Through a vast selection of more than 350 works, paintings, drawings, pieces of furniture as well as numerous unpublished written and photographic archives, this exhibition puts into perspective the realization of some of Picasso's major works by restoring this production in the framework of this personal history, filter of an enlarged political and social history.

Olga, model par excellence of the classic period

Born in 1891 in Nijyn, a Ukrainian city in what was then the Russian Empire, Olga Khokhlova is the daughter of a colonel. She joined the prestigious and innovative troupe of the Ballets Russes directed by Serge Diaghilev in 1912.

It was in Rome in the spring of 1917 that she met Pablo Picasso, while the artist produced, at the invitation of Jean Cocteau, the sets and costumes for the ballet Parade (music by Erik Satie, argument by Jean Cocteau, choreography by Léonide Massine).

They married on July 12, 1918 at the Orthodox Church on rue Daru, with witnesses Jean Cocteau, Max Jacob, and Guillaume Apollinaire.

Model par excellence of the classic Picasso period, Olga first appears under a fine and elegant line marked by Ingresque influence. Synonymous with a certain return to figuration, Olga is often depicted melancholy, seated, reading or writing, undoubtedly alluding to the correspondence that she maintains with her family which is living a tragic moment in History.

At the same time, in fact, alongside the couple's social ascent and the increased artistic recognition of Picasso's work, Imperial Russia, severely affected by the Great War, suffered from a major economic and food crisis, and lost more than two million soldiers at the front. Olga's family suffered at the same time a tragedy echoing the letters that Olga received: social downgrading, disappearance of the father, gradual cut of the letter links.

After the birth of their first child, Paul, on February 4, 1921, Olga became the inspiration for many maternity scenes, compositions bathed in unprecedented sweetness. The family scenes and the portraits of the young boy testify to a serene happiness which flourishes in particular in timeless forms which correspond to a new attention for Antiquity and the Renaissance, discovered in Italy and reactivated by the summer stay in Fontainebleau ( 1921).

After the meeting in 1927 of Marie-Thérèse Walter, a young woman then aged 17 and who became Picasso's mistress, the figure of Olga metamorphoses.

In 1929, in Le Grand nu au chaise rouge, she was nothing more than pain, a soft form whose expressive violence reflected the nature of the deep crisis then experienced by the couple.

If the spouses finally separated in 1935, a year which also marks a temporary cessation of painting in the master's work, they remained married until Olga's death in 1955.

Pratical information

Commissioner:
Emilia Philippot, curator at the Musée national Picasso-Paris
Joachim Pissarro, art historian, curator, director of art galleries at Hunter College
Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, co-founder and co-president of the Fundacion Almine y Bernard Ruiz-Picasso para el Arte (FABA)

Exhibition presented at the Musée national Picasso-Paris
From 21 March to 3 September 2017
5 rue de Thorigny, Paris III
Tuesday to Friday 10:30 a.m. / 18 p.m., Saturday, Sunday and school holidays 9:30 a.m. / 18 p.m.
Closed Monday and public holidays.
Entrance: 12,50 euros, reduced rate: 11 euros
Reservations: +33 1 85 56 00 36 or www.museepicassoparis.fr