La Minotauromachie

The worst period of his life

Between the winter of 1934 and the summer of 1935, Picasso almost stopped making art. He later called it 'la pire époque de ma vie,' the worst period of his life. His marriage to Olga Khokhlova was collapsing, and his young lover Marie-Thérèse Walter was pregnant. Olga discovered the pregnancy and left him in June 1935. Their daughter Maya was born on September 5, 1935, in Boulogne-Billancourt.

Printmaking, which demands physical work at the plate, gave him a way back. One account of the print's making, published with an impression offered in 2016, says that on a Saturday in early July 1935 Picasso sat down in Roger Lacourière's studio in Paris with a large copper plate and built up the image in elaborate detail over the next five days. Other sources place the work earlier in the year, from March to May 1935. The sources reviewed do not settle the dates.

He worked through a series of states, printing proofs as the image changed. Most catalogs, following the scholar Brigitte Baer, describe seven states, with the seventh as final; a 2006 London gallery exhibition presented what it called the only complete set of all eight. The final image is the one collectors and museums mean by La Minotauromachie.

What is in the picture

Read from left to right: a bearded man climbs a ladder and looks back over his shoulder. Two women at a window look down, with two doves beside them. Below, a young girl holding a bouquet raises a candle. Its light falls on a wounded horse carrying a female bullfighter who lies across its back, apparently unconscious. The right half is filled by a huge Minotaur, the bull-headed man of Greek myth, who stretches out an arm against the light. On the horizon, a sailboat.

The museum that owns one impression calls the scene 'difficult but not impossible to interpret.' The women's faces resemble Marie-Thérèse, and one study identifies the bullfighter's swollen abdomen as a reference to her pregnancy. Picasso had used the Minotaur as his own alter ego since the early 1930s, and in the Vollard Suite etchings of 1933-1936 the creature carouses, sleeps beside a lover, goes blind and is led by a young girl, and finally dies in the bullring.

The biographer John Richardson proposed another reading: that the girl with the candle is Picasso's sister Conchita, who died of diphtheria in 1895 at age seven after he vowed to give up painting if she lived. In that reading the flame stands for the art he had promised to abandon. Picasso himself famously declined to explain his pictures, which is part of why the print has been argued over ever since.

Europe in 1935, and the road to Guernica

The year the plate was made, Europe was sliding toward war. In January the Saar voted to join Germany. In September the Nuremberg Laws stripped German Jews of citizenship, and in October Italy invaded Ethiopia. In the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act in August and dedicated the Hoover Dam in September.

Spain's civil war began in 1936, a year after the print. When the town of Guernica was bombed during that war, Picasso answered in 1937 with the painting that bears its name, and the print is often cited as its precursor. Both pictures put aggression on the right side, both have a figure holding a light to the scene, and both have a wounded horse; Guernica's bull resembles the Minotaur, though it is only a head. The museum that owns one impression describes the print as 'prophetic' of the war and a visual source for the mural.

How to know an impression

La Minotauromachie is catalogued as Bloch 288 and Baer 573. Impressions of the final state measure about 49.5 x 69.2 cm at the plate; the published figures differ slightly by source (one museum gives 49.6 x 69.6 cm, a 2006 exhibition 49.8 x 69.3 cm). The paper is usually Montval laid paper, and the printer was Roger Lacourière in Paris. The technique is etching and engraving worked with a scraper; the sources reviewed do not describe drypoint.

It was never editioned in the orderly way most of Picasso's prints were. The museum that owns one records an edition of 'approximately 55 (inscribed 50),' and Baer counts about 55 final-state impressions. Picasso was reluctant to release them, gave impressions to close friends and, according to one catalog, even told trusted dealers he had not finished the plate. Either 23 or 27 impressions were still in his estate when he died in 1973.

Some impressions are signed in ink and numbered; one sold in 2016 is signed 'Picasso' lower right and numbered '2/50' lower left. Others came straight from the estate, including impressions that passed through his granddaughter Marina Picasso. Earlier states, proofs and a color-printed impression of the final image also exist and are a different matter from the standard final state.

Fifty-odd copies, and a record that keeps moving

At least half of the final-state impressions are in museums, among them the Musée Picasso in Paris; the Metropolitan Art Museum in Tokyo; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; and the National Gallery of Art in Washington. The Museum of Modern Art in New York acquired its impression through the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Fund. The Museu Picasso in Barcelona holds one that Picasso himself gave in 1938, and Princeton University's art museum holds another.

