Unique style and divine endowment allowed Picasso to influence evolution contemporary art and throughout the art world.
Pablo Picasso was born in 1881 in Malaga, Spain. He discovered his talent at an early age and entered the School of Fine Arts when he was 15 years old.
The artist spent most of his life in his beloved France. In 1904 he moved to Paris, and in 1947 he moved to the sunny south of the country.
The work of Picasso is divided into unique and interesting periods.
His early "blue period" began in 1901 and lasted about three years. Much of the artwork created during this time is characterized by human suffering, poverty, and shades of blue.
The "Pink Period" lasted for about a year, beginning in 1905. This phase is characterized by a lighter rose-gold and rose-gray palette, and the characters are mostly itinerant artists.
The picture that Picasso painted in 1907 marked the transition to a new style. The artist single-handedly changed the course of contemporary art. These were the "Avignon Maidens", which caused a lot of upheaval in the then society. The depiction of nude prostitutes in the cubist style became a real scandal, but served as the basis for subsequent conceptual and surrealist art.
On the eve of World War II, during the conflict in Spain, Picasso created another brilliant work - the painting "Guernica". The immediate source of inspiration was the bombing of Guernica, the canvas personifies the protest of the artist who condemned fascism.
In his work, Picasso devoted much time to the study of comedy and fantasy. He also realized himself as a graphic artist, sculptor, decorator and ceramist. The master was constantly working, creating great amount illustrations, drawings and designs of whimsical content. On the final stage his career he painted variations of famous paintings by Velasquez and Delacroix.
Pablo Picasso died in 1973 in France at the age of 91, having created 22,000 works of art.
Paintings by Pablo Picasso:
Boy with a pipe, 1905
This painting of an early Picasso refers to " pink period”, he wrote it shortly after arriving in Paris. It depicts a boy with a pipe in his hand and a wreath of flowers on his head.
Old guitarist, 1903
The picture refers to blue period» works of Picasso. It depicts an old, blind and impoverished street musician with a guitar. The work is done in shades of blue and is based on expressionism.
Girls of Avignon, 1907
Perhaps the most revolutionary painting in modern art and the first painting in the style of cubism. The master ignored the generally accepted aesthetic rules, shocked the purists and single-handedly changed the course of art. He depicted in a peculiar way five naked prostitutes from a brothel in Barcelona.
A bottle of rum, 1911
Picasso completed this painting in the French Pyrenees, a favorite haunt of musicians, poets and painters, which the Cubists had chosen before the First World War. The work is done in a complex cubist style.
Head, 1913
it famous work became one of the most abstract Cubist collages. The profile of the head can be traced in a semicircle outlined by charcoal, but all elements of the face are significantly reduced to geometric figures.
Still life with compote and glass, 1914-15
Forms of pure color and faceted objects juxtapose and overlap each other to create a harmonious composition. Picasso in this picture demonstrates the practice of collage, which he often uses in his work.
Girl in front of a mirror, 1932
This is a portrait of Picasso's young mistress, Marie-Therese Walter. The model and her reflection symbolize the transition from a girl to a seductive woman.
Guernica, 1937
This painting depicts the tragic nature of war and the suffering of innocent victims. The work is monumental in its scope and significance, and is seen throughout the world as an anti-war symbol and poster for peace.
Weeping woman, 1937
Picasso was interested in the theme of suffering. This detailed painting, with a grimace distorted, deformed face, is considered a continuation of Guernica. 
