Title: Femme Nue se Couronnant de Fleurs
Nude woman crowning herself with flowers
Medium: Original Etching, Paris, 1933, (Plate 83 from the Vollard Suite) , on small Montval fillegree paper, with Vollard signature watermark, with full margins, signed by the artist in pencil
Edition: 260 unnumbered proofs (there was also an edition of 50 with wider margins). There were 2 or 3 artists proofs and 3 impressions on vellum paper.
Reference: Bloch, Georges. 1968-1979. Pablo Picasso, catalogue de l'oeuvre gravé et lithographié, 4 vol. Berne: Kornfeld and Klipstein. (Bloch 190)
Geiser, Bernhard and Brigitte Baer. 1986-1996. Picasso: Peintre-Graveur, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre gravé et des monotypes, 7 vols. Berne: Kornfeld. (Baer 349.B.d)
Miguel Orozco: “The complete etchings of Pablo Picasso” Number 480 (Page 443)
Note: The publication of the hundred etchings created by Picasso between 1930 and 1937 was one of Ambroise Vollard's most impressive undertakings. Vollard was one of the greatest art dealers and publishers of his time and his championship of some of the most celebrated artists of the day deserves the thanks of later generations. His artists, to name but a few, included Cezanne, Renoir, Gauguin, Van Gogh, Rousseau, Rouault and Picasso. Picasso met Vollard in Paris in 1901 and worked with him over an extended period. When the Vollard Suite etchings were first made they were in fact rarely signed (with the exception of some rare proofs made on vellum in editions of just three. Vollard died tragically in a car accident in 1939 and eventually, after the Second World War, most of the Vollard Suite passed into the hands of the famous Dealer Petiet. Petiet knew that Picasso , would never sign anything until he was paid for it and the artist required a substantial fee for putting his signature on the Vollard Suite etchings. Accordingly Petiet gave his buyers the option of buying them either unsigned or, for 10% more on the cost, signed. This meant that Picasso signatures from 1939 until the artists death appear on Vollard Suite etchings. Obviously there is a difference in the artists signature as he aged.
Published by: Ambroise Vollard, Paris in 1939
Printed by: Lacouriere in 1939
