Descripción
The print run began in the first half of 1939 and was completed in 1942. A copy exists in the Musée Picasso, Hotel Sale, Paris.
Neither this poster nor its motif has been reproduced on other posters. In early 1939, Picasso, still recovering from sciatica, continued to create images of people and animals “with great violence and frequent allusions to cruelty”. He was under the influence of the death of his mother, the events in Spain and the forebodings of what would become the Second World War. Fortunately, all this negative pressure was mitigated by the success of his exhibitions, mainly in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco and London. In the work reproduced on this poster, Picasso uses distortions of the double face, which here, however, appear in an attenuated form. In this print, the projection of the nose in profile and from the front is prominent, thus accentuating, dramatising and reinforcing the figure especially with the image of the two ears on the same plane. Meanwhile, the impact is attenuated by the application of a golden colour to the face, which contrasts with the black of the eyes and hair and the white of the blouse.
During these months of the first half of 1939, Picasso worked intensively in the engraving workshop in Lacourière and, later, had the screw-driven printing press brought from his farm in Boisgeloup to his workshop on the rue des Grands Augustins, so that he could experiment more frequently.
