Face No. 111

Pablo Picasso, 1963

Technical Details

About This Work

Created in 1963 during Pablo Picasso’s legendary collaboration with the Madoura pottery workshop in Vallauris, France, Face No. 111 is a striking white earthenware ceramic plate measuring 25.4 by 25.4 centimeters, held in the collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Art. The circular composition features a highly stylized, abstract human visage masterfully rendered across the convex terracotta surface using colored engobes and enamel underglaze in vibrant tones of black, green, blue, and red. Picasso uses bold contours and economical yet expressive brushwork to delineate the facial features, merging eyes, nose, and mouth into an expressive geometric schema. The stark, playful abstraction highlights the artist's intuitive mastery of ceramic volumes and his ability to transform utilitarian pottery into a dynamic pictorial canvas. The interplay between the porous white earthenware clay and the rich, glossy glaze accents creates a tactile immediacy, embodying the joyous creative experimentation and spontaneous draftsmanship that defined Picasso’s prolific late ceramic output in the Mediterranean. The serial number foregrounds variation rather than a stable individual likeness. Its meaning lies in Picasso's late exploration of face, mask, and identity through repeated transformation.

Executed in 1963, Face No. 111 reflects Pablo Picasso’s deep immersion in ceramic artistry at the Madoura pottery studio in Vallauris, a creative chapter that began in 1946 when the artist first met Georges and Suzanne Ramié. During the 1950s and 1960s, Picasso revolutionized traditional pottery by utilizing standard earthenware blanks—plates, pitchers, and bowls—as sculptural supports for his evolving iconography of mythological figures, animals, and human faces. This specific work belongs to his famous serial explorations of stylized visages, cataloged extensively in Alain Ramié’s definitive catalogue raisonné of ceramic editions under number A.R. 476. Acquired by the Minneapolis Institute of Art through the gift of Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth S. Carpenter, the plate exemplifies how Picasso bridged fine art and functional craft during his decades in the south of France. By treating everyday ceramics as canvases, he engaged with ancient Mediterranean craft traditions while injecting them with modern avant-garde vitality, cementing his enduring legacy as a visionary master of ceramic sculpture.

Current Location

Valuation & Provenance

Keywords