Francis Picabia, Port of Saint-Tropez

Port of Saint-Tropez, evening effect (1909)



Sedell, 1909

Star dancer and her school of dance, 1913

Sad Figure, 1913

Woman on green background (Femme sur Fond Vert), 1938

Woman with a Black Cravat, circa 1942

Portrait d’Yvette, c.1942-43

Avarice de la nature, 1948. Oil on card, 61.3 x 49.6 cm.

Francis Picabia (22 January 1879 – 30 November 1953) was a French painter, poet, and typographist, associated with Cubism, Abstract art, Dada and Surrealism.

In the beginning of his career, from 1903 to 1908, Picabia was influenced by the Impressionist paintings of Alfred Sisley. Little churches, lanes, roofs of Paris, riverbanks, wash houses, lanes, barges—these were his subject matter. Some however, began to question his sincerity and said he copied Sisley, or that his cathedrals looked like Monet, or that he painted like Signac. 

From 1909, he came under the influence of the Cubists and the Golden Section (Section d'Or).

In 1925, he returned to figurative painting, and during the 1930s became a close friend of Gertrude Stein. In the early 1940s he moved to the south of France, where his work took a surprising turn: he produced a series of paintings based on the nude glamour photos in French "girlie" magazines like Paris Sex-Appeal, in a garish style which appears to subvert traditional, academic nude painting. Some of these went to an Algerian merchant who sold them on, and so Picabia came to decorate brothels across North Africa under the Occupation.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Picabia