"Blue" period
The "Blue Period" is perhaps the first stage in the work of Picasso, in relation to which one can speak of the individuality of the master, despite the still sounding notes of influences. The first creative takeoff was provoked by a long depression: in February 1901 in Madrid, Picasso learned about the death of his close friend Carlos Casagemas. On May 5, 1901, the artist came to Paris for the second time in his life, where everything reminded him of Casagemas, with whom he had recently discovered the French capital. Pablo settled in the room where Carlos spent his last days, started an affair with Germain, because of which a friend committed suicide, communicated with the same circle of people. One can imagine what a complex knot the bitterness of loss, a sense of guilt, a sense of the proximity of death were woven into for him ... All this largely served as the "garbage" from which the "blue period" grew. Later, Picasso said: "I plunged into Blue colour when he realized Casagemas was dead"..."Pink" period
The "Pink Period" was relatively short (from the autumn of 1904 to the end of 1906) and not entirely homogeneous. However, a large number of paintings are marked by light colors, the appearance of pearl gray, ocher and pink-red tones; new themes appear and become dominant - actors, acrobats, athletes. The Circus Medrano, located at the foot of the Montmartre hill, certainly provided a lot of material for the artist. Theatricality in its many manifestations (costumes, accentuated gestures), a variety of types of people, beautiful and ugly, young and adults, seemed to return the artist to the world of several transformed, but real forms, volumes, spaces; the images were filled with life again, in contrast to the characters of the "blue period" ..."African" period
The first work that turned Picasso's brushes towards a new figurativeness was the portrait of Gertrude Stein in 1906. After rewriting it about 80 times, the artist despaired of translating the writer into a classical style. The artist was clearly ripe for a new creative period, and following nature ceased to interest him. This canvas can be considered the first step towards the deformation of the form.In 1907, Picasso first encountered archaic African art at an ethnographic exhibition at the Trocadero Museum. Primitive idols, figurines and masks, where the generalized form was freed from the flickering of details, embodied the mighty forces of nature, from which primitive man did not distance himself. The ideology of Picasso, who invariably put art above all else, coincided with the powerful message embedded in these images: for ancient people, art did not serve to decorate everyday life, it was witchcraft that tamed incomprehensible and hostile spirits that controlled earthly life full of danger...
Cubism
Before cubism in European art, one of the main problems has always been the problem of lifelikeness. For several centuries, art has evolved without questioning this task. Even the Impressionists, who opened a new chapter in the history of painting devoted to light, fixing a fleeting impression, also solved the question: how to capture this world on canvas.The impetus for the development of a new language of art, perhaps, was the question: why paint? By the beginning of the XX century. the basics of "correct" drawing could be taught to almost anyone. Photography was actively developing, and it became clear that images of a fixation, technical plan would become her domain. The question arose before the artists: how can art stay alive and relevant in a world where pictorial images becoming more accessible and easier to replicate? Picasso's answer is extremely simple: in the arsenal of painting there are only its own specific means - the plane of the canvas, line, color, light, and it is absolutely not necessary to put them at the service of nature. External world only gives impetus to express the individuality of the creator. The rejection of a plausible imitation of the objective world opened up incredibly wide opportunities for artists. This process proceeded in several directions. In the field of "liberation" of color, Matisse, perhaps, was in the lead, and Braque and Picasso - the founders of cubism - were more interested in form ...
"Classic" period
The 1910s turned out to be quite difficult for Picasso. In 1911, a story surfaced with the purchase and storage of figurines stolen from the Louvre, which demonstrated to Picasso the limitations of his own moral, human strength: he turned out to be unable to directly resist the pressure of power, and to maintain loyalty to friendship (during the first interrogation, he tried to renounce even the very fact acquaintance with Appolinaire, "thanks" to whom he was involved in this unpleasant incident). In 1914 the First World War and it turned out that Picasso was not ready to fight for France, which became his second home. This also separated him from many friends. Marcel Humbert died in 1915...Surrealism
The division of creativity into periods is a standard way to squeeze art into frames and sort it out. In the case of Pablo Picasso, an artist without style or, rather, an artist of many styles, this approach is conventional, but traditionally applied. The period of Picasso's proximity to surrealism chronologically fits into the framework of 1925 - 1932. As a rule, a certain Muse ruled over each stylistic stage in the artist's work. Being married to the ex-ballerina Olga Khokhlova, who longed to “recognize herself on the canvases”, Picasso turned from cubism invented by him together with Georges Braque to neoclassicism.When did a young blonde enter the artist's life
As an artist, Picasso used a wide range of creative styles, including cubism, abstractionism, neoclassicism, surrealism, and expressionism.
