The Minotaur

Prints and Drawings

June 24, 1933

Pablo Picasso
Spanish, 1881-1973

This violent drawing captures a half-man, half-bull Minotaur raping a woman. The figure of the Minotaur dates back to Greek mythology: it inhabited a labyrinth, devoured innocent people, and was ultimately slain by the hero Theseus. In the 1930s, when Picasso made this work, people understood the Minotaur as a manifestation of unconscious and uncontrolled desire. Despite the horror of such imagery, the beast in some ways may have embodied Picasso’s own self-perception as a womanizer.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Prints and Drawings

Artist: Pablo Picasso
Title: The Minotaur
Place: Spain (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1933
Medium: Pen and brush and black ink and brush and gray wash on blue wove paper
Inscriptions: Signed recto, lower right, in pen and black ink: "Picasso" (underlined); inscribed lower right, in pen and black ink: "24 juin XXXIII L Boisgeloup"; inscribed verso, lower right, in graphite: "Henry Kleemann / January 1943"; along right edge, in graphite: "Tendu sur carton depassant 1 cm tout autour"
Dimensions: 48 × 63 cm (18 15/16 × 24 13/16 in.)
Credit Line: Margaret Day Blake Collection
Reference Number: 1967.516
Copyright: © 2018 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Picasso: Fifteen Drawings (New York, 1946), pl. 13, as Minotaur.
Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso VIII (Paris, 1957), p. 48, no. 112 (ill.), as Minotaur.
Maurice Jardot, Pablo Picasso Drawings (New York, 1959), p. 157, fig. 89 (ill.).
Jakob Rosenberg, Great Draughtsmen from Pisanello to Picasso (Cambridge, 1959), p. 132, fig. 242 (ill.), as The Minotaur attacking a Woman.
Hans L. C. Jaffe, Pablo Picasso (New York, 1964), fig. 73 (ill.), as The Minotaur.
Picasso (Tokyo, 1970), n.p. (ill.).
William Rubin, Pablo Picasso in the Collection of the Museum of Modern Art (New York, 1972), p. 231, fig. 135, as Minotaur.
Maurice Sérullaz, “Dessins français de l’Art Institute de Chicago, de Watteau à Picasso,” La Revue du Louvre 4 (1976), p. 305, fig. 5 (ill.), as The Minotaur.
Dale McConathy, “Picasso: The Transfigurations of the Minotaur,” artscanada 236/237 (September-–October 1980), p. 44 (ill.), as Minotaur and Woman.
Alan G. Artner, “Drawings of Picasso on View at Art Institute,” Chicago Tribune (May 10, 1981), as as The Rape.
Lydia Gasman, Mystery, Magic and Love in Picasso, 1925–1928: Picasso and the Surrealist Poets, Ph.D dissertation, Columbia University (New York, 1981), pp. 1363, 1366, 1431–1441, pl. 440, as Minotaur and Woman.
Sebastian Goeppert and Herma C. Goeppert-Frank, Die Minotauromachie von Pablo Picasso (Genf, 1987), p. 35 (ill.), as Minotauros und Freuenakt.
George Boudaille, Picasso, dessinateur (Paris, 1987), p. 78, pl. 28, as Minotaur.
Ulrich Weisner, Picasso: Letzte Bilder, Werke 1966–1972, exh. cat. (Stuttgart, Germany, 1993), p. 312, fig. 47b. as Minotaur.
James N. Wood and Sally Ruth May, The Art Institute of Chicago: The Essential Guide (Chicago, 1993), p. 218 (ill.).
William Rubin, Picasso and Portraiