Pablo Picasso Spanish, 1881-1973
Théâtre ou télévision: cape et épée , 1968
Aquatint and etching on Rives vellum paper
Image: 29.5 x 34.5 cm
Sheet: 45.5 x 52 cm
Sheet: 45.5 x 52 cm
N° 18/50From an edition of 50. Printed by the Atelier Crommelynck, ParisEdited by Galerie Louise Leiris, Paris
Signed on the lower right corner
© Succession Picasso 2026
Picasso's interest in the theatre began very early: the artist met his first wife, Olga, while designing costumes for Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. Picasso's first major suite, published by Vollard, was the Suite des Saltimbanques, dealing with the arts of spectacle.
Picasso's fascination with the theatre and the performing arts more generally runs through the creation of the Suite de 347, Picasso's last major series in printmaking. The artist undertook this work in Mougins, between 16 March and 8 October 1968, in a period of great creative fertility. The Suite was dedicated to Jaime Sabartès, his secretary and confidant. The themes of the circus, theatre and television, a new fashion in the mid-twentieth century, are recurrent in the Suite. Picasso took advantage of them to stage dramatic subjects, not without irony. The subject matter, as Geiser/Baer also points out, is probably taken from an episode of Dumas' Three Musketeers. Thus Spectacle or Television, inspired by popular epic cloak-and-dagger stories, is a staging of the spectator himself.
Picasso's interest in the theatre began very early: the artist met his first wife, Olga, while designing costumes for Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. Picasso's first major suite, published by Vollard, was the Suite des Saltimbanques, dealing with the arts of spectacle.
Picasso's fascination with the theatre and the performing arts more generally runs through the creation of the Suite de 347, Picasso's last major series in printmaking. The artist undertook this work in Mougins, between 16 March and 8 October 1968, in a period of great creative fertility. The Suite was dedicated to Jaime Sabartès, his secretary and confidant. The themes of the circus, theatre and television, a new fashion in the mid-twentieth century, are recurrent in the Suite. Picasso took advantage of them to stage dramatic subjects, not without irony. The subject matter, as Geiser/Baer also points out, is probably taken from an episode of Dumas' Three Musketeers. Thus Spectacle or Television, inspired by popular epic cloak-and-dagger stories, is a staging of the spectator himself.
Provenance
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New-York (institutional stamp on the verso)
Private collection, Germany
Literature
Bloch n° 1567
Geiser/Baer n°1583 III B
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