Man on a Balcony
| Man on a Balcony | |
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| French: L'Homme au balcon | |
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| Artist | Albert Gleizes |
| Year | 1912 |
| Medium | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 195.6 cm × 114.9 cm (77 in × 45.25 in) |
| Location | Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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 Curator Michael Taylor discussing Gleizes' Man on a Balcony, Philadelphia Museum of Art |
Man on a Balcony (also known as Portrait of Dr. Théo Morinaud and 'L'Homme au balcon), is a large oil painting created in 1912 by the French artist, theorist and writer Albert Gleizes (1881–1953). The painting was exhibited in Paris at the Salon d'Automne of 1912 (no. 689). The Cubist contribution to the salon created a controversy in the French Parliament about the use of public funds to provide the venue for such 'barbaric art'. Gleizes was a founder of Cubism, and demonstrates the principles of the movement in this monumental painting (over six feet tall) with its projecting planes and fragmented lines. The large size of the painting reflects Gleizes's ambition to show it in the large annual salon exhibitions in Paris, where he was able with others of his entourage to bring Cubism to wider audiences.
In February 1913, Gleizes and other artists introduced the new style of modern art known as Cubism to an American audience at the Armory Show in New York City, Chicago and Boston. In addition to Man on a balcony (no. 196), Gleizes exhibited his 1910 painting Femme aux Phlox (Museum of Fine Arts, Houston).
Man on a Balcony was reproduced in L'Excelsior, Au Salon d'Automne, Les Indépendants, 2 October 1912. It was then reproduced in Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques, a collection of essays by Guillaume Apollinaire published in 1913 The painting was completed around the same time as Albert Gleizes co-authored with Jean Metzinger a major treatise titled Du "Cubisme" (the first and only manifesto on Cubism). Man on a Balcony was purchased at the 1913 Armory show by the lawyer, author, art critic, private art collector, and American proponent of Cubism Arthur Jerome Eddy for $540. Gleizes' Man on a Balcony was the frontispiece of Arthur Jerome Eddy's book Cubists and Post-Impressionism, March 1914. The painting later formed part of the Louise and Walter Conrad Arensberg Collection, 1950. It is currently in the permanent collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
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