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'Whenever I see you, my first impulse is to reach in my pocket to offer you a cigarette, even though I know very well that neither of us smoke any longer. Age has forced us to give up but the desire remains. It's the same thing with making love. We don't do it any more, but the desire for it is still with us'. (Quoted in Brassai, The Master at 90, New York Times Magazine, New York, 1971.) Lovemaking and painting, two supreme acts of creation, become one in each of the 25 fervid scenes of Raphaël et la fornarina. Inspired in part by television images of the then current Pope Paul VI touring Columbia, Picasso's voyeuristic Pope Julius II, occasionally accompanied by a cowering Michelangelo, is witness to some of the most unashamedly piquant sexual acts portrayed in in Picasso's work.

Pablo Picasso

Raphaël et la Fornarina XX, from Séries 347 (B. 1795; Ba. 1812 Bb1)

Details

Pablo Picasso
Raphaël et la Fornarina XX, from Séries 347 (B. 1795; Ba. 1812 Bb1)
etching, 1968, on wove, signed in pencil, numbered 32/50 (there were also 17 artist's proofs), published by Galerie L. Leiris, Paris, 1969, with wide margins, in very good condition
P. 147 x 208 mm., S. 283 x 347 mm.

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