Olga Picasso

In light of a large selection of previously unpublished personal archives - documents, photographs and films - this title explores Picasso's 'Olga period' by contextualising his work during this period and by questioning the contrast between the subject and its portrayal. A favourite model since their meeting in 1917, Olga Khokhlova, a Russian ballet dancer who married Picasso in July 1918, is the most represented female figure in the artist's work of the late 1910s and 1920s. Picasso renders the ambiguity of his first wife, her beauty, her Ingres-like contours, and her deep, pensive, melancholy, in many of his most famous portraits. The exhibition that this book accompanies brings to light materials conserved by Olga's family until recently, including memorabilia of her life as a dancer, photos of Picasso, their son Paul, and their daily life together, and their travels to Barcelona, Naples, and Monte Carlo.