Artist:  Pablo Picasso
Title: Le Sauvetage I
Size: 9 x 12 3/4 in. (24.8 x 32.4 cm)
Medium: Etching on laid paper
Edition:  7 of 50
Year:  1932-1961
Notes: With the artist's stamped-signature, numbered 7/50 (there were also nineteen artist's proofs), published by galerie Louise Leiris, Paris, 1981
Image: 61⁄8 x 75⁄8 in. (158 x 194 mm.); Sheet: 93⁄4 x 123⁄4 in. (248 x 324 mm.)

About: After revolutionizing art with Cubism alongside Georges Braque, Picasso became the defining visionary of 20th-century creativity. Born in Málaga in 1881 to an artist father, Picasso attended art schools in Spain. In his teens, he embraced the bohemian circles of Barcelona and Madrid, who challenged Spain’s conservative norms. Early on, Picasso’s work drew from diverse influences—El Greco’s intense figures, Symbolism’s dark outlines, and Art Nouveau’s flowing curves. Between 1905 and 1915, he unleashed groundbreaking originality: his emotive Rose and Blue Periods, mask-like portraits inspired by Iberian and African art, and the fragmented forms of Cubism, epitomized in Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907). Throughout his prolific career, Picasso explored a vast range of mediums, from theatre design to ceramics, sculpture, and public art. His prints and drawings often featured mythological themes, notably the Minotaur, a symbol of his own identity. In his final years, Picasso engaged in dialogue with the old masters, creating works that reinterpreted icons by Poussin, Velázquez, and others—just as future artists would respond to him. Pablo Picasso died in 1972 at age ninety-one.