The painting entitled Paysage de Cannes au crépuscule (View of Cannes at Dusk) is a late work by Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), one of the great masters of modern art. Signed in red at the top right corner, it is the only work by Picasso in a public collection in Luxembourg.

Dated at the back (30.03.60), this large work depicts a view from the balcony of La Californie, the painter’s villa in Cannes. Picasso and his partner Jacqueline Roque had moved to this house in 1955, seeking light, nature and inspiration in a vast studio. Picasso lived there until 1961.

Following the construction of a building that partially blocked his view onto the sea, Picasso left Cannes for Mougins, where he lived until the end of his life. This event is dramatically brought to life in this highly critical canvas. Picasso’s revolt against uncontrolled urbanization in Cannes in the 1960’s is symbolized by a brown crane in the twilight.

While the painting is dark in most of its composition, a contrasting light rises along the right edge of the canvas. It draws the viewer’s eye to a “white spot”, a stylized bird reminiscent of the famous Dove of Peace created by Picasso in 1949 for the World Congress of Partisans for Peace.

Before painting this large canvas, Picasso made several smaller studies of pigeons. The bush with its birds in the central part of the painting and the wrought-iron elements of the balustrade also appear in his oil painting Pigeons devant la fenêtre (Pigeons in front of the window).

The landscape is an image in an image, an interior landscape. Inspired by the “interior/exterior” landscapes by Henri Matisse (1869-1954) in which the exterior invades in the interior, Picasso developed this concept in the 1950s.