Research Paper On Francis Picabia

Francis Picabia: Known only to the Artistically Enlightened

Francis Picabia (1879 – 1953), was a distinguished French art personality of the late nineteenth and middle twentieth centuries, showcased his multiple talents as a painter, illustrator, designer, writer, and editor. His paintings reflected abstract expressions, landscapes, machinery, nudes, people, and other subjects. His works are currently on exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The exhibition runs from November 17th 2016 through March 19th 2017. The exhibit is titled “Francis Picabia: Our Heads Are Round So Our Thoughts Can Change Direction,” which is a compilation of 241 artwork examples. Smith argues that the focus of the exhibition is Picabia’s workmanship in Cubism and Dada art movements (Smith para 3).

It is interesting that Smith

He painted (number) in the following movements: Cubism, Dada, Impressionist, and Surrealism.

As a dabbler in cubism, Picabia only produced seven pieces of artwork. Sayre acknowledges that “cubic painting represented the three-dimensional world in increasing two-dimensional terms” (Sayre 499). From a mathematical perspective, I think the term “cubism” is a misnomer for this type of artwork. A cube by mathematical standard is a solid with six squares. A better appellation for this type of art could be what I term as “geometricism” because of the appearance of basic geometric shapes in cubism art form. Polygons are defined as “one of the most all-encompassing shapes in geometry. From the simple triangle, up through squares, rectangles, trapezoids, to dodecagons and beyond (Poly, sec. 1). In Picabia’s Dances of the Spring (figure 2) and Picasso’s Three Musicians (Figure 3), there are many irregular polygons, each having its own artist defined length and height. Notice the absence of the geometric cube and triangles in the paintings. These