Picasso's early works date from 1901 and 1904, now called " blue period". They convey gloomy themes of poverty and despair, painted in monochromatic blue colors depicting elongated, twisted bodies with distorted features. However, in 1905, Picasso redirected his attention to other themes, depicting harlequins and other carnival characters in bright shades of red and pink. Now this time is called pink period».
By the early 1930s, Picasso was becoming more and more immersed in the Cubist style, which is evident in all of his work, turning to bolder colors and more complex contours. All this appeals to surreal, biomorphic motifs. His artistic innovation allowed him to continue to create many works for which he gained fame and fortune. Many of his works have received a place in the ranking of the most expensive paintings in the world. After Picasso, a huge artistic legacy was left, which is still being discussed and continues to excite the art world.
let's consider 10 most expensive and discussed paintings by Pablo Picasso.
10. At the Agile Rabbit or Harlequin with a Glass (1904): $40.7 million
Harlequins and circus performers, presented in brighter and more cheerful colors, are very different from the melancholic " blue period» Picasso. " Harlequin with a glass» was originally created to decorate a bar in Montmartre.
It was rumored that the artist painted the painting in exchange for a free meal at a famous cabaret in Paris.. When it was finished, Picasso showed the work to Frédé, the cabaret owner, who then sold the painting in 1912 for $20. In 1952, the work was acquired by collector Joan Whitney Payson. Then the painting cost $60,000. The work was eventually sold at Sotheby's for $40.7 million.
9 Reading (1932): $40.7 million
This oil portrait depicts Picasso's mistress and muse, Marie-Thérèse Walter, who fell asleep with a book in her lap. Picasso met seventeen-year-old Marie in 1927 when she was leaving the Paris metro, then they began a love affair, which they kept secret due to their age difference, and the fact that Picasso was married to Olga Khokhlova at that time prevented.
Then, seeing in the works of the artist not her facial features, Olga realized that her husband had an affair, and the marriage soon fell apart. Picasso painted Reading"from December 1931 to January 1932, researchers call this time" madly in love period". The painting was sold at Sotheby's in 2011 for $40.7 million, the buyer preferred to remain anonymous.
8. Self-portrait "I, Picasso" (1901): $47.9 million
This self-portrait of Picasso, dated 1901, refer to " blue period at". Although the artist was selling paintings at that time with difficulty, he had already managed to gain popularity. In 1981, Sotheby's went to the famous collector Wendell Cherry for $5.8 million.
When Cherry put it up for auction again in 1989, it sold for $43.5 million plus the 10% promised by Sotheby's, for a total of $47.9 million.
7 The Dream (1932): $48.4 million
Marie Teresa Walter also becomes the main character of this picture. The scene is reminiscent of Reading”, another work from this series, the artist once again captured his muse and mistress sleeping in an armchair. The painting is known for its erotic content., as well as an unpleasant incident that occurred in 2006, when the owner auction house Christie accidentally put his hand on the job, which brought the cost down to $85 million.
While the owner planned to sell it for $139 million prior to this incident, he therefore decided not to auction the painting and took it back. In this way, " Dream» remains in the gallery « Wynn Collection" and to this day.
6 Woman Seated in the Garden (1938): $49.5 million
By this time, Picasso had become fascinated and began to experiment with cubism. This 1938 painting shows Dora Maar in a garden. The French artist, photographer and poet was known for being Picasso's mistress. The portrait is a work in the distinct style of Cubism, an avant-garde movement of the early 20th century that Picasso put a lot of effort into promoting.
It is known that the artist completed this famous work within a day. The painting remained in private collection cellist and composer Daniel Seidenberg until his death in 1997. In 1999, the work was sold at Sotheby's for $49.5 million.
