Pablo Picasso's Une Anatomie suite of drawings was initially published in the inaugural issue of the Surrealist magazine Minotaure (1933, pp.33-37). These highly sculptural drawings have an afro-totemic skeletal quality and the majority of them appear to be female except for an ithyphallic male, who also possesses a hint of androgyny. Though hardly discussed and rarely illustrated after Minotaure their impact on twentieth-century art was significant, mainly in terms of their influence on sculptors such as  Henry Moore and  Isamu Noguchi .  

Une Anatomie's appearance in Minotaure inevitably associated them with Surrealism. Whilst this provides a useful context it is not an adequate description of Picasso’s intention, especially since on many occasions he expressed his ambivalence towards Surrealism. Clearly, the drawings are figurative, but what was their collective raison d’être? 

My three-dimensional transcriptions of the anatomy drawings and the following essay attempt to arrive at a raison d’être, which, I am proposing, involves a near drowning Goddess, polluted water and gratitude for divine intervention. (Fench version)

Pablo Picasso Une Anatomie : 1933-2022 (essay) > (English)

Pablo Picasso Une Anatomie : 1933-2022 (essai) > (French)

The 3D versions of Une Anatomie were exhibited in the Sigmund Freud Museum, London, in 1999 >>