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Lithograph, 1955, on Arches wove paper, signed in pencil by the artist, numbered 25/50 from the edition of 50, printed by Mourlot, Paris, published by Galerie Louise Leiris, Paris, sheet: 66.4 x 50 cm. (26⅛ x 19¾ in.)
This abstract, three-quarter profile is of Picasso’s second wife, Jacqueline Roque. The couple met during the summer of 1952 whilst Roque was working at Georges and Suzanne Ramié’s Madoura pottery works in Vallauris, the studio where Picasso made his ceramics in the South of France. The couples love endured until the artist’s death in 1973, Picasso adored Jacqueline so much so that for seventeen of the twenty years the couple spent together – the longest relationship of Picasso’s life – Roque was the only female Picasso painted. When Picasso embarked on his late, great period, his biographer John Richardson succinctly defined and characterised as ‘l’époque Jacqueline.’ In this lithograph, Picasso bestows Roque with an elegant, sphinx-like appearance. The straight line of the nose which extends directly from the forehead to the tip is particularly evocative of these ancient Egyptian sculptures, as well as in the calm gaze in her characteristically almond-shaped eyes.
