Cubism - the history of the art movement, Picasso, Braque, and characteristics
Cubism is the art movement that more than any other shattered the European art tradition, five hundred years old, of depicting reality as the eye sees it. When Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque began splitting faces, guitars, and bottles into faceted planes in Paris around 1907, they created an entirely new visual language - one in which an object could be seen from the front, in profile, and from below at the same time. For anyone who loves art, Cubism is not merely a historical footnote but the starting point of all modern painting, and its geometric motifs live on in paintings and posters in thousands of Swedish homes even today.
This fact page is intended to become the most comprehensive Swedish resource on Cubism: its origins, its two phases, its pioneers, the works that changed art history, and the techniques that made them possible. We also look at how the movement was received in Sweden, what a Cubist work costs at auction today, and how you can bring the movement’s geometric visual language into your own home through graphic art. Each section is based on verifiable facts from museums such as Moderna Museet and the Museum of Modern Art.
Contents
↓ What is Cubism?
↓ The birth and history of Cubism
↓ Cubism’s most important works
↓ Technique, style, and characteristics
↓ Cubism’s legacy and influence
↓ Cubism at home
↓ Timeline
↓ Related art movements
↓ Frequently asked questions about Cubism
What is Cubism?
Cubism is an art movement that emerged in Paris around 1907 and broke subjects down into geometric, faceted forms to show them from several viewpoints simultaneously. Instead of depicting an object as it appears to the eye in a single moment, the Cubists constructed images from fragments that described the object from different angles. The Renaissance’s unified pictorial space, based on linear perspective, was thus completely dissolved - and this very break is why art historians regard Cubism as the true zero point of modern art.
Quick facts: Origins: Paris, around 1907. Founders: Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) and Georges Braque (1882–1963). First work: Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907), 243.9 × 233.7 cm, now at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Phases: analytical Cubism (around 1908–1912) and synthetic Cubism (from 1912). Term coined: by critic Louis Vauxcelles in the newspaper Gil Blas on November 14, 1908. Auction record: Picasso’s Femme assise (1909) sold for $63.4 million at Sotheby’s in 2016 - the most expensive Cubist painting ever. Swedish collection: Moderna Museet in Stockholm owns works by Picasso, Braque, and Fernand Léger.
The movement’s name was originally a mocking expression. When Braque exhibited landscapes at the Salon d'Automne in 1908, critic Louis Vauxcelles described them in Gil Blas as reduced to “geometric basic forms, to cubes.” The expression stuck, and the word “cubisme” was already in common use among painters and critics by the end of 1909. One of the 20th century’s most influential movements thus got its name from a reviewer who actually wanted to dismiss it.
To understand how radical the approach was, it is worth remembering what Cubism broke with. Since the Renaissance, European painting had been based on the illusion of a three-dimensional space seen through a window, with a single, fixed viewer's perspective. The Cubists rejected this five-hundred-year-old convention. They realized that a painting is fundamentally a flat surface, and that the artist is therefore free to construct the image according to the logic of the idea rather than that of the eye. This insight - that the image is an independent construction rather than a window onto reality - is perhaps Cubism's most important contribution to art history, and it underlies almost everything called modern art.
The birth and history of Cubism
Cubism's main period is generally dated from 1907 to 1914, when the movement was interrupted by the outbreak of the First World War. But the seeds had been sown earlier. Two influences were decisive: Paul Cézanne's late landscapes, in which nature was simplified to "the cylinder, the sphere and the cone," and the encounter with African and Iberian sculpture, whose simplified, mask-like faces Picasso studied in Paris. From this intersection emerged a kind of painting that no longer sought to imitate visual perception but to analyze the structure of form.
Cézanne's legacy and the African masks
Paul Cézanne died in 1906, and the following year a major memorial exhibition was held in Paris that proved decisive for the younger generation. Cézanne's method of allowing planes to flow into one another and of painting the same subject from slightly shifted angles became a direct model for Cubism's fragmentation. At the same time, non-European art gave Picasso a visual language freed from academic naturalism - a visual language that emerges with full force in Les Demoiselles d'Avignon.
Picasso and Braque - an unparalleled collaboration
Between 1909 and 1914, Picasso and Braque worked so closely that their works are at times difficult to tell apart. Braque himself described the relationship as "two mountain climbers tied to the same rope." They visited each other's studios daily, scrutinized each other's canvases, and jointly drove the development from fragmentation to collage. This radical co-authorship is one of the best-known creative partnerships in art history and explains why Cubism developed so rapidly during just a few intense years.
After 1912, more names joined the movement. Juan Gris refined Synthetic Cubism with clear colors and a rigorous composition, while Fernand Léger developed a distinctive, tubular variant often called "Tubism." The war scattered the group in 1914 - Braque and Léger were called up - but by then the movement had already spread far beyond Paris.
Alongside Picasso and Braque, there was also a broader circle of so-called Salon Cubists who exhibited together and brought the movement to public attention. Artists such as Albert Gleizes and Jean Metzinger published Du cubisme in 1912, the movement's first theoretical treatment, and that same year a number of Cubists came together in the notable Section d'Or exhibition in Paris. While Picasso and Braque themselves rarely explained their intentions in words, these theorists gave Cubism an intellectual framework and spread its ideas to an international audience.
