All the love of Picasso and Khokhlova in the Goyard chest
A closed opening of the exhibition took place on November 19 "Picasso & Khokhlova" в Pushkin Museum im. A. S. Pushkina, which will be held at the museum until February 3, 2019. The exhibition includes paintings by Pablo Picasso, video and archival materials from the collection of the Pushkin Museum. A.S. Pushkin, the National Picasso Museum in Paris and the Almina and Bernard Ruiz-Picasso Foundation for the Support of Art (FABA).
At the preview of the exhibition, no one, not even the grandson of Khokhlova and Picasso Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, voiced the brand legendary Goyard chest, which contained the personal archive of Picasso’s first wife Olga Khokhlova. Apparently, Goyard’s marketing and PR strategy is so silent that, out of modesty, it does not allow mentioning even such famous clients of the brand. The list of Goyard admirers is more than impressive: Coco Chanel, Sir Arthur Conan Doilbe, Pablo Picasso, Karl Lagerfeld, Meghan Markle and Alain Ducasse.
Meanwhile, at the opening, the grandson of Picasso and Khokhlova said that the legendary chest with the engraving “OP” (Olga Picasso) was opened in the early 2000s, and the study of the documents contained in it was not completed even for the exhibition in which the archive is presented first. These personal documents and things, including letters and photographs, make it possible to reconstruct the history of the relationship between Pablo and Olga.
Russian ballerina Olga Khokhlova (married Olga Picasso) became the first wife of the great avant-garde artist, the only model and muse for a whole decade. They met in 1917 in Rome, while working on a production of the ballet “Parade” as part of Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. In 1918 they got married in an Orthodox church in Paris. Under the influence of Olga, who did not like abstraction, Picasso turned to neoclassicism and created numerous portraits of her. However, the artist's love for the muse passed. By the mid-1920s, Picasso's attitude towards his wife and muse had changed, which was reflected in his work. Picasso fell in love with someone else. He again returned to abstract, primitivist forms and bright colors replaced muted tones. Now in his art he identified himself either with the bull-victim of a bullfighter, played by his new beloved Maria-Therese Walter, or in the image of a minotaur, symbolizing the duality of the artist’s relationship with women. Maria Teresa gave birth to a daughter, Maya, from him, but he remained Olga's legal husband until her death in 1955. The exhibition examines the master's work from the late 1910s to the early 1930s through the prism of his life and love.
