92
125x92
Technique
oil on canvas
Collection
Exhibition
25
Open in app#1
Pablo Picasso
Old Jew and a Boy (Blind Beggar with a Boy)
#5
#2
One of the central works of the ‘blue period’ was Old Jew and a Boy, painted in 1903 in Barcelona. Here, the main theme of this period sounds with renewed force — two human beings lost in silence and making up a unified whole, trying to stay together. Against a neutral background, we can see poor people, a senior and a child, that symbolize the most vulnerable and feeble ages. The painfully fragile blind man and boy nestle together, as if they are a single entity. Picasso intentionally stretches out the figures, especially the old man, to demonstrate his leanness and exhaustion.
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About the theme of blindness
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The theme of blindness had a special meaning for Picasso: the blind man exemplified genuine spirituality and, at the same time, the moral poverty of the world. The sighted boy also behaves as if he was blind: his eyes are open but motionless, and his face resembles a mask. The characters communicate not with glances but with the touch of their hands, and Picasso distorted their forms as much as possible: the man’s raw-boned hands look almost Gothic. For Picasso, the idea of the wisdom of blindness, which causes people to perceive the world with their inner sight, was like the idea of love. The man and the boy supporting each other contain the gift of love in themselves.
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About the blue color
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Picasso tries to tear through the cover of the visible for the sake of comprehending the painting’s essence. Plastic problems, such as drawing, color, and space, are solved as if they relate to people. The power of line is emphasized by the monochromatic coloring of the painting. The blue color is the real color of the objectified world. It comprises the emotional essence of life, thus intensifying the grief and sadness expressed in the characters’ sorrowful and concentrated faces. The bluish figures do not blend into the background — on the contrary, they stand out like a sharp contour. The painting has no perspective, and there is only minimal shading and color modeling of figures. The intense expression of this work resembles Spanish art of the 16th century, especially El Greco and Morales.
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Old Jew and a Boy
Creation period
1903
Dimensions
125x92 cm
125x92
125x92
Technique
oil on canvas
Collection
Exhibition
25
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