Even in his early work, Picasso found a source of inspiration for his art in the theater. Of his many motifs from the world of traveling and popular theater, the figures of the commedia dell’arte like the harlequin and Pierrot played a key role. These sad jokers become emotionally laden figures of identification for the modern artist. Picasso’s fascination with the theater is reflected not only in the motifs of countless paintings and drawings. With the ballet “Parade” in 1917, he began an intense period of collaboration with Diaghilev’s “Ballets Russes”, for which Picasso designed his famous stage sets and costumes.

Artistic engagement with the stage proved to be an extraordinarily fruitful field of experimentation for the universal artist Picasso, and it found expression in both his paintings and his sculptures. The exhibition shows more than eighty works from 1900 to 1930 that demonstrate how passionately Picasso was attached to the theater.