Corrida. Bullfight. by Pablo Picasso, 1881-1973

Pablo Picasso, 1881-1973
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Corrida. Bullfight.

Original lithograph created with paper cut-outs, frottage and chalk in black ink. January 1946. Signed in pencil. Numbered (47) from the edition of 50. There were also 18 proof impressions. Drawn and printed at the studio of Mourlot, Paris 1946. Issued by Picasso and Galerie Leiris.
Ref: Mourlot - Picasso Lithographs 26. Hatje - Picasso Lithographs 116.

Excellent impression with rich inking. On pale cream wove Arches paper. Excellent condition. Drawn almost to the full sheet size, as issued. Sheet: 12 3/4 x 17 3/8ins (325x444mm).

Price: £ 9950 ($15750)
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‘Bullfight’ is a wonderful example of the genius of invention and the total rethinking of accepted technique, as well a of composition, with which Picasso approached his work in lithography at Mourlot’s studio in the mid 1940’s.

Picasso first went to Mourlot’s lithography studio in November 1945. Many years later Fernand Mourlot described that first period recounting how, although he made some 20 works in lithography between 1919 and 1929, Picasso listened attentively whilst the established ways of working the stone were explained and demonstrated. When he then began to work himself he threw all the conventional methods to one side and immediately started to invent his own techniques.

‘Corrida - Bullfight’, above, typifies this inventive approach. For this work Picasso took pieces of lithographic transfer paper covered them in rubbed crayon, cut them into the shapes he wanted and pasted them to a sheet; he then transferred the whole image to the stone. The result is to create highly textural figure shapes those cut forms seem to dance over the light of the open surface of the sheet but detached from it. The manner in which an element of plane and space is created by the abstracted suggestion of the barrier at the edge of the ring in the foreground illustrates the freedom with which he felt he could approach actual composition and use it to focus attention on the ‘dance’ of the figures and the brilliant light.