Seated woman on wooden chair 1941

This is Picasso’s ‘Seated Woman on Wooden Chair’ at the Currier Museum. Look at the turquoise background, then the woman herself, composed of planes, lines, and wild decorative gestures. Imagine Picasso moving around the canvas. The painting seems to be in flux as it pushes and pulls in different directions. You can see the whole history of painting, especially from Cézanne onward, in his distorted perspectives. The woman is fragmented; her face is a collection of shapes, and her eyes are misaligned. He's probably thinking about how to capture not just what she looks like, but how we perceive and experience her. See that singular flowing line from the top of her head that loops into a curl? It looks so casual, like a flourish of the hand, yet it brings a sense of movement and liveliness to the composition. Picasso knew, like many painters, that one mark could change everything. It's like he's in conversation with all the other artists who have ever tried to capture a figure on canvas.