Cubism's most important works
A handful of paintings carry the history of the entire movement. Here are the works that every account of Cubism must pass through, from the first shock in 1907 to the colorful collages of the 1910s. Together, they chart how the movement moved from analysis to synthesis in less than a decade.
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907)
Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon is widely regarded as the first Cubist painting and the work that opened the door to all of modern art. The canvas measures 243.9 × 233.7 cm and depicts five female figures whose bodies are broken into angular planes and whose faces are partly mask-like. The Museum of Modern Art in New York acquired the painting in 1939 through Lillie P. Bliss's bequest, and it has since hung among the collection's absolute highlights. The work shocked even Picasso's closest friends when it was shown, and it took years for its significance to be fully understood.
Femme assise and the analytical phase
Picasso's Femme assise from 1909 depicts the model and the artist's then-partner Fernande Olivier, painted during a summer in the Spanish village of Horta de Ebro. The work is a textbook example of analytical Cubism: the face and body are broken down into small, muted planes in brown, gray and ochre. The fact that this particular work sold for £43.2 million in 2016 - equivalent to $63.4 million - at Sotheby's in London, thereby becoming the most expensive Cubist painting ever sold at auction, says something about how highly the market values the movement's early years today.
Braque's collages and the synthetic turn
In 1912, Georges Braque became the first to paste cut-out pieces of paper directly onto the canvas - the papier collé technique. With works built from wallpaper, newsprint and imitation wood grain, Cubism shifted from analyzing forms to reassembling them. Colors became brighter, and letters, sheet music and everyday objects became part of the image. Braque's auction record stands at £10.1 million for Paysage à La Ciotat (1907), set at Christie's in 2010 - a reminder that, although Braque was as central as Picasso, he long remained in the shadow of his partner on the market.
"I paint objects as I think them, not as I see them." – Pablo Picasso, quoted in John Golding's standard work Cubism (1959)
Technique, style and characteristics
So what is it that makes an image Cubist? The movement has several recognizable signatures, and they differ clearly between the analytical and synthetic phases. Below, we go through the most important devices, all of which were established as early as the period 1908-1914.
Several Viewpoints at Once
The most fundamental Cubist device is to show an object from several angles in the same image. A bottle may be depicted both from above and from the side, a face both in profile and from the front. The viewer is forced to assemble the parts into a whole, making the observer an active co-creator rather than a passive recipient. Picasso formulated this principle in his famous statement about painting objects as he thought of them.
Analytical Cubism and the Muted Palette
During the analytical phase, approximately from 1908 to 1912, subjects were broken down into ever more numerous and smaller planes until they became almost unrecognizable. The color palette was deliberately reduced to brown, gray, and ochre, almost monochromatic, because strong colors would have disrupted the eye's reading of the complicated forms. The images can therefore seem difficult to read at first glance - they require one to linger and slowly discern a guitar, a newspaper, or a face from the pattern of facets.
Synthetic Cubism, Papier Collé, and Collage
From 1912 onward, the movement turned toward Synthetic Cubism. Images were now built up from already finished, simplified forms, and real materials were pasted onto the canvas: newspaper clippings, wallpaper, and imitation wood grain. Papier collé - pasted paper pieces - became an entirely new technique and a direct precursor to all twentieth-century collage art. Colors became brighter and compositions clearer, and art approached abstraction for the first time without completely abandoning representation.
Everyday Subjects and the Graphic Surface
The Cubists did not turn to dramatic or elevated subjects. On the contrary, they painted guitars, bottles, newspapers, pipes, and café tables - everyday objects. This downplaying of the subject, in favor of the intrinsic value of form and surface, is a central part of Cubism's modern character and one reason the movement's visual language translates so well to graphic art and poster formats even today.
Passepartout and Shallow Picture Space
A technical characteristic that unites the entire movement is its deliberately shallow picture space. Whereas earlier painting created depth through perspective and aerial perspective, Cubism compresses the space so that foreground and background merge into almost the same plane. Objects seem to float close to the surface of the canvas, while shadows and volume are suggested rather than described. The result is an image that constantly reminds the viewer that it is precisely a painted surface - one of several reasons why Cubist works retain their power even in small formats and as prints.
The Legacy and Influence of Cubism
Few movements have had such a far-reaching impact. As early as the 1910s, the ideas of Cubism spread to a range of new movements across Europe, and the movement is now regarded as fundamental to virtually all the abstract art that followed.
From Futurism to Constructivism
Italian Futurism took over Cubism’s fragmentation but charged it with movement and speed. In Russia, Constructivism and Suprematism built further on the geometric planes, and in France, the experiments led towards pure abstraction. The paths Wassily Kandinsky and Piet Mondrian took towards non-representational art can also be traced back to the freedom from representation that Cubism first made conceivable.
