The Bateau Lavoir Montmartre where Picasso was ‘born’

Walk 1, map of upper Montmartre; route and points of interest of the Montmartre walking tour Montmartre Artists’ Studios © OpenStreetMap contributors, the Open Database Licence (ODbL).

Where is the Bateau Lavoir ?

The Bateau Lavoir artists’ studios is located at 13 Rue Ravignan on Place Emile Goudeau, Montmartre. Picasso rented a workshop here in 1904 and by 1907 had painted The Demoiselles d’Avignon (The Young Ladies of Avignon).

People sitting on a terrace at a cafe in a quiet square in Montmartre Paris. An artist draws the scene from some steps leading from square — The Relais de la Butte Restaurant. In the early 1900s it was known as Chez Père Azon – ‘Dad’ Azon’s place.

You now climb up some steps away from the café, point 1 Pere Azon , and arrive at Place Emile Goudeau, at the top, straight ahead, you will see the site of the Bateau Lavoir artists’ workshops.

An OpenStreetMap detail of the signed route map from Rue Ravignan to Place Emile Goudeau to Rue Gabrielle in Montmartre. The map shows three points of interest; point 1 Pere Azon/Relais de la Butte, point 2 the Bateau Lavoir artists studios and point 3 Picasso’s first studio in Paris in 1900. — Detail of map showing the proximity of point 1 Pere Azon, point 2 the Bateau Lavoir and point 3 Picasso’s first studio Rue Gabrielle. © OpenStreetMap contributors, the Open Database Licence (ODbL).

What does the Bateau Lavoir mean?

Le Bateau Lavoir in French means the laundry boat. Why the laundry boat? There are various explanations: the building was said to resemble the public clothes-washing boats moored on the Seine in the early years of the twentieth century. The ramshakle building was said to strain and groan when it was windy—just like the laundry boats on the Seine, or was it the permanent display of artists’ drying clothes? Whatever the reason the name stuck.

The building was originally a piano workshop. By the early 1900s it had been cheaply and hastily converted into rough and ready studios by shoving up some wood and plaster partitions. The result was a bewildering maze-like conglomerate structure. Contemporary accounts speak of a confusing warren of corridors, creaking stairs, groaning floorboards and damp walls.

From the main entrance stairs led down to the main body of the building. There were also a number of secondary entrances. Because the building was set on a steep slope accounts differ about how many floors it actually contained, some said two, others three.

None of the studios had electricity or gas at this time. If there was money to buy fuel there was a stove for heating and cooking and an oil lamp or candles for light. Sweltering in summer, cold and damp in winter, there was one source of cold running water for the whole building.

1904 Picasso moves in to the Bateau Lavoir

Whilst property prices and rents in Montmartre are today sky-high, in the early years of the 20th century they were very cheap. By 1904 Picasso managed to get a studio in this building.

A general view of the Bateau Lavoir artists studios and workshops. The view is from Rue Ravignan looking west. Many tourists and visitors are visible. — General view of the Bateau Lavoir artists studios and workshops. The current building replaces the original from Picasso’s time burnt down in 1970.

Fernande Olivier joins Picasso in the Bateau Lavoir

Pablo Picasso was soon joined by the artist’s model Fernande Olivier. She became his companion and muse, the subject of many paintings of this period. The beginning of his relationship with Olivier was surely an influence in Picasso’s change of style. He shifted from the hunger and hardship of his Blue Period to the lighter and warmer Rose Period.

Fernande Olivier wrote about her life with Picasso in the Bateau Lavoir during these years in her memoir Picasso and his Friends.

When she was when invited to visit Picasso’s working and living space for the first time, she used a long list to convey neatly how her keen eye skipped around the disorder of Picasso’s studio.

“…The base of a bed on four legs in one corner. A rusty little cast iron stove on which was placed an earthenware wash bowl…A wicker chair, easels, canvases of every size, tubes of paint scattered on the floor, paintbrushes, jerrycans (for the petrol lamps), a bowl of etching acid, no curtains…It was the end of the Blue Period. Large unfinished paintings were standing upright in the workshop; everything bore witness to work but work in one hell of a mess”…

Just how poor Picasso was at this time remains controversial. He was able to travel frequently between Spain and Paris in his early Paris years and later would regularly take off to the French countryside or Spain for painting trips and to escape the Parisian summer heat.

HQ of modern art and its network of amplifiers and influencers

Among the other short or long-term leaseholders in the Bateau Lavoir were: Juan Gris, Kees van Dongen and Amedeo Modigliani.

The poets, writers, essayists and critics who helped amplify Picasso’s reputation and influence avant-garde opinion among gallery owners and private buyers were chiefly Guillaume Apollinaire, André Salmon and Max Jacob.

The most important early buyers of modern art were the American brother and sister Leo and Gertrude Stein. Both had an eye for originality and quality. They lived in Paris.

The Steins get interested

It was Leo Stein who first noticed work by Picasso. It was not long before Leo and Gertrude Stein found their way up the hill to Montmartre and were regular visitors and buyers at Picasso’s home and workplace.

Gertrude Stein had her portrait painted by Picasso at the Bateau Lavoir in 1906. Because the painting required many sittings, Stein and Picasso soon became friendly and Picasso was regularly invited to Gertrude Stein’s artistic evenings in her apartment at 27 Rue de Fleurus not far from the Luxembourg Gardens. It was here that he first saw works by Henri Matisse bought by his host.

Le Bateau Lavoir and Les Demoiselles d’Avignon

It was in his studio in the Bateau Lavoir in 1907 that Picasso painted Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (The Young Ladies of Avignon). The picture is generally considered by art historians to be modern art’s first painting. It remains one of his most famous and greatest works.

If you are interested in finding out some more about Les Demoiselles d’Avignon and the painters, paintings and artistic movements that influenced its conception and final form then please look at the Demoiselles d’Avignon influences page.

Reconstructing the Bateau Lavoir

On the 12th of May 1970 the Bateau Lavoir complex that Picasso and his contemporaries had known was gutted by fire.

The building you see today is a reconstruction. The site is still used as artists’ studios but cannot be visited. Outside the studios you will see a metal Paris mayor’s office historical information panel in French and a window display. The first few lines of the panel are interesting because they convey Picasso’s feelings about his modest Montmartre home before his star rose.

Here is my translation of those first lines:

The information panel put up by the Mayor of Paris

The Bateau Lavoir.

‘ “ We will all go back to the Bateau Lavoir the only place where we were really happy”…Right up to his death, Picasso (1881 – 1973) remained nostalgic for the rural Montmartre of his youth with its farms, orchards, and colourful cabarets.’