Perls Galleries, New York

Richard A. Loeb, Clinton, New Jersey

Constance W. Stafford, USA (sold: Sotheby'❀s, New York,꧑ 9th May 1989, lot 52)

Sale: Sotheby's, New York, 13th May 1997, lot 47

Private Collection, California (pur🧔chased at the above sale. Sold: Sotheby's, New York, 9th May 2001, lot 474)

Purchased at the above sale by the present owner

Stuttgart, Staatsgalerie, Picasso: Badende, 2005, no. 73, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

The beach had always been a source of inspiration for Picasso, an environment equally conducive to erotic exploration or evocations of the ancient world. However, as a backdrop or motif it became increasingly charged following his meeting with Marie-Thérèse Walter in 1927. The summers of that year and the following one, spent respectively at Cannes and Dinard, were particularly productive as the clandestine presence of the young Marie-Thérèse in Picasso’s life added an erotic frisson to seaside activities and a counterpoint to his deteriorating relationship with his wife Olga. John Richardson has described how, at Dinard in July 1928: ‘Whenever possible, Picasso would escape from his wife’s sulks and the stifling atmosphere of their ugly rented house (the Villa des Roches in the Saint-Enogat quarter of Dinard) and make for the Plage de l’Ecluse in another part of the town. Marie-Thérèse would be playing ball with some of the children from her holiday home – a scene Picasso would repeatedly portray on the spot over the next few weeks, and from memory laced with fantasy over the next few years’ (J. Richardson, ‘Picasso and Marie-Thérèse Walter’, in Through the Eye of Picasso 1928-1934 (exhibition catalogue), William Beadleston Gallery, New York, 1985).

Picasso spent the summer of 1932 at Boisgeloup, often in the company of Marie-Thérèse, while Olga and Paulo were sent to Juan-les-Pins. His work of that summer is full of reference to his lover and those memories continued to inspire him into the autumn when he began work on a series of beach scenes that recalled not only the past months but also previous summers spent together at Dinard. A glorious cacophony of movement and colour, Les Trois baigneuses shows two figures at play, whilst a third lies supine at their feet. The figures are rendered with the voluptuous lines and sensuality that Picasso used to allude to his lover, yet the work is full of complexities. Only two months later Picasso would paint his dramatic Le Sauvetage works depicting the 𒆙seaside rescue of Marie-Thérèse and there is something of the same feeling of urgency an💝d threat in the present work. The dark, ominous palette is matched by the exigency of brushwork; the sky and sea indicated with billowing greys and blues and the dramatic attitudes of the three figures emphasised with single, urgent strokes of brightly-coloured pigments. These paintings were inspired by real-life events – Marie-Thérèse had contracted a serious illness after swimming in the Marne and for some months was very unwell. His concerns exacerbated by the distance he had been forced to keep over the summer, Picasso returned to the beach motif that had become so synonymous with Marie-Thérèse and transforms it into a landscape in which he can express his feelings in all their tumultuous intensity.  

This work has been requested for the exhibition Picasso 1932 to be held at the Musée na🍷tional Picasso-Paris, Paris and Tate Modern, London from October 2017 to September 2018.