Guitar in Front of the Sea

Painted in 1925, Guitar in Front of the Sea is one of the last works created by Juan Gris. Despite its apparent simplicity, the painting carries forward the compositional ideas he developed a decade earlier, in 1915. The scene features a table—doubling as a windowsill—on which rest a guitar, sheet music or a book, a playing card, a piece of fruit, and a folded newspaper. Beyond the window, the viewer glimpses a vivid blue sky, the sea with a sailboat, and distant mountains. The folded newspaper, suspended in the air, cleverly becomes part of the window frame, while the raised book or sheet music creates a volumetric space where the playing card and fruit stand out. The guitar, at once flat and dimensional, is broken into segments, blurring surface and depth. This painting forgoes the formal and technical complexity of Gris's earlier Cubist period.

P.S. Want to understand how a guitar, a fruit, and a newspaper can redefine space? Learn how Cubism reshaped the way we see in our online course: Cubism 101: Picasso, Braque and the Others. 

P.P.S. Different artistic styles were distinguished by various features. For example, Cubism showed multiple perspectives of the same subject in a single painting. Can you recognize what characterized other art movements? Test yourself in our Guess the Art Movement QUIZ!