Pablo Picasso Les Deux Saltimbanques: l’Arlequin et Sa Compagne (The Two Saltimbanques: The Harlequin and His Companion) is an intimate portrayal of traveling entertainers. The woman on the left, dressed in clothing of radiant orange, rests her chin on her hand, and looks directly out of the image. Her hair is piled on top of her head, and she looks relaxed. Sitting directly beside her is the other figure, dressed in a shirt of alternating diamonds of light and dark blue. Their closeness, though there is more room at the table, portrays both the intimacy of the moment, and gives a sense of the small café that they are sitting in.

The deep, warm colors that Picasso has used to frame the figures bring in the eye and make The Saltimbanques come alive.

This work is particularly significant as one of the very few prints associated with Picasso’s celebrated Blue Period, one of the most important and emotionally charged phases of his career. Created after the artist’s renowned 1901 painting Les Deux Saltimbanques, now housed in the Pushkin Museum in Moscow, the composition reflects the somber lyricism and introspective quality that defined Picasso’s Blue Period. Emerging in the early years of the twentieth century following the tragic death of his close friend Carlos Casagemas, Picasso’s Blue Period was characterized by melancholic subject matter, elongated figures, and cool tonalities that conveyed themes of isolation, poverty, and quiet humanity. During this pivotal moment, Picasso frequently turned to performers, harlequins, and circus entertainers as symbolic figures who existed between spectacle and solitude, making Les Deux Saltimbanques: l’Arlequin et Sa Compagne both an intimate portrait and an important reflection of one of the most historically significant periods in modern art.

Created circa 1960 after an oil painting Les Deux Saltimbanques, this color Collotype with pochoir on Arches wove paper with an Arches watermark is hand-signed by Pablo Picasso (Malaga, 1881 – Mougins, 1973) in blue crayon in the lower right margin. Numbered from the edition of 125 in pencil in the lower left margin.

Catalogue Raisonné & COA:

Picasso The Two Saltimbanques: The Harlequin and His Companion (Les Deux Saltimbanques: l’Arlequin et Sa Compagne), c.1960 is fully documented and referenced in the below catalogue raisonnés and texts (copies will be enclosed as added documentation with the invoices that will accompany the final sale of the work).

1. Boudaille, Georges and Pierre Daix with Joan Rosselet. Picasso, The Blue & Rose Periods: A Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, 1900-1906, Neuchâtel, 1966. Original painting is listed and illustrated as catalogue raisonné no. VI.20.
2. Spitzer, Guy. Éditions Guy Spitzer, Reproductions de Tableaux de Maitres, Paris. Illustrated on the frontispiece of this catalogue.
3. A Certificate of Authenticity will accompany this work.

About the Framing:

Framed to archival museum grade conservation standards Picasso The Two Saltimbanques: The Harlequin and His Companion (Les Deux Saltimbanques: l’Arlequin et Sa Compagne), c.1960 is framed in a complementary moulding with silk mats and optical grade Plexiglas.