Christopher Green describes the importance of this painting in his introductory essay to a publication devoted to Demoiselles d’Avignon (1):

In the mythology of modernist and postmodern art history, the status of

Picasso’s Demoiselles d’Avignon as a painting that marks a dramatic break

from the past and a new twentieth century beginning is now unques-

tioned. Its immediacy, the directness with which the stares of each individ-

ual prostitute invite the spectator in, underlines its role in one of the

central developments of art in the twentieth century: the empowering of

the spectator. We, the work’s spectators, are made the centre of attention.

The work becomes not so much Picasso’s statement as a challenge to us to

respond and, by responding, to give it meaning. In modernism altogether,

art (not merely visual art alone) has been reoriented, placing the onus on

the relationship not between the artist and the work of art, but rather

between the work and the spectator. Despite this crucial shift, and the role

of the Demoiselles in marking it, writing about the picture has been as

much devoted to constructing a narrative of its conception and to explor-

ing its relationship with Picasso’s biography, as to the analysis of the kind

of experience it offers

References

(1) Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, edited by Christopher Green, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, Cambridge University Press, 2001.

The painting has been analyzed and restored in 2003-4. The following pigment analysis is based on this investigation by the scientists of the Museum of Modern Art in New York (1).

White areas are painted in lead white

Red: vermilion mixed with lead white

Cobalt blue

Brown ochre

Green areas are painted in emerald green

The small yellow patch contains cadmium yellow

Black lines: bone black

References

(1) Les Demoiselles d’Avignon: Conserving a modern masterpiece, Website of Museum of Modern Art, New York

(1) Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, edited by Christopher Green, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, Cambridge University Press, 2001.

(2) Rubin, W. et al. Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. The Museum of Modern Art. Studies in Modern Art 3. New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1994.

(3) Bandmann, G. Picasso: Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Stuttgart: Reclam, 1965.

(4) Golding, J. “The Demoiselles d’Avignon.” The Burlington Magazine, vol. 100, no. 662 (May 1958): 155–163.

(5) Rosenblum, R. “The Demoiselles d’Avignon Revisited.” Art News, no. 72, no. 4 (April 1973): pp. 45-48.

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon: Conserving a modern masterpiece, Website of Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Pablo Ruiz Picasso