Fernand Léger “Study of a Nude” at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice

Study of a Nude

“Considering that a painting must materially be the contrast of a wall on which it is hung, it must personify movement and life in all its power.

Everything must be dull next to him.

I believe that there is only the present time that allows this (being cleared of limiting).

Plastic intensity can be achieved and dead surfaces in the picture should be avoided.

The question of bright surfaces and dead surfaces is for me the point of judgment in painting.”
Fernand Léger

“Léger reached this second level — synthetic Cubism — without going through analytical Cubism.


Study of a Nude While his comrades struggled in the conflict that resulted from their relentless desire to show, in the given rectangle of the painting, everything they knew about an object, Léger (he says so) was only aimed at "exasperating volumes, shapes".

The antinomy between the personal experiences and the canvas on which it becomes visible to all was very attenuated for Léger, who "dislodged the forms".

Deformation is not an embarrassment to him, who moves in the "abstract painting".

According to him, in 1913 and 1914 he even painted "abstract pictures".

In fact, these pictures all have a "lived experience" at their starting point, and are, in fact, variations on a theme — a nude in the workshop, among others.”
Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler

Study of a Nude

Study of a Nude

Study of a Nude

Study of a Nude