Impressions that do come up for sale bring some of the highest prices ever paid for prints. In September 2010 an impression sold at auction in London for about £1.3 million, more than double its guide, and was reported as the highest price ever paid for a single print at auction, passing a 2007 record set by an Edvard Munch print. One report put it at about $2 million; a market database records about $1.99 million.

The highest figure found in the sources reviewed came on May 12, 2016, in New York: $2,629,000 for impression 2/50, which had passed through the collection of Nelson Rockefeller, a New York gallery and a Bern dealer before the consignors bought it in 1995. That November, an impression from Marina Picasso's line sold in New York for about $2.11 million. The same impression was offered in London on March 7, 2024, with an estimate of £800,000 to £1.2 million; one guide reports it sold for £945,000, while a market database lists no price for that sale.

Another impression, from Picasso's estate, sold in London in 1995, was bought by a Swiss collector, resold in London in June 2014 for about $1.74 million and offered again in New York on May 13, 2025, with an estimate of $1 million to $2 million. It sold for about $1.14 million.

The numbers

Medium

Etching and engraving with scraper on Montval laid paper

Dimensions

Plate about 49.5 x 69.2 cm (19 1/2 x 27 1/4 in); sheets vary

Catalogue raisonné

Bloch 288; Baer 573

Edition

About 55 final-state impressions (inscribed 50)

Printer

Roger Lacourière, Paris

Public collections

Museum of Modern Art, New York; Musée Picasso, Paris; Museu Picasso, Barcelona; Princeton University Art Museum; Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Philadelphia Museum of Art; National Gallery of Art, Washington; and others

Timeline

1. Jan 8, 1927

   Picasso meets Marie-Thérèse Walter outside the Galeries Lafayette in Paris.

2. 1933

   Picasso begins the Vollard Suite etchings, in which the Minotaur becomes his alter ego.

3. Jun 1935

   Olga Khokhlova leaves Picasso after learning that Marie-Thérèse is pregnant.

4. Jul 1935

   By one account, Picasso works the copper plate in Roger Lacourière's Paris studio over five days in early July; other sources date the work to March-May 1935.

5. Sep 5, 1935

   Picasso and Marie-Thérèse's daughter Maya is born.

6. 1937

   Picasso paints Guernica, which shares the print's wounded horse and light-bearer.

7. 1938

   Picasso donates the impression now held by the Museu Picasso in Barcelona.

8. 1973

   Picasso dies; 23 or 27 impressions remain in his estate.

9. Nov 28, 1995

   An estate impression sells at auction in London to a Swiss collector.

10. 2006

    A London gallery shows what it calls the only complete set of all the print's states.

11. Sep 16, 2010

    An impression sells in London for about £1.3 million, a record for a single print at auction.

12. Jun 23, 2014

    The Swiss-owned estate impression resells in London for about $1.74 million.

13. May 12, 2016

    Impression 2/50, once owned by Nelson Rockefeller, sells in New York for $2,629,000.

14. Nov 16, 2016

    An impression that descended to Marina Picasso sells in New York for about $2.11 million.

15. Mar 7, 2024

    That impression is offered in London, estimated at £800,000 to £1.2 million; one guide reports a £945,000 sale.

16. May 13, 2025

    The estate impression sells in New York for about $1.14 million.

The world in 1935

• Jan 13, 1935

  In a referendum, 90.3% of voters in the Saar Basin choose to join Germany.

• Feb 6, 1935

  Parker Brothers begins selling the board game Monopoly.

• May 29, 1935

  The French liner Normandie sets out on her maiden voyage and takes the Blue Riband.

• Aug 14, 1935

  President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Social Security Act.

• Sep 15, 1935

  The Nuremberg Laws take effect in Germany, removing citizenship from Jews.

• Sep 30, 1935

  Roosevelt dedicates the Hoover Dam.

• Oct 3, 1935

  Italy invades Ethiopia, beginning the Second Italo-Ethiopian War.

Price record

A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.

By reference price, La Minotauromachie is number 28 of 100 in the art entries of the FLOAT 100. 88 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (26 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• Picasso told even trusted dealers that he had not finished the plate, to avoid releasing impressions.
• One catalog says Picasso chose who was entitled to own an impression; having the money was not enough.
• Picasso made almost no paintings between the winter of 1934 and the summer of 1935; this print is the major work of those months.
• In 2010 an impression became the most expensive single print ever sold at auction, passing a record set by Edvard Munch.
• The girl with the candle may be Picasso's sister Conchita, who died of diphtheria at seven, according to his biographer John Richardson.
• The print's wounded horse and light-bearer reappear two years later in Guernica.