Pablo Picasso
(1881-1973) Spanish 

Picasso was a painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet, and playwright who spent most of his adult life in France. His artistic genius has impacted the development of modern and contemporary art with unparalleled magnitude. His prolific output includes more than 20,000 paintings, prints, drawings, sculptures, ceramics, theatre sets, and costumes that convey a variety of intellectual, political, social, and amorous messages.

Picasso started making prints early in his career and mastering the traditional techniques of intaglio and lithography which he integrated in his artistic repertoire. Then, while he was based in Paris he had access to the Ateltier Mourlot and worked closely with the master printers on etchings and lithographs. As with the painting and drawing his print making methods reflected the ease, and indeed the speed, with which he produced his imagery, reworking a theme until he had exhausted its possibilities.

Picasso met Fernand Mourlot in October 1945 after much encouragement from Henri Matisse and Georges Braque. As they predicted, Picasso soon became obsessed with the possibilites of lithography and amazed the Mourlot team with his artistic audacity and talent. He proceeded to make many innovative experiments on the limestones. He would stay at the Mourlot print workshop for several months at a time, 12 hours a day, and over the course of 20 years he created nearly 400 lithographs