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picasso - la comedie humaine

These original lithographs by Picasso focused on work executed in Vallauris from 28th November 1953 to 3rd February 1954 were published under the direction of Teriade in 1954. Mourlot Freres printed the 16 original lithographs in colour. Accompanying the Picasso lithgraphs was an essay by Michel Leiris, “Picasso and the Human Comedy or The Avatars of Fat-Foot,” and an appreciation by Rebecca West, hence the tiles “La Comedie Humaine”.

 

Teriade outlines his excitement at publishing these images, by stating, “Last winter, from mid-December to the end of January 1954 Picasso was working indefatigably on this series of drawings, which rank among the finest, boldest, most poignantly human of all he has produced in the course of his long and brilliant career… Almost one could fancy that in his lonely nights at Vallauris these denizens of a world invented by himself crowded into the artist’s room, sat for him, confessed unblushingly their most shameful secrets… We have published the series of drawings in its entirety. They form an organic whole, born of a surging up rush of the creative spirit, and to omit any of its elements would have been a mutilation. Nevertheless, when we isolate anyone of these elements and fix our attention on a single page, we find the fragment almost as eye filling as the ensemble. All the drawings are reproduced in the exact size of the originals and in the chronological order of their making.”

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