Owls can be found throughout Picasso's career, in all manner of styles and mediums. His Owl ceramics were particularly charming, with the spout of the item being used as the bird's beak.
In this section we examine two of his best known drawings, which bear similar looks to his portraits of Dog, Camel and Penguin.
Picasso is known to have taken in several animals through a variety of means, sometimes taking on friends' own pets, whilst in other cases finding stray birds and animals which were in need of care and attention.
An owl was one such creature who Pablo helped to restore to it's best health and this helped to impart a general love of owls on him.
Owl Sketch is one of the many works produced by Picasso which concerns owls. Owls occur again and again in Picasso's work. This sketch is a line drawing produced by Picasso. It is extraordinarily simple but is, in my opinion, charming in its simplicity.
As mentioned above Pablo Picasso produced many works concerning owls. This love for owls seems to have been influenced by his love for classical themes. The owl possibly (with this context in mind) represents wisdom and intelligence. It is worth noting also that in the area where Picasso spent much of his later life the owl had been the traditional symbol of the tribe that had once inhabited the area.
He at one point even owned an owl as a pet, in fact, one friend tells a story of how “While Pablo was still working at the Musée d’Antibes [in 1946, the photographer Michel] Sima had come to us one day with a little owl he had found in a corner of the museum. One of his claws had been injured. We bandaged it and it gradually healed. We bought a cage for him and when we returned to Paris we brought him back with us and put him in the kitchen with the Canaries, the pigeons and the turtledoves. He smelt awful and ate nothing but mice." It is worth noting that most of Pablos works concerning owls are ceramic in nature.
These works include one particularly famous work simply titled "Owl". Owl was produced in 1947 and helps show how Pablo's skill with ceramics had increased during this time. The "owl" is particularly notable for using the base of the jug as the bird's feet. This piece is currently on display at the MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) in New York.
However, Owl sketch is one of his works concerning owls which is not ceramic. This work is part of Picasso's range of "line art". Picasso was heavily influenced by the early 20th-century style of primitive art in the creation of his line art. These works mostly deal with animals and reflect his enduring love for animals. These images are hugely popular most likely due to the energy they exude. They stand out for being so simple and yet they show a mastery of the craft of drawing due to how expertly Picasso manages to use so view lines to convey the idea of the animal. It truly reflects Picasso's skill that he was able to create these animals in an almost life-like manner using only a few short, simple lines.
