?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 30,000 - $ 40,000
Picasso, Pablo, illus. (188-1973) & Fernando de Rojas (ca. 1465/73-1541) La Célestine.
Paris: Éditions de l'Atelier Crommelynck, 1971.
Limited edition, quarto; copy 162 of 350 numbered copies on watermarked Richard de Bas paper and signed by the artist in pencil on the colophon, from a total edition of 400; text translated into French by Pierre Huegas; illustrated with 66 etchings and aquatints; bound in full parchment with the title lettered in black (very rare pale discoloration, otherwise bright and beautifully preserved); housed in the original quarter parchment chemise and slipcase; 8 1/4 x 6 1/2 in.
Produced during the last years of his life, Picasso's illustrated Célestine is the culmination of a lifelong fascination with the protagonist from Fernando de Roja's tragicomedy. Picasso became interested in early Spanish literature, particularly the Celestine, as an adolescent. His continued obsession with de Rojas's character can be tracked through numerous portrayals on paper, in engravings, etchings, oil and clay, until this, his final and most extensive ode to the cunning titular character.
See Carol Salus's Picasso and Celestina: The Artist's Vision of the Procuress.
