The Picasso Museum in Malaga presents a world premiere exhibition featuring paintings, collages and photo-collages produced by the American artist Richard Prince in the last two years.
Prince is one of the leading artists on the international art scene, and his career has been characterised by the inclusion in his works of icons of popular culture and the communications media, the mechanisms of humour, the common portrayal of women and of sex in the rural world, film culture and the power of photography.
In this exhibition Prince uses the work of Picasso to encourage a sensation of puzzlement in the spectator and to create a distance which drives audiences to reassess prevailing perceptions and conventions on sexuality, eroticism and desire.
Richard Prince approaches the subject of Picasso in this exhibition by using a tactic of radical cannibalisation of the artist, causing the spectator to feel somewhat alienated and warning us to revise our perceptions and conventional views on the desire.Growing recognition of Prince’s work by the professional art world, while not devoid of controversy, has made him one of the most closely-watched artists on the international contemporary art scene. From now until the 27th May, Museo Picasso Málaga will be hosting the world premiere of an exhibition that comprises 38 large-format paintings and 51 small-format collages and photo-collages created by the US artist over the last two years.
Also on display are 26 graphite drawings and watercolours from the 1970s, and one pencil drawing on paper from the same period. Throughout his career, Prince has shown a constant interest in including in his art practice – in which he has clearly studied the major milestones of modern art history while at the same time being highly innovative – American popular cultural and media icons, the mechanisms of humour and caricature, common depictions of women and sex in American rural and working environments, film culture, and the power of photography in everyday life. Richard Prince makes speculations by setting up complex relationships and creating short-circuits between elements taken from the worlds of the image and the word.
The exhibition PRINCE / PICASSO, curated by Museo Picasso Málaga and organized in collaboration with the Fundación Almine y Bernard Ruiz-Picasso para el Arte (FABA), fulfils one of the core missions of Museo Picasso Málaga: i.e., to deal with contemporary art face-on, just as Pablo Picasso confronted his own time. It continues with the theme of a series that began with Bill Viola, Figurative Works, Museo Picasso Málaga, 2010, and Kippenberger Meets Picasso, Museo Picasso Málaga, 2011.
