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EXAMPLE FROM 1939

"Night Fishing at Antibes" 1939 (124)

Barr described Picasso's "Night Fishing at Antibes" (124) as the largest and possibly the most important canvas painted by Picasso during the decade following the "Guernica" mural of 1937. Picasso painted this large work in Antibes, France. Historically. this was just prior to the German invasion of Poland. One might present the notion that Picasso's fishermen, poised to spear the fish under the glare of the acetylene lamps, might represent the evil that was to occur leading to World War II. However the ladies eating ice cream lend a holiday air to the scene. The women (Andre Breton's wife and Dora Maar) watch from the quay. One holds a bicycle. The sense of the historical moment should not be dismissed considering other works of the period in which Picasso presented a fantasy world, his personal arcadia (Barr 151).

Timothy Hilton in his book on Picasso reported on an aspect of this work which created some speculation that it resembled a painting in the Louvre by the seventeenth century Dutch artist Nicolas Maes, the "Bathers." (124A) Hilton said "It is very likely that Picasso had a memory of this picture, but its position as a really active ingredient of "Night Fishing" is hardly proven. One might, and with more relevance, note the stooping figure's resemblance to the bathing woman in Manet's "Dejeuner sur l'herbe," a motif which itself derives from one of Raphael's fishermen" (Hilton 252).

I have found definite correlations between Picasso's "Night Fishing at Antibes" (124) and a fifteenth century Flemish painting of the Martyrdom of St. Hippolytus" (101E). This is the most complex revision of a work by Picasso, since he has not only based his composition on the work, but he has rearranged and altered the shapes to suit his purpose. Moreover, a study of the following points should support my contention that Picasso developed (124) aside from, or in concert with, the other works mentioned by Hilton. Sources from (101E) are listed on the left.

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