Sotheby's Paris to present 50 drawings by Pablo Picasso

KOLKATA: Sotheby's Paris is presenting a selection of fifty drawings by Pablo Picasso from the private collection of his grand-daughter Marina Picasso. This superb ensemble (enriched with a handful of ceramics), to be exhibited from 28th March-1st April during the Salon International du Dessin in Paris, will focus the theme of The Nude in Picasso's work.

Starting with his erotically tinged Indian ink sketches of prostitutes from his Barcelona period, and continuing down to his remarkable Artist & Model series, the Nude remained a subject of constant desire and fascination for Picasso, one which he explored in a variety of styles and media.

It was the theme of the Nude which, in 1906/07, prompted Picasso to engage in the visual experimentation that would ultimately lead to Cubism. This can be seen in the numerous preparatory studies for his legendary work Les Demoiselles d'Avignon.

Several of these are featured in the exhibition, among them Woman's Body - Front View (1908), where Picasso uses hatching to create the outlines of a faceless female body reduced to an angular, sculptural structure. The process of deconstruction is clear to see.

Later drawings include an enchanting 1920 charcoal and red chalk Standing Nude in Profile. The Nude here is idealized and stylized: a perfect illustration of Picasso's return to Classicism in the 1920s, in line with the teachings of Ancient Greece, and revealing another facet of his oeuvre.