Art print / Picasso / Limited Edition / Jacqueline with roses, 1954 / 5 colors / 60 x 80 cm

Picasso met Jacqueline Roque at the pottery workshop in 1953 when she was 27 and he was 72. He courted her by chalking a dove on her house and bringing her a rose every day until six months later when she agreed to date him. When Picasso's first wife Olga Koklova died in 1955, he was free to marry. They married on March 2, 1961 in Vallauris.

Jacqueline with Flowers, 1954 celebrates the entry of Picasso's new partner Jacqueline Roque into his painting. Antonina Vallentin calls the character a "modern sphinx" and it is true that there is something of a mythical character about Jacqueline in this crouched pose, with her long neck and almond-shaped eyes. She liked this special sitting posture, which is also reflected in later portraits, including the series of "Odalisques". When Picasso first met her, he was struck by her resemblance to the woman with the hookah in Delacroix's The Women of Algiers. He saw in her the same classic, Mediterranean beauty that he had begun to paint in Gasol.

The image of Roque appears in Picasso's paintings from May 1954. These portraits are characterized by an exaggerated neck and a feline face that disfigure Roque's features. Eventually, her dark eyes and eyebrows, high cheekbones, and classic profile became familiar symbols in his late paintings. It is likely that Picasso's series of paintings inspired by Eugène Delacroix's The Women of Algiers was inspired by Roque's beauty; the artist commented that "Eugene Delacroix had already met Jacqueline". In 1955 he drew Jacqueline as Lola de Valence, a reference to a famous painting of the Spanish dancer by Edouard Manet.

5-color hybrid print on 260 g Rives handmade paper / Limited edition: 1,000 copies

Without a frame - the picture will be delivered in a sturdy cardboard sleeve.