Descripción
Four copies of this poster have been made, two of which have burgundy frames surrounding the print and bearing the text. The other two have green frames. The burgundy editions can also be distinguished from each other by their size, as can the green ones. The two burgundy editions were printed for the exhibition held from 23 March to 25 May 1970 at the Maeght Foundation in Saint-Paul. The poster presented here corresponds to the smaller size of this edition. The green editions were made later and refer to the exhibition held at the Musée d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, in Paris.
At the beginning of 1922, the book Cravates de Chanvre by the poet Pierre Reverdy was published by the publishing house Editions Nord-Sud, whose journal Nord-Sud had founded in 1917. This work was illustrated by Picasso, who made three engravings on zinc plates, one of which is the “Portrait of Pierre Reverdy” used here.
In this portrait, which is purely neoclassical in line, Picasso reminds us of the French portraitist Ingres. With a few precise strokes and his characteristic pure line, he describes the seated figure shown reading.
Picasso illustrated many of the books of his poet friends to help them sell their work. For Reverdy he illustrated the “Chant des Morts” and “Cravates de Chanvre”, whose illustration with Reverdy’s portrait is the subject of this poster. Braasaï’s description of Reverdy reveals that there was a similarity between the poet and Picasso, in their look: he was an attractive man, “with a manly voice, dark eyes (like Picasso’s), the haughty attitude of his head, and even the sudden changes of mood and the tantrums of his tempestuous temperament.”
