Cheval de Minuit - Finale. Midnight Horse - Finale. by Pablo Picasso, 1881-1973

Pablo Picasso, 1881-1973
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Cheval de Minuit - Finale. Midnight Horse - Finale.

Original drypoint in black ink. 1956. Numbered (5) from the only existing edition of 6 impressions. (No impressions were signed). The plate subsequently used with added text for an edition of 71 impressions in the album: 'Chevaux de Minuit'. Drawn and printed at the Atelier Lacourière-Dutrou, Paris 1956. Issued edition published by Iliazd. With Iliazd's signature.
Ref: Baer-Picasso Peintre Graveur 946c

Superb impression with burr on the drypoint. On pale cream hand-made japan paper. Excellent condition; sheet backed with japan to protect two margin thin spots. On the double sheet of paper, as issued. Full margins. Sheet: 16 x 11ins. Plate: 9 1/8 x 6 1/8ins (230x153mm).

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The series of pure drypoint line-drawn prints of horses which Picasso drew in 1955/56 under the title 'Chevaux de Minuit - Midnight Horses' are amongst the most individual and brilliantly inventive works in his post-war graphic oeuvre. He had read some surrealist poems by the Baronne d'Oettingen (writing under the name of Roch Grey) about 'horses at midnight'. Fascinated by the word-images that they conjured up he decided to make a series of drypoint studies which would be incorporated into an album of words and images by the surrealist publisher Iliad. In the album words are woven round the images, but before making the album Picasso decided to print just six impressions of each subject as individual prints. These separate impressions are now exceptionally rare.

(Note: these prints were never signed by Picasso, but the proofs, as here, are numbered in pencil and have Iliazd's counter signature at the foot of the sheet).

The drypoints of the 'Midnight Horses' series show just how inventive Picasso could be. Full of humour he has used the line as a totally defined and controlled stroke, moving deliberately from 'point' to 'point'. Out of this precision there emerges a form which is somehow full of movement, of elegance and of expression. It is a tour-de-force of drawing and of printmaking.