Pablo Picasso

Pablo Ruiz y Picasso was born on October 25, 1881, in Málaga, Spain. Demonstrating astonishing artistic prodigy under the tutelage of his father, art professor Don José Ruiz, the young Picasso had mastered realistic academic oil painting before adolescence. Moving to Barcelona and later Paris at the turn of the century, the suicide of his dear friend Carlos Casagemas plunged Picasso into his melancholic 'Blue Period' (1901–1904), depicting beggars, outcasts, and sorrow in sombre indigo hues.

This was succeeded by the warmer, poetic 'Rose Period' (1904–1906), inspired by circus performers and acrobats. In 1907, Picasso shattered centuries of Western artistic convention with 'Les Demoiselles d'Avignon', an explosive proto-Cubist canvas influenced by Iberian sculpture and African masks. Together with Georges Braque, he invented Analytical and Synthetic Cubism, deconstructing three-dimensional objects into multi-angled geometric planes and inventing modern collage.

In 1937, following the horrific Nazi saturation bombing of the Basque town of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War, Picasso created his monumental monochrome masterpiece 'Guernica'. Displayed at the Paris International Exposition, the painting became the definitive global anti-war icon of the 20th century. Over an extraordinarily creative career producing more than 50,000 artworks—including paintings, sculptures, ceramics, drawings, and prints—Picasso radically transformed the human visual imagination.