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The Arts Intel Report

Le Main de Picasso

Pablo Picasso, Main de l’artiste, 1937.

Sept 24 – Nov 5, 2022
43 E 78th St, New York, NY 10075

Here is an exhibition of one work: a plaster cast of Pablo Picasso’s left hand, made by Picasso himself. It dates to 1937, the year Picasso created his momentous Guernica, a cacophonous painting that foregrounds a left hand, its fingers stretched open in agony. The plaster hand, however, is raised palm flat, with fingers and thumb pressed together—a saintly salutation. The Surrealist poet Max Jacob, who read Picasso’s future from his left hand, wrote, “all lines appear to emanate from the line of chance … like the first spark of a firework.” —Laura Jacobs

Photo: courtesy of Galerie Gmurzynska