The Galeries nationales du Grand Palais (GNGP), in Paris ushers in Autumn with Picasso and the Masters, an extensive show which features Picasso's works alongside the art that inspired them. For those familiar with the artist many of the pairings come off as obvious and uninspired, but, nonetheless, the exhibition covers an impressive range of pieces, which highlight Picasso's role as an artistic scavenger.
The exhibition, which includes 200 canvasses from all over the world, represents a staggering feat of logistics and overflows the walls of the GNGP. (Peripheral exhibitions at the Louvre and Musée d'Orsay explore Picasso's dialogue with Delacroix's Femmes d'Alger and Manet's Déjeuner sur l'herbe.)
The first room sets the scene with an array of self-portraits by artists including Rembrandt, Poussin, Gauguin, El Greco, Delacroix and Cézanne juxtaposed with early examples by Picasso, the painter poised with palette in hand or bohemian scarf around his neck.
Other works contain strong influences of Spanish art: Veláquez and Goya, and motifs of knights and toreadors, though in the case of The Matador, the imagery is actually filtered through the French painter Manet.
Other French painters such as Renoir and Henri Rousseau, had an influence on his work, albeit one less obvious. Picasso possessed their works in his personal collection, and while we often attribute Picasso's joyful beach scenes to Cézanne, Renoir deserves equal credit.
The show reinforces the importance of El Greco, with the long-bearded forms of Picasso's early black paintings and offers a fascinating chance to see Picasso's pink-period Boy Leading a Horse alongside El Greco's poetic Saint Martin and the Beggar. Elsewhere Picasso's female portraits are hung alongside those of Goya, Ingres, Manet andRousseau, while the still-lifes reveal a quieter, more contemplative side with Chardin, Goya and the spiritual power of Zurbarán's extraordinary Agnus Dei.
Just a few pieces provide totally unexpected or unlikely insights, such as a pointillist version, done in 1917, of Louis Le Nain's The Return from the Christening, a 17th-century moral genre painting, which Picasso has transformed into an ethereal family portrait, obscured in clouds of pastel confetti.
Some of the most intriguing borrowings are what the curator Marie-Laure Bernadac calls "Picasso cannibal", as if he ate up his sources and spat them out all jumbled up and rich in gastric juices. Poussin's cold rationality might seem far removed from Picasso's exuberance, yet the swirling, complex composition of The Rape of the Sabine Women is recreated here as an entangled mass of horses and bodies. In a separate gallery, a kind of art- historical beauty pageant unfolds with Titian's Venus, Goya's Maja Nu and Manet's Olympia as its contestants. Yet Olympia, in the hands of Picasso, becomes an earthly mass of flesh.
It is amusing, but in the end this "greatest hits" array is all a bit too obvious. As with any big crowd-pulling blockbuster, it offers an easy fix without the need to travel all over the world. We can see Picasso's delirious mix of genres and styles, his constant pillaging from historical sources - and for those who see it as a victory for continuity in the ever-popular "tradition versus rupture debate", it is proof that Picasso could happily accommodate both tradition and rupture. Yet these side-by-side illustrations don't really tell us an awful lot more about Picasso. We can see that he chewed up and spat out Poussin, but wouldn't it be interesting to know why?
Until February 2 2009, Galleries nationales du Grand Palais (@email:www.grandpalais.fr).
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Rating: 3.5/5
Results
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Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
THE BIO: Martin Van Almsick
Hometown: Cologne, Germany
Family: Wife Hanan Ahmed and their three children, Marrah (23), Tibijan (19), Amon (13)
Favourite dessert: Umm Ali with dark camel milk chocolate flakes
Favourite hobby: Football
Breakfast routine: a tall glass of camel milk
Team Angel Wolf Beach Blast takes place every Wednesday between 4:30pm and 5:30pm
Electric scooters: some rules to remember
- Riders must be 14-years-old or over
- Wear a protective helmet
- Park the electric scooter in designated parking lots (if any)
- Do not leave electric scooter in locations that obstruct traffic or pedestrians
- Solo riders only, no passengers allowed
- Do not drive outside designated lanes
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
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Ms Yang's top tips for parents new to the UAE
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- Keep an open mind
Our family matters legal consultant
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Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
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The National's picks
4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
5.45pm: Raging Torrent
6.20pm: West Acre
7pm: Flood Zone
7.40pm: Straight No Chaser
8.15pm: Romantic Warrior
8.50pm: Calandogan
9.30pm: Forever Young
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
The biog
Favourite film: Motorcycle Dairies, Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday, Kagemusha
Favourite book: One Hundred Years of Solitude
Holiday destination: Sri Lanka
First car: VW Golf
Proudest achievement: Building Robotics Labs at Khalifa University and King’s College London, Daughters
Driverless cars or drones: Driverless Cars
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The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cylturbo
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Power: 242bhp
Torque: 370Nm
Price: Dh136,814
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances