Art News

‘Angry Young Men’ ~ Picasso, Miró, Dalí at the Palazzo Strozzi in Florence


artwork: Salvador Dali - "Neo-Cubist Academy (Composition with Three Figures)", 1926 - Oil on canvas - 190 x 200 cm. Museu de Montserrat, Spain. Currently on view at the Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, part of the 'Angry Young Men: Picasso, Miró, Dalí' exhibtion until 17 July 2011.


Florence, Italy.- From March 2011 until 17th July 2011, the Palazoo Strozzi in Florence is showing “Angy Young Men: Picasso, Miró, Dalí’. The exhibition, which was previously at the Kunstahalle in Bonn, is dedicated to the early work of Picasso, Mirò and Dalí, which played a decisive role in the beginning of modern art in Spain. The exhibition concentrates on Picasso’s pre-cubist period 1900 – 1905, whilst Juan Mirò’s works of 1915–1920 are presented along with Salvador Dali’s from 1920–1925, both artists painting in the period before the discovery of surrealism.

Each artist will be represented by 25 – 30 masterpieces selected to show aspects of the three artists in their earliest periods, works that are rarely shown in mainstream catalogues and exhibitions. For instance, Picasso’s early work was often coloured by his strong political convictions.

In Madrid in 1901, Picasso and his anarchist friend Francisco de Asís Soler founded the magazine Arte Joven (Young Art), which published five issues. Picasso illustrated the journal, mostly contributing grim cartoons depicting and sympathizing with the state of the poor. Mirò too understood art as political, and Miró’s oft-quoted assassination of painting is derived from a dislike of bourgeois art of any kind, especially when used as a way to promote cultural identity among the wealthy. Specifically, Miró saw Cubism in this way, and he is quoted as saying I will break their guitars, referring to Picasso and Braque’s early Cubist paintings.

artwork: Pablo Picasso - "At the Lapin Agile", 1905 - Oil on canvas - 99.1 x 100.3 cm. The Walter H. & Leonore Annenberg Collection, at the Museum of Modern Art, Currently on view at the Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, until 17 July 2011.

artwork: Salvador Dalí - "Woman at the Window (Muchacha en la ventana)", 1925 Oil on board - 104 x 73.7 cm. Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation, © Salvador Dalí, Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation/Artists Rights Society(ARS), New York. Currently on view at the Palazzo Strozzi in Florence.Much younger than Picasso and Mirò, Dalí was expelled from the Academia in 1926 shortly before his final exams when he stated that no one on the faculty was competent enough to examine him. His mastery of painting skills is well documented in his early works, such as the flawlessly realistic Girl at the window, which was painted in 1926.  That same year he made his first visit to Paris where he met with Pablo Picasso, whom young Dalí revered – Picasso had already heard favourable things about Dalí from Joan Mirò.

Palazzo Strozzi is a palace in Florence, Italy. The Palace was begun in 1489 by Benedetto da Maiano, for Filippo Strozzi the Elder, a rival of the Medici family who had returned to the city in November 1466 and wanted the most magnificent palace to assert his family’s continued prominence and, perhaps more importantly, to make a political statement of his own status. A great number of other buildings were acquired during the 70s and demolished to provide enough space for the new construction. Giuliano da Sangallo the Younger provided a wood model of the design. Filippo Strozzi died in 1491, long before the construction’s completion in 1538. Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici confiscated it in the same year, not returning it to the Strozzi family until thirty years later. The palazzo remained the seat of the Strozzi family until 1937. Great changes were made to the building when the Istituto Nazionale delle Assicurazioni occupied Palazzo Strozzi. The palazzo, granted by the Istituto Nazionale delle Assicurazioni to the Italian State in 1999, is now home to the Institute of Humanist Studies and to the Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi. The Gabinetto G.P. Viesseux and the Renaissance Studies Institute have both also occupied the building since 1940.

Today the palace is used for international expositions like the now-annual antique show, founded as the Biennale dell’Antiquariato in 1959, fashion shows and other cultural and artistic events, such as “Cézanne in Florence. Two Collectors and the 1910 Exhibition of Impressionism”. Since its inception in July 2006 , the key challenges of the Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi in Florence were to take an international approach in organizing cultural events, providing a platform for experimentation and a place for debate and discussion, create new synergies with others, become a catalyst for the broader culture, in short to “think global, act local” . A key objective at the Palazzo Strozzi is to stage exhibitions that are a pleasure, not a duty. Palazzo Strozzi is intended primarily for visitors and one of the aspects that makes the experience at Palazzo Strozzi is the special attention reserved for them, including appropriate captions for families and children and for the visually impaired and a video information center in the courtyard. Visit the Palazzo Strozzi website at … http://www.palazzostrozzi.org