This image by Francis Picabia is entitled “Le Saint des Saints, c’est de moi qu’il s’agit dans ce portrait,” which translates to mean “The holy of the holies is to me that it is in this picture,” which, of course, sounds crazy to any normal person looking at this image. When I first looked at Picabia’s images, my initial reaction was: “What?!” I had to do a little research on him before I even felt comfortable attempting this blog entry.

 Once I learned a little about Picabia and his portraits mécaniques, I felt a little less confused. Apparently, Picabia used these strange mechanical images to inspire people to question his art. The questioning of whether or not these images were art, essentially, made them art. He mixed mechanical images with other mechanical images and connected them to the human experience through his titles.

This particular image appears to be, maybe, a steam engine of some kind, mixed with something that resembles a camera or a horn. Even just looking at the image, I struggle to classify it. However, what makes this image even odder is the title. How is this steam engine / camera / horn hybrid “holy” and what makes it the “holy of holies”? My first instinct, and one that ties in with the war, would be the reverence people had for machinery – for human creations intended to make life “easier” or “better.” Strangely, during the war, people were even seen as “machinery” in a sense. They worked together as one to “further” the human condition. So, Picabia was probably being ironic and sarcastic when he called this mechanism “holy,” but he clearly reflected prevailing views of his time.