The German state of Bavaria has acquired Pablo Picasso’s 1911 painting Woman with a Violin for the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich with support from an array of private and state sponsors, including the national government.
The painting belonged to a private collector who had loaned it to the Pinakothek der Moderne since 2014. The acquisition was funded by the Bavarian state government, the federal culture ministry, the Ernst von Siemens Art Foundation, the States’ Cultural Foundation, the Würth Group, a manufacturer of screws and tools, and Fritz Schäfer, a private patron.
“Thanks to terrific collaboration between political institutions, foundations, business and private sponsors, this iconic work by Picasso will have its home in the heart of the cultural metropolis of Munich,” Markus Blume, the Bavarian culture minister, said in a press release.
Woman with a Violin was first shown in Germany in 1912, in an exhibition in Cologne. It was purchased from Daniel Henry Kahnweiler by the famous dealer Alfred Flechtheim and shown in the first international Picasso retrospective at the Galerie Heinrich Thannhauser in Munich in 1913. After changing hands twice, it was purchased at some point between 1927 and 1931 by the Krefeld textiles manufacturer Hermann Lange and remained in his family until the newly announced acquisition.
The latest purchasers did not reveal the price paid for the painting, though the States’ Cultural Foundation said it had contributed €1.35m. Claudia Roth, the German culture minister, described the painting as “a masterpiece of Cubism of priceless art historical value.”
The Pinakothek der Moderne said the painting fills a gap: “Until now, the Munich collections had no central work devoted to analysing the human form from Picasso’s peak period,” said Oliver Kase, the director of Bavaria’s Modern collections. The painting is a “splendid” complement to two earlier Cubist Picassos in the collection and George Braques’ 1910 Woman With a Mandolin, he said.
The newly framed Woman with a Violin is on display in a gallery of Cubist works at the Pinakothek der Moderne.
