Provenance Research Project
This work is included in the Provenance Research Project, which investigates the ownership history of works in MoMA's collection.
1925, Pablo Picasso
By 1926, Galerie Paul Rosenberg, Paris
1926 – at least 1932, Gottlieb Friedrich Reber, Lugano and Lausanne, purchased from/through the above
By August 1939 – 1964, James Johnson Sweeney, New York and Houston, probably purchased from Gottlieb Friedrich Reber [1]
1964, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, purchased from James Johnson Sweeney
[1] Dorothy Kosinski, “G. F. Reber: Collector of Cubism,” The Burlington Magazine, vol. 133, no. 1061 (August 1991), p. 531. In the Appendix, “G.F. Reber’s collection of Cubist works of art,” the entry for Picasso’s Still Life with Plaster Head includes the note “s. James Johnson Sweeney, Houston.” The abbreviation “s.: sold by Reber (followed by purchaser’s name)” indicates that Sweeney acquired the work directly from Reber.
In other sources, “A.M. Bellanger” has been cited as an owner in 1937. This was probably based on the erroneous assumption that the work was included in the 1937 exhibition Les maîtres de l’art indépendant at the Petit Palais, Paris, as Nature morte au bras de plâtre (exh. cat., p. 106, no.1), which is, in fact, a different painting by Picasso.
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Pablo Picasso
Spanish, 1881–1973 1251 works onlineWith these words, Picasso shed light on two central principles of his artistic production over nearly 80 years: his openness to a diverse range of styles, subject matters, and mediums, and his resistance to the notion that change in art necessarily corresponds to improvement or progress.
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