This was achieved by Anthony Bourached, a behavioral neuroscience researcher, and George Cann, a Martian gas specialist, who developed an innovative technique.
A painting of a nude woman by Pablo Picasso that was hidden under one of his “blue period” masterpieces for over a century has been recreated by scientists from UCL using a combination of X-rays, AI, and 3D printing. (Photo: UCL News)
Researchers at University College London (UCL) have used artificial intelligence (AI) to resurrect a painting of a nude woman by artist Pablo Picasso, which had been hidden for more than a century under one of his “blue period” masterpieces.
Anthony Bourached, who is researching a machine learning and behavioral neuroscience, and George Cann, a space scientist from the United Kingdom, recreated the full-size, full-color painting with raised textured brush strokes through a combination of spectroscopic imagery, AI, and 3D printing.
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The painting of a crouching nude woman was found beneath ‘The Blind Man’s Meal,’ which was completed in 1903 and is exhibited at New York’s Metropolitan Museum.
This hidden image, which has been dubbed ‘The Lonesome Crouching Nude,’ is also depicted as an unfinished painting in the background of another famous Picasso artwork, ‘La Vie’ (Life), which is on show at the Cleveland Museum of Art.
The process of revealing works of art painted underneath others is achieved thanks to a combination of X-rays, artificial intelligence, and 3D printing.
Bourached explained that Picasso made the painting of the woman early in his career, during the blue period.
Picasso’s blue period, 1901-1904, gets its name from the color that dominated his paintings after the suicide of Carlos Casagemas, who was also a painter, a poet, and the artist’s best friend.
Cann, a UK Space Agency scientist at UCL who is conducting research on traces of gases in the Martian atmosphere, added that, “at the time Picasso painted ‘The Lonesome Crouching Nude’ and ‘The Blind Man’s Meal’, he was poor and artist materials were expensive.”
The researchers believe that the first work was probably covered up by the paint used on the second work.
This idea stems from the fact that the woman who appears under ‘The Blind Man’s Meal’ is also found in ‘La Vie’ and some other Picasso sketches. “This suggests he may have had an affinity for this woman.”
Cann thinks that Picasso would be happy to learn that the treasure he hid for future generations has finally come to light, 118 years after the painting was first covered up.
“I also hope that the woman within the portrait would be happy in knowing that she hadn’t been erased from history,” he said.
According to UCL, “to help ensure the recreation was as close in look, feel and tone to the original, they developed an artificial intelligence algorithm that analyzed dozens of Picasso’s paintings, and trained itself to understand the artist’s style.”
The technological process developed by two UCL scientists to bring hidden artworks back to life uses a combination of spectroscopic imaging, artificial intelligence and 3D printing and will, perhaps, bring new paintings by other artists to light.
These reproductions made by the UCL researchers are called “NeoMasters” and are conducted through a company they co-founded called Oxia Palus, which has recreated two other paintings for exhibition so far.
They have reproduced the portrait of a woman found underneath Amadeo Modigliani’s (1884-1920) ‘Portrait of a Girl’, made in 1917. And they have recreated a mountainous landscape found underneath Picasso’s ‘The Crouching Beggar’, painted in 1902.
