Pablo Picasso's "Le Ronde" Framed & Matted Print.

Pablo Picasso's "Le Ronde" Framed & Matted Print.

HIS REAL NAME WAS PABLO RUIZ

Well, actually Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de Los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso. The Spanish artist adopted his mother's Italian surname because he thought it suited him better.  Picasso is of Italian origin, as you know. And the name a person bears or adopts has its importance. Can you imagine me calling myself Ruiz? Pablo Ruiz? Diego-José Ruiz? Or Juan-Népomucène Ruiz?"

HE FINISHED HIS FIRST PAINTING AT AGE 9

Picasso's parents didn't have a refrigerator, but if they did, they'd have displayed his early works with pride. Painting ran in the family. Picasso started figure drawing and oil painting lessons with his painter father when he was 7. Picasso entered Barcelona's School of Fine Arts, where his father taught, at 13. Two years later, he completed what he called his first major painting.

THERE ARE VICIOUS RUMORS THAT PICASSO WAS LEFT-HANDED

Being called a southpaw isn't the worst thing in the world. Picasso would certainly be in good company if it were true. But Picasso was a righty.

ANOTHER RUMOR, PICASSO STOLE THE MONA LISA

On August 21, 1911, someone stole the Mona Lisa from the Louvre and turned the art world upside-down. When a French newspaper offered a reward for information, a man came forward with a statue he'd stolen from the museum four years earlier. He claimed to have stolen a few of them for the poet Guillaume Apollinaire, who'd sold them to Picasso. The 29-year-old artist was taken to court, where he denied knowing that the statues he'd purchased were stolen. There was no real evidence or a link to the Mona Lisa theft, so Picasso wasn't charged.

The real thief, Vincenzo Peruggia, was caught in 1913 when he tried to sell the pilfered Mona Lisa to an art dealer. Peruggia had once been a guard at the Louvre and constructed the frame that encased the painting. He claimed to have stolen the Mona Lisa to bring her home to Italy, but some still believe that Picasso may have had something to do with it.

HIS ICONIC SHIRT IS NO ORDINARY STRIPED SHIRT

It's a Breton-striped shirt. In 1858, the navy and white knit top became the official uniform for French seamen in Brittany, with 21 horizontal stripes to represent each of Napoleon's victories and a continuous stripe from shirt to sleeves to make it easier to see sailors in the distance. Coco Chanel brought working-class Breton stripes to the fashion world in 1917. They're still in vogue.

MARIE-THÉRÈSE WALTER WAS THE ONE WHO GOT AWAY

Picasso said, “Love is the greatest refreshment in life.” And let’s just say the man never left the concession stand. In 1927, he saw a pretty blonde named Marie-Thérèse Walter on the street and tried to pick her up with the old, “Miss, you have an interesting face. I would like to do your portrait, I am Picasso” routine.

MARIE-THÉRÈSE HAD NEVER HEARD OF HIM

But the two got together, despite differences in age (she was 17, he was 45), social stations (the rest of the world had heard of him), and relationship status (Picasso had a wife, ballerina Olga Khokhlova, and a few random mistresses). It was Picasso’s most colourful love affair. Some of his most acclaimed, and expensive, artwork were inspired by Marie-Thérèse. They even had a daughter together.

Alas, Picasso’s greatest muse never became Mrs. Picasso. The artist refused to divorce Olga, and he and Marie-Thérèse called it quits around 1936. After Olga died, Picasso married Jacqueline Roque, who worked in a pottery studio. Some say Marie-Thérèse was still waiting for Picasso to put a ring on it when he died in 1973. She hanged herself four years later in the home they’d shared. (Jacqueline also committed suicide 13 years after Picasso's death.)

PABLO PICASSO PROBABLY GOT CALLED AN A-HOLE

One of the most rocking tributes to Picasso is a 1976 song by The Modern Lovers that starts with memorable lines. "Well, some people try to pick up girls/And get called a**holes/This never happened to Pablo Picasso."

The song isn't entirely accurate. Contrary to its lyrics, Picasso was more likely 5'4", didn't drive an El Dorado, and probably got called more than a few colourful names.

HE WASN'T JUST A PAINTER

Picasso once said, "My mother said to me, 'If you are a soldier, you will become a general. If you are a monk, you will become the Pope.' Instead, I was a painter, and became Picasso.'" But that wasn't all. Picasso dabbled in poetry in 1935 after breaking up with his first wife and later wrote two surrealist plays, one of which was performed as reading with Albert Camus, Simone de Beauvoir, and Jean-Paul Sartre.

Rumour has it, that Picasso predicted that someday he'd be more famous for his poems than paintings. 

Item Code - VIS15A1207760GA

Width: 27 3/8"  Height: 28 5/8"  Depth: 3/4"  Weight: 2.847 kg