“Picasso llegando a París con Jaume Andreu Bonsons” (Paris, May 1901) - seen in Berlin.
In May 1901, a 19-year-old Pablo Picasso arrived for the second time in Paris — no longer the carefree prodigy who had first come the year before, but a young man changed by grief. Just months earlier, his close friend Carles Casagemas had taken his own life, an event that would haunt Picasso for years and give birth to his Blue Period.
This moment of return is captured in his drawing “Picasso llegando a París con Jaume Andreu Bonsons”, executed in colored wax crayons on card. The work shows Picasso beside his friend Jaume Andreu Bonsons, another Catalan painter, as they enter the city that would shape modern art. Their faces carry both determination and fatigue — the look of two young men stepping into a new chapter, carrying memory as baggage.
Only weeks after this arrival, Picasso held his first major exhibition at Ambroise Vollard’s gallery, marking the start of his Paris years and his rapid transformation from promise to legend.
Seen today, “Picasso llegando a París” feels like a hinge between innocence and maturity — a fragile record of friendship, resilience, and the moment when the artist’s personal sorrow began to turn into art.