The Ascetic (L' Ascète)

Discussion

FROM THE BARNES FOUNDATION’S CATALOG

Between 1901 and 1904, during what is now called his Blue Period, Picasso pursued the themes of suffering and alienation, taking the sick, the blind, the imprisoned, and the indigent as his subjects—marginalized people with whom he greatly identified as he struggled in the early years of his career. Here we see a man with a sunken, emaciated chest and hollow cheeks seated before a spare meal. The setting lacks specificity, as if to emphasize this figure's outcast status.

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