The artwork titled “Portrait of Ambroise Vollard” was created by the eminent artist Pablo Picasso in 1910. This oil on canvas measures 92 x 65 cm and stands as a quintessential example of Analytical Cubism. The portrait genre piece is housed in the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts located in Moscow. It captures the essence of Ambroise Vollard, who was an influential art dealer of the time.
The artwork is a cubist interpretation, where the subject’s features are fractured into geometric shapes and planes, illustrating multiple perspectives within a single plane. The muted palette of earthy tones is typical for this phase of Picasso’s work, relying on grays, browns, and ochres, which adds to the complex interplay of form and shadow. Although the figure’s likeness is abstracted, there remains a semblance of human form—a nod to the traditional portrait. The viewer is invited to engage with the work, piecing together the fragmented components to perceive a sense of depth and volume in what initially appears as a perplexing array of shapes. Picasso’s technique in this piece reflects his exploration into the nature of perception and representation, and it epitomizes the radical departure from classical portraiture that Cubism represented at the time.
