Picasso’s The Blue Room painting was one of his first creation’s during his “blue period”. The painting was produced in 1901. This period was an iconic time for the artist, in which he focused on gloomy content and mostly used various shades of blue. Picasso’s “blue period” spanned over several years.

This piece now has artists speculating over a mysterious aspect of the painting, a hidden portrait of a man. Art experts are working to, and hoping that they will be able to, identify this man. Art experts are able to distinguish that the portrait is of a bearded man in a jacket and a bow tie. The man is resting his hand on the side of his face. The venture to discover this portrait’s subject has been going on for five years now.

The hunt to find the painting’s hidden meaning began in 2008, when the hidden image was “officially” discovered. Discovering its abnormality required flipping the painting over then many, many hours of examination from both scientists and experts.

Recently, The Associated Press had the opportunity to get a tour of the progress that these art experts have been making thus far. The Blue Room portrait was revealed for the first time during this tour. The painting has belonged to The Phillips Collection since 1927.

When Picasso was in Paris he painted over the man on a whim of inspiration as he began to create The Blue Room. Yet, curators have been unsatisfied with this explanation for decades now, trying to uncover what else there is to this painting, notably why Picasso chose to paint over the man. Their relentless exploration is primarily due to the strange brushstrokes on the painting as they do not match the main composition of a nude woman bathing in Picasso’s studio.

Curator Susan Behrends Frank, told The Associated Press, “When he had an idea, you know, he just had to get it down and realize it. He could not afford to acquire new canvasses every time he had an idea that he wanted to pursue.”

Scholars have already dismissed the possibility of it being a self-portrait. One suspect is Ambrose Villard, a Paris art dealer who hosted Picasso’s first show back in 1901, the year that the painting was created. Nevertheless, there is no proof of this, no documentation or other concrete clues, so scientists continue searching for a definitive answer. According to curators, a technical analysis reveals that the portrait had likely been a work in progress just before The Blue Room was painted.

Curators plan the first exhibit focused on The Blue Room as a seminal work in Picasso’s career for 2017. This exhibit will examine what they hope to discover about the hidden man as well as other works of Picasso including those which he engaged with other artists for.

Conservators have been using various technological tools since the portrait was discovered in order to develop an accurate theory on the painting. Favero and other experts have been scanning the piece with multi-spectral imaging technology and x-ray fluorescence intensity mapping to distinguish the colors used in the hidden portrait. They also hope to reestablish a digital image approximating the colors that Picasso had used.

The Phillips Collection, National Gallery of Art, Cornell University and Delaware’s Winterthur Museum are among the groups who participated in this exploration. A conservator at The Phillips Collectiontold The Associated Press, “It’s really one of those moments that really makes what you do special. We’re still working on answering that question.”

Currently, The Blue Room remains part of a tour to South Korea until 2015 as the research persists.

Hidden portrait discovered beneath early Picasso masterpiece

Photo:  Still image from AP video: detail of Picasso’s The Blue Room