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But already by the early autumn, Skov seems to have realized that
his work had reached a limit of sorts as regards further experimentation in
this direction of simplification. The formality of the approach was
becoming constraining instead of liberating his creativity, and he
obviously needed to re-examine and redirect the focus of his work.
To regain his
perspective on his work, he and Isabella therefore decided to take a
vacation away from Copenhagen in September travelling to Italy and France. After seeing several art exhibitions in Paris
and Lyon, including one in Lyon showing Picasso’s very latest work, they visited
for a few days in Cagnes and La Colle where they had lived in the
nineteen-thirties. During this
trip they also visited with Pablo Picasso and Francoise Gilot at their
home, “La Galloise”, in Vallauris, and Skov finally had the opportunity to
discuss his sense and understanding of the Cubist pictorial perception with
the older master. As his entire subsequent artistic pursuit clearly documents,
and also according to both Isabella’s and his own accounts afterwards, this visit and the discussions with
Picasso had a profound and lasting effect on Skov. This was because he here
obtained clear and substantial confirmation - directly from the undisputedly
most authentic, originating source - of the aesthetic perceptions and
objectives of Cubism. And he had the opportunity to discuss the various
means of achieving visual concretization of these perceptions. Perhaps it
was unfortunate that the visit took place during the final period of Madame
Gilot’s stay with Picasso, actually one of her last weeks in Valloris, they
later learned, because, although very amiable there was a marked feeling of
tension between the two, Isabella recalled later; however, it is also quite
possible that, precisely therefore, it was a welcome break for Picasso to
receive visitors who had no other aim than to discuss his life’s work.
Skov had come to
admire Picasso, who was his senior by 26 years,
ever since he six years earlier had realized the profound qualities
and revolutionary aspects of the Cubist vision; and the older artist
apparently
quickly grasped that in Skov he had encountered a dedicated painter
with considerable artistic and aesthetic kinship as well as completely
undisguised sincerity. The conversations between the two were in
French
which Skov spoke quite fluently since his early years in France; and during
one particular exchange - one that Skov on many occasions later
would
quote in order to explain to others the important relevance of
movement to pictorial perception - he at once experienced first hand the
legendary,
mercurial swiftness that was characteristic of Picasso, and also
obtained confirming feedback for his own personal interpretation of the
aesthetics
of the perception of movement in Cubist painting. It occurred as the
conversation turned from the aesthetics of Cubism to the interest
for art in Denmark in general. Responding to a question from
Picasso, Skov
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