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Pablo Picasso

1881–1973

Bottle of Vieux Marc, Glass, Guitar and Newspaper 1913
© Succession Picasso/DACS 2025

Biography

Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907) and the anti-war painting Guernica (1937), a dramatic portrayal of the bombing of Guernica by German and Italian air forces during the Spanish Civil War.

Beginning his formal training under his father José Ruiz y Blasco aged seven, Picasso demonstrated extraordinary artistic talent from a young age, painting in a naturalistic manner through his childhood and adolescence. During the first decade of the 20th century, his style changed as he experimented with different theories, techniques, and ideas. After 1906, the Fauvist work of the older artist Henri Matisse motivated Picasso to explore more radical styles, beginning a fruitful rivalry between the two artists, who subsequently were often paired by critics as the leaders of modern art.

Picasso's output, especially in his early career, is often periodized. While the names of many of his later periods are debated, the most commonly accepted periods in his work are the Blue Period (1901–1904), the Rose Period (1904–1906), the African-influenced Period (1907–1909), Analytic Cubism (1909–1912), and Synthetic Cubism (1912–1919), also referred to as the Crystal period. Much of Picasso's work of the late 1910s and early 1920s is in a neoclassical style, and his work in the mid-1920s often has characteristics of Surrealism. His later work often combines elements of his earlier styles.

Exceptionally prolific throughout the course of his long life, Picasso achieved universal renown and immense fortune for his revolutionary artistic accomplishments, and became one of the best-known figures in 20th-century art.

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Analytical cubism Return to order

Artworks

Left Right
  • Bust of a Woman

    Pablo Picasso
    1944
  • Flowers

    Pablo Picasso
    1901
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Seated Woman in a Chemise

    Pablo Picasso
    1923
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Girl in a Chemise

    Pablo Picasso
    c.1905
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Horse with a Youth in Blue

    Pablo Picasso
    1905–6
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Seated Nude

    Pablo Picasso
    1909–10
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Bust of a Woman

    Pablo Picasso
    1909
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Cock

    Pablo Picasso
    1932, cast 1952
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
See all 55

Artist as subject

Left Right
  • Thanx Picasso

    Conrad Atkinson
    1988
  • Mort

    R.B. Kitaj
    1966
    View by appointment
  • The Defects of its Qualities

    R.B. Kitaj
    1967–8
    View by appointment
  • Picasso’s meninas

    Richard Hamilton
    1973
    View by appointment
  • Faun Revealing a Sleeping Woman (Jupiter and Antiope, after Rembrandt)

    Pablo Picasso
    1936
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Head of a Young Boy

    Pablo Picasso
    1945
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Etching: 11, 28 February 1970 3, 16, 30 March 1970 (L.13)

    Pablo Picasso
    1970
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • Etching: 19 February 1970 (L.16)

    Pablo Picasso
    1970
    On display at É«¿Ø´«Ã½ part of Theatre Picasso
  • I Could Lend You Something, but I Would Not be Doing You Any Favours

    Martin Kippenberger
    1985
  • ³¢â€™A³¾´Ç³Ü°ù

    George Condo
    2003

Film and audio

  • Interview

    Did Picasso paint this in a day?

  • TateShots

    Françoise Gilot: Studio visit

  • In the Gallery

    Pablo Picasso’s The Three Dancers

  • Podcast

    Where Does Inspiration Come From?

  • How To

    How to Paint Like Picasso

Features

  • Quiz

    Can you spot Picasso's signature?

  • List

    Five Things to Know: Pablo Picasso

  • Tate Etc

    Picasso 1932: The Year of Wonders

    Achim Borchardt-Hume

  • Tate Etc

    Picasso's Woman in a Red Armchair 1932

    George Condo

  • Tate Etc

    Opinion: Art and Nature

    John-Paul Stonard

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