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Head of a Woman

1921
Not on view
This pastel is a study for Three Women at the Spring (Museum of Modern Art, New York), Picasso's major neoclassical composition painted in the autumn of 1921. Although the gigantic goddesses in that work seem otherworldly, their features were in fact inspired by Picasso's wife, the Ukrainian dancer Olga Kokhlova. The scale and technique, however, derive from the ancient wall paintings Picasso had seen in and around Rome and Naples in 1917 while working for Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes; it was on that same trip that he met and fell in love with Olga.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Head of a Woman
  • Artist: Pablo Picasso (Spanish, Malaga 1881–1973 Mougins, France)
  • Date: 1921
  • Medium: Pastel on paper
  • Dimensions: 25 5/8 × 19 3/4 in. (65.1 × 50.2 cm)
  • Classification: Drawings
  • Credit Line: Bequest of Scofield Thayer, 1982
  • Object Number: 1984.433.270
  • Rights and Reproduction: © 2025 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
  • Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art

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