Female nude with man's head 1967

Picasso made this painting of a female nude with a man’s head, we’re not sure when. It’s rendered with the kind of tonal restraint that can actually amplify the intensity of feeling. Look at the stark white canvas. It's barely veiled by the diluted grey hues, a color scheme that feels incomplete, like a sketch searching for its final form. The drips that cascade down the body almost seem to mock the traditional notion of the nude as a smooth, perfected form. There’s something almost brutally honest in the application, a kind of vulnerability. The thick, almost brutal line that defines the woman's profile is so confident, it's jarring against the tentative washes that make up the rest of the figure. I'm reminded a little of Francis Picabia in the way that Picasso toys with representation and abstraction here. This painting is about the act of seeing, the act of questioning, and the restless pursuit of form that defined Picasso’s career.