Nude Woman In A Red Armchair

The image I've chosen is a painting by Pablo Picasso called Ð''Nude Woman in a Red Armchair,' painted in 1932. In the immediate foreground of the painting, a plump woman is sitting on an armchair; naked with only a bead necklace around her neck. The woman and the chair do not face the viewer directly; they are slightly angled to our left. Her two eyes seem to be looking at two different direction to her lower right. Her nose is straight and her hair is straight and short. Her right breast is outlines in a silhouette with black line while her left breast hangs out of place in the middle of her chest. The left breast is a solid white circular form with black outlines. This circular form also happens to be in the very middle of the painting. Her left leg is crossed over her right. Her elbows rest on the arms of the chair and her head rests in her hands. The bottom of the frame cuts her just above her knees. She fills around 80% of the frame and it is hard to figure what is around her and where she is, except for a few lines suggesting the ceiling and the walls.

The painting is created with blocks of simple colors which complement one another and repeated shapes. The woman is painted as series of fluid curves and circles that translate the shapes of her body. Picasso divides her face in half. The right half of her face (from our point of view) is in soft violet grey and the left half is in a much paler grey. Her nose is represented twice, once as a single black line, running across the left eyebrow down to the bridge of the nose and tits tip. Next, the edge of violet grey paints her in profile, creating a double image of the woman. The center parting of her hair accentuates this double image idea. To our right, the hair is soft green while the left half of the hair is yellow.

The curves of her body are emphasized with strong black outlines, which seem to accentuates her body contour. Her hands, in which her face is rested on, are boneless and look as if they were dove's wings. Her rounded body is contrasted with the abrupt right-angle of the chair's back. The chair's dark brown wooden frame and red cushion enhances her luminuous color. The curled-up arms of the chair encircle her in an embrace and somewhat mirror the shapes of her arms.

Her arms also echo the erotic anatomy of her sensuous hip and thighs. Her

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