Picasso’s Later Cubism and Guernica
Cubism did not die with the First World War. Picasso carried its visual language with him throughout his life, and in his most famous work, Guernica from 1937, he combined Cubism’s fragmented forms with charged political content. The black-and-white, flat composition, more than seven metres wide, shows how the movement’s approach could convey even the deepest gravity. The fact that Cubism’s visual language could be charged with everything from still lifes to the horrors of war is one of the clearest proofs of its enduring power as a language rather than a style.
Cubism in Sweden and Moderna Museet
Cubism reached Sweden in the early 1910s, primarily through Swedish artists who travelled to Paris and Berlin. Foremost among them was Gösta Adrian-Nilsson, known as GAN (1884–1965), who is considered a pioneer of Swedish modernism. When he arrived in Paris in 1920, he became acquainted with Fernand Léger, and during his first years there he painted a series of austere compositions in the spirit of synthetic Cubism. His compatriot Otto G. Carlsund studied at Léger’s Académie Moderne. Today, Moderna Museet in Stockholm owns significant works by Cubism’s pioneers Picasso, Braque and Léger, making it the obvious place to experience the movement up close in Sweden.
Cubism at Home - A Practical Guide
Cubism’s geometric visual language is one of the easiest to bring into an interior, precisely because it is graphic and clear. A Cubist-inspired artwork gives a room structure and intellectual weight without requiring the strong colour contrasts on which, for example, Expressionism relies. The muted earth tones of the analytical phase - brown, grey and ochre - also harmonise naturally with wood, linen and other materials that are common in the Scandinavian home.
If you want more vibrancy, choose motifs in the lighter colour palette of synthetic Cubism instead, or pure geometric abstractions that carry the movement’s ideas forward. A Cubist poster works excellently as an anchor in a gallery wall alongside graphic and abstract motifs, as the faceted forms tie different styles together. In our range of abstract posters and graphic posters, you’ll find several motifs that connect with the movement’s sense of form.
Also consider the format. A Cubist motif with many small planes benefits from being hung in a larger format, so the details have room to be read, while a more restrained geometric composition works well even as a smaller painting in a grouping. A living room can easily accommodate a large, dominant work above the sofa, while a hallway or home office suits a denser collection of several smaller motifs in related colors.
Tip: Give a Cubist painting plenty of space around it. The faceted forms are visually intense, so a simple, slim frame in black or natural wood and a calm surrounding area allow the motif to breathe. If you want to build a collection, combine a geometric motif with two or three calmer abstract works in the same muted color palette - this creates a considered whole without making the room feel cluttered.
For those who want to learn more about hanging and combining art, we have several guides: read more about creating a gallery wall, framing art, and abstract posters for more inspiration for a thoughtfully designed interior.
Timeline of Cubism
Cubism's intense years of development can be summarized in a chronology from its early influences to the movement's spread.
1906: Paul Cézanne dies, and a memorial exhibition the following year becomes a decisive source of inspiration for the young painters in Paris.
1907: Picasso completes Les Demoiselles d'Avignon - the work regarded as the starting point of Cubism.
1908: Braque exhibits landscapes at the Salon d'Automne; critic Louis Vauxcelles describes them as "cubes" in Gil Blas on November 14, giving the movement its name.
1909: Picasso paints Femme assise in Horta de Ebro; the word "cubisme" is now in common use. The analytical phase begins.
1910-1911: Analytical Cubism reaches its peak with highly fragmented, almost monochrome works.
1912: Braque introduces papier collé; Synthetic Cubism takes shape through collage and lighter colors. Gleizes and Metzinger publish Du cubisme, and Juan Gris emerges as a leading figure.
1914: The First World War breaks out; Braque and Léger are called up, and the pioneering circle is scattered.
1920s: The ideas of Cubism spread internationally; in Sweden, GAN and Otto G. Carlsund carried the movement forward after meeting Léger in Paris.
1937: Picasso paints Guernica and shows that Cubism's visual language can also convey the deepest seriousness.
Related art movements and artists
Cubism lies at the center of an entire network of modern movements. The movement's leading founder is explored on our page about Pablo Picasso, and it was Henri Matisse who, according to tradition, first spoke of Braque's "little cubes." The path onward toward the non-representational is described on the pages about abstract art and the pioneer Wassily Kandinsky, while Surrealism took over from Cubism as Paris's leading avant-garde movement. Cubism's geometric visual language also lived on in the decorative Art Deco style of the 1920s. For an overview of how everything fits together, see our comprehensive art history and visit our Knowledge Bank with fact pages about artists and movements. You can also delve further into the movement through Wikipedia's article on Cubism, the collection at Moderna Museet, and the page for Les Demoiselles d'Avignon at MoMA. Dadaism arose in parallel as modernism's most provocative revolt - read more about Dadaism.
Would you like to explore a related movement? Read our in-depth article on Futurism - the Italian avant-garde movement that made speed and movement into art.
Frequently asked questions about Cubism
Do you want to bring the geometric sense of form of Cubism into your own home? Explore our range of abstract posters, our famous artists, and our guide to decorating with posters to find designs that carry the movement's legacy forward.