A Museum for Picasso's Picassos

By Gerald Clarke

Bearded, bundled in his greatcoat, the young man stares defiantly at passersby as if to say that although he is only 19, he already knows that he will dominate the art world for the rest of his life. If anyone doubts the implicit truth of Pablo Picasso's 1901 self-portrait, he has only to walk farther into Paris' new Picasso Museum, which opened last week. There, spread out like all the treasures from Aladdin's cave, are the gems of nearly three-quarters of a century of labor: 228 paintings, 149 sculptures, nearly 1,500 drawings and just as many engravings.

The museum is perhaps the best excuse ever devised for high inheritance taxes. After Picasso's death in 1973, the French government calculated that his heirs owed it an estimated $50 million, about 20% of an estate that totaled $250 million. Under an enlightened 1968 law, the many heirs could pay in art rather than cash, and that is what they finally did, a decision that has given France, where the painter lived for 68 of his 91 years, the greatest Picasso collection in the world. (The runner-up: Manhattan's Museum of Modern Art.)

Son Claude Picasso thought that works of the prophet of modernism should have been housed in a modern building. Others pointed out that Picasso himself had never built nor lived in a new building and preferred his monumental paintings to be hung in monumental spaces. The antimodernists prevailed, perhaps fortunately, given the deplorable standards of new French architecture. The Hotel Sale, built in 1656, was chosen. Located in the Marais district, the museum is a short walk from the Pompidou Center, whose exterior is closer to an oil refinery than a museum of modern art. Conversion of the dilapidated Sale began in 1980 and was completed only this summer, at a cost of nearly $10 million. Great care was taken to preserve the original palatial sand-colored structure and to hide, as well as possible, the air- conditioning and security devices. "It will look simple when we're finished," Architect Roland Simounet told Israel Shenker in Art News, "despite all the work and all the hours. People will wonder what we've been doing all this time." They found out last week, during a series of official openings. In the first wave came French President Francois Mitterrand and representatives of the rival branches of Picasso's family, which consisted of two wives, four mistresses, one legitimate son and three illegitimate children, including Jewelry Designer Paloma Picasso. Given the artist, a controversy about invitations was inevitable. In a country now governed by Socialists, it was arranged that every Socialist worth his card be put on the VIP list, while some members of other political groups almost had % to beg at the door. Christiane Schwartzbard, a Communist member of the Paris city council, bitterly complained about having been overlooked, tartly observing that Picasso himself was a Communist. Retorted Roger Roman, another of the uninvited council members, "Picasso does not belong to a faction, but to France--to the universe."

Dominique Bozo, the museum's director, was able to choose from the Picassos the artist had hoarded for himself. In addition, he was given paintings from Picasso's private collection, by such artists as Matisse, Renoir and Miro. As a result of Bozo's freedom to make his own selections, the museum admirably represents almost all major phases of a protean career. Yet there are a few gaps. Picasso was a Spaniard, and the Picasso Museum in Barcelona has most of his very early works. Madrid has the Guernica, which found refuge in the Museum of Modern Art during Francisco Franco's 40 years in power; London has the Three Dancers; and MOMA still has Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. Paris' new museum has several fascinating studies, however, for Les Demoiselles, the painting that initiated cubism, and in years to come there will be loans between the Picasso Museum and other important Picasso repositories.

The museum, in a sense, closes a circle begun 330 years ago. The house built by Aubert de Fontenay, royal collector of the salt tax, now contains a collection assembled by 20th century taxes. The artist would have relished the irony. Said the influential Le Monde: "One knows that Picasso is in his place in the noble building from the time of Louis XIV. He is home."

With reporting by B.J. Phillips and Alexandra Tuttle/Paris