5 Pierrette's Marriage (1905): $51.3 million
This painting by Picasso, dated 1905, refers to " blue period". A monochromatic color palette with hints of blue gives the work a darker look. The scene itself contrasts with the shades: a festive mood is depicted, Harlequin admires the bride. The presence of blurred elements in the background suggests that the picture may not be finished, although the researchers say otherwise.
Art dealer Joseph Stransky, a friend of Picasso, received the painting in 1907. However, between 1945 and 1962, it came into the possession of Paulo Picasso, the artist's son. The financier Frederic Rus bought the work and presented it as a gift to the French government. In 1989, the painting eventually went up for auction and was sold for $51.3 million.
4. Woman with Crossed Arms (1902): $55 million
This refers to " blue period» Picasso. The heroine of the picture, presumably, was a patient of the Saint-Lazare prison hospital in Paris. Gertrude Stein, writer and art collector, was one of the owners of this painting. Picasso also painted a portrait of Gertrude herself in 1906.
In 1936 " Woman with crossed arms"came into the possession of the collector Chauncey McCormick and remained there until 2000. At this time, she was put up for auction by Christie, where she was bought by an anonymous buyer for $ 55 million.
3. Dora Maar with a cat (1941): $95.2 million
The subject of this iconic 1941 painting is surrealist photographer Dora Maar, one of Picasso's most famous muses and mistresses. depicts Dora sitting in a chair, while a small black cat stands behind her. The painting showcases Picasso's brilliant use of bold and vibrant colors, as well as the Cubist style..
For example, the combination of patterns on Dora's dress adds drama to the pose and the overall calmness of the picture. Picasso often viewed Dora as " own muse". In 1963, the painting was sold to a private collection. In the end, in 2006, it was put up for auction by Sotheby's and sold for $ 95.2 million.
2 The Boy with the Pipe (1905): $104 million
This portrait shows a boy wearing a crown of roses and holding a pipe in his hand. The colors used in the painting show that it refers to " pink period", when the artist preferred to use cheerful orange and pink shades, different from gloomy and cold colors" blue period».
John Whitney, the American ambassador to Britain, was the first to purchase the work in 1950 for $30,000. The painting remained in Whitney's private collection until 2004. By that time, Whitney's wife had founded a charitable foundation " Green Tree after John's death in 1982. In 2004, the painting was auctioned by Sotheby's and sold for $104 million, exceeding the preliminary estimate of experts.
1 Nude, Green Leaves and Bust (1932): $106.5 million
This most prized Picasso depicts the artist's muse and mistress, Marie-Thérèse Walter, in the nude. Her bust is a sculpture that Picasso sculpted in 1931. The artist painted a picture in one day, and this the job represents a successful milestone in his career. The painting belongs to the list of the most expensive items sold at auctions.
Picasso had perfected his skills by this time and therefore began to use symbolism in his work. In 1952, collectors bought the painting for $17,000 and it remained in a private collection until 2010, when it was sold at Christie's for $106.5 million.
Pablo Picasso - Spanish painter, the founder of Cubism, according to a 2009 The Times poll the most famous artist XX century.
The future genius was born on October 25, 1881 in Andalusia, in the village of Malaga. José Ruiz's father was a painter. Ruiz did not become famous for his work, so he was forced to get a job at a local museum. visual arts caretaker. Mother Maria Picasso Lopez belonged to a wealthy family of grape plantation owners, but from childhood she experienced what poverty was like, as her father left the family and moved to America.
When José and Maria had their first child, they named him Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuseno Maria de los Remedios Crispin Crispignano de la Santisima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso, which traditionally listed revered ancestors and Catholic saints. After the birth of Pablo, two more girls appeared in the family - Dolores and Conchita, whom the mother loved less than her adored son.
The boy was very handsome and talented. At the age of 7, he already began to help his father in painting canvases. At the age of 13, José allowed his son to complete a large part of the work and was very surprised by the skill of Pablo. After this incident, the father gave all his art supplies to the boy, and he himself stopped writing.
Studies
In the same year, the young man enters the Academy of Arts in the city of Barcelona. It was not without difficulty that Pablo managed to convince the teaching staff of the university of his professional viability. After three years of study, having gained experience, the young student is transferred to Madrid to the prestigious San Fernando Academy, where for six months he studies the technique of the work of Spanish artists, and. Here Picasso creates the paintings "First Communion", "Self-Portrait", "Portrait of a Mother".
Due to his wayward character and free lifestyle, the young painter failed to stay within the walls of the educational institution, therefore, having dropped out of school, Pablo embarks on a free voyage. By that time, the same obstinate American student Carles Casagemas, with whom Pablo repeatedly visits Paris, becomes his close friend.
Friends devoted their first trips to studying the paintings of Delacroix, Toulouse Lautrec, as well as ancient Phoenician, Egyptian frescoes, Japanese engravings. Young people made acquaintance not only with representatives of Bohemia, but also with wealthy collectors.
Creation
For the first time, Pablo begins to sign his own paintings with the pseudonym Picasso, maiden name his mother. In 1901, a tragedy occurs that left its mark on the artist's work: his friend Carles commits suicide because of unhappy love. In memory of this event, Pablo creates a number of paintings that are usually attributed to the first "Blue Period".
The abundance of blue and gray colors in the paintings is explained not only by the depressed state of the young man, but also by the lack of funds for oil paint other shades. Picasso paints the works "Portrait of Jaime Sabartes", "Date", "Tragedy", "Old Jew with a Boy". All paintings are permeated with a sense of anxiety, despondency, fear and longing. The writing technique becomes angular, torn, the perspective is replaced by the rigid contours of flat figures.
In 1904, despite the lack of finances, Pablo Picasso decided to move to the capital of France, where new experiences and events awaited him. The change of residence gave impetus to the second period of the artist's work, which is commonly called "Pink". In many ways, the cheerfulness of the paintings and their plot line was influenced by the place where Pablo Picasso lived.
At the base of the Montmartre hill stood the circus Medrano, whose artists served as nature for the works of the young artist. In two years, a whole series of paintings “Actor”, “Seated Nude”, “Woman in a Shirt”, “Acrobats. Mother and son”, “Family of comedians”. In 1905, the most significant painting of this period, "The Girl on the Ball", appeared. After 8 years, the painting was acquired by the Russian philanthropist I. A. Morozov, who brought it to Russia. In 1948, "The Girl on the Ball" was exhibited at the Museum. , where it remains to this day.
The artist is gradually moving away from the image of nature as such, modernist motifs appear in his work using pure geometric shapes, from which the structure of the depicted object is composed. Picasso intuitively approached a new direction when he created a portrait of his admirer and philanthropist Gertrude Stein.
At the age of 28, Picasso painted the painting “The Girls of Avignon”, which became the forerunner of works written in the style of cubism. The portrait ensemble, which depicted naked beauties, was met with a large stream of criticism, but Pablo Picasso continued to develop the found direction.
Beginning in 1908, the paintings "Can and Bowls", "Three Women", "Woman with a Fan", "Portrait of Ambroise Vollard", "Factory in Horta de San Juan", "Portrait of Fernanda Olivier", "Portrait of Kahnweiler", " Still life with a wicker chair”, “Perno bottle”, “Violin and guitar”. New works are characterized by a gradual increase in posterity of images, approaching abstractionism. Finally, Pablo Picasso, despite the scandalousness, begins to earn good money: paintings painted in a new style make a profit.
In 1917, Pablo Picasso was given the opportunity to collaborate with the Russian Seasons. Jean Cocteau proposed to the master of the ballet the candidacy of a Spanish artist as the creator of sketches for the sets and costumes for new productions. To work for a while, Picasso moved to Rome, where he met his first wife, Olga Khokhlova, a Russian dancer, the daughter of an exiled officer.
The bright period of his life was also reflected in the artist's work - for a time, Picasso departs from cubism, and creates a number of paintings in the spirit of classical realism. These are, first of all, "Portrait of Olga in an armchair", "Bathers", "Women running along the beach", "Children's portrait of Paul Picasso".
Surrealism
Fed up with the life of a wealthy bourgeois, Pablo Picasso returns to his former bohemian existence. The turning point was marked by the writing in 1925 of the first painting in a surrealistic manner "Dance". The distorted figures of the dancers, the general feeling of pain settled in the artist's work for a long time.
Dissatisfaction with personal life was reflected in Picasso's misogynistic paintings "Mirror", "Girl in front of a mirror". In the 30s, Pablo became interested in creating sculptures. The works “Reclining Woman”, “Man with a Bouquet” appear. One of the artist's experiments is the creation of illustrations in the form of engravings for the works of Ovid and Aristophanes.
War period
During the years of the Spanish Revolution and the war, Pablo Picasso is in Paris. In 1937, the artist creates the canvas “Guernica” in black and white by order of the Spanish government for the World Exhibition in Paris. A small town in northern Spain was completely razed to the ground in the spring of 1937 by German aircraft. The tragedy of the people is reflected in collective images a dead warrior, a grieving mother, people cut into pieces. Picasso's symbol of war is the image of the Minotaur bull with large indifferent eyes. Since 1992, the canvas has been kept in the Museum of Madrid.
At the end of the 30s, the paintings “Night fishing in Antibes”, “ crying woman". During the war, Picasso did not emigrate from German-occupied Paris. Even in cramped living conditions, the artist continued to work. Themes of death and war appear in his paintings "Still Life with a Bull's Skull", "Morning Serenade", "Slaughterhouse" and the sculpture "Man with a Lamb".
post-war period
The joy of life settles again in the paintings of the master, created in post-war period. The brilliance of the palette and light images were embodied in a cycle of life-affirming panels that Picasso created for a private collection in collaboration with the artists Paloma and Claude Already.
The favorite theme of this period for Picasso is ancient Greek mythology. She is embodied not only in the paintings of the master, but also in ceramics, which Picasso became interested in. In 1949, for the World Congress of Peace Supporters, the artist paints the canvas “Dove of Peace”. The master creates and variations in the style of cubism on the themes of painters of the past - Velasquez, Goya,.
Personal life
From a young age, Picasso was constantly in love with someone. In his youth, models and dancers became friends and muses of a novice artist. Young Pablo Picasso experienced his first love while studying in Barcelona. The girl's name was Rosita del Oro, she worked in a cabaret. In Madrid, the artist met Fernando, who became his faithful friend for several years. In Paris, fate brought young man with the miniature Marcel Humbert, whom everyone called Eve, but the sudden death of the girl separated the lovers.
While working in Rome with a Russian ballet company, Pablo Picasso marries Olga Khokhlova. The newlyweds got married in a Russian church on the outskirts of Paris, and then moved to a mansion on the seashore. The girl's dowry, as well as income from the sale of Picasso's works, allowed the family to lead the life of a wealthy bourgeois. Three years after the wedding, Olga and Pablo have their first child, the son of Paulo.
Soon Picasso is fed up with the good life and again becomes a free artist. He settles separately from his wife and begins dating a young girl, Marie-Therese Walter. From an extramarital union in 1935, Maya's daughter was born, whom Picasso never recognized.
During the war, the next muse of the master was the Yugoslav subject, the photographer Dora Maar, who, with her work, pushed the artist to search for new forms and content. Dora went down in history as the owner of a large collection of Picasso paintings, which she kept until the end of her life. Also known are her photographs of the canvas “Guernica”, which depict the entire path of creating the painting in stages.
After the war, the artist met Francoise Gilot, who brought a note of joy to his work. Children are born - son Claude and daughter Paloma. But in the early 60s, Jacqueline leaves the master because of his constant betrayals. The last muse and second official wife of the 80-year-old artist is the ordinary saleswoman Jacqueline Rock, who idolized Pablo and had a great influence on his social circle. After the death of Picasso, 13 years later, Jacqueline could not stand the separation and committed suicide.
Death
In the 60s, Picasso devoted himself entirely to the creation of female portraits. His last wife, Jacqueline Rock, poses for the artist as a model. By the end of his life, Pablo Picasso already had a multi-million dollar fortune and several personal castles.
Monument to Pablo Picasso Three years before the death of a genius in Barcelona, a museum named after him was opened, and 12 years after his death, a museum in Paris. For my long creative biography Picasso created 80 thousand paintings, more than 1000 sculptures, collages, drawings, prints.
Paintings
- "First Communion", 1895-1896
- "Girl on a ball", 1905
- Harlequin Seated on a Red Bench, 1905
- "Girl in a shirt", 1905
- "Family of comedians", 1905
- "Portrait of Gertrude Stein", 1906
- Girls of Avignon, 1907
- "Young lady", 1909
- "Mother and child", 1922
- "Guernica", 1937
- "Weeping Woman", 1937
- Francoise, Claude and Paloma, 1951
- "Man and woman with a bouquet", 1970
- "Hugs", 1970
- "Two", 1973
Pablo Ruiz y Picasso, full name - Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuseno Maria de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santisima Trinidad Martyr Patricio Ruiz and Picasso José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Mártir Patricio Ruiz y Picasso; October 25, 1881 (18811025), Malaga, Spain - April 8, 1973, Mougins, France) - Spanish and French artist, sculptor, graphic artist, theater artist, ceramist and designer.
The founder of cubism (together with Georges Braque and Juan Gris), in which a three-dimensional body was depicted in an original manner as a series of planes combined together. Picasso worked a lot as a graphic artist, sculptor, ceramist, etc. He brought to life a lot of imitators and had an exceptional influence on the development of fine arts in the 20th century. According to the Museum of Modern Art (New York), Picasso created about 20 thousand works during his life.
According to expert estimates, Picasso is the most "expensive" artist in the world: in 2008, official sales of his works alone amounted to $262 million. On May 4, 2010, Picasso's Nude, Green Leaves and Bust sold at Christie's for $106,482,000 became the most expensive work art in the world at that time.
On May 11, 2015, a new absolute record was set at the Christie's auction for works of art sold at open auction - Pablo Picasso's painting "Women of Algiers (version O)" went for a record $179,365,000.
According to a poll of 1.4 million readers conducted by The Times in 2009, Picasso is the best artist among those who have lived in the last 100 years. Also, his paintings take first place in terms of "popularity" among the kidnappers.
According to the Spanish tradition, Picasso received two surnames from the first surnames of his parents: his father - Ruiz and his mother - Picasso. Full name, which the future artist received at baptism - Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuseno Maria de los Remedios Cipriano (Crispiniano) de la Santisima Trinidad Martir Patricio Ruiz and Picasso. The maternal surname of Picasso, under which the artist became famous, is of Italian origin: Picasso's mother's great-grandfather Tommaso moved to Spain in early XIX century from the town of Sori in the province of Genoa. Picasso was born in the house on Malaga's Merced Square, which now houses the artist's house-museum and the foundation that bears his name.
Picasso began to draw from childhood, he received his first lessons in artistic skill from his father, art teacher Jose Ruiz Blasco, and soon succeeded greatly in this. At the age of 8, he painted his first serious oil painting, "Picador", from which he did not part throughout his life.
In 1891, Don José received a position as a drawing teacher in A Coruña, and the young Pablo moved with his family to the north of Spain, where he studied at the local art school (1894-1895).
Subsequently, the family moved to Barcelona, and in 1895 Picasso entered the La Lonja School of Fine Arts. Pablo was only fourteen, so he was too young to enter La Longha. However, at the insistence of his father, he was allowed to take the entrance exams on a competitive basis. Picasso passed all the exams with flying colours, and entered La Longha. At first he signed his father's name Ruiz Blasco, but then he chose his mother's surname - Picasso.
In early October 1897, Picasso left for Madrid, where he entered the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando. Picasso used his stay in Madrid mainly for a detailed study of the collection of the Prado Museum, and not for studying at the academy with its classical traditions, where Picasso was cramped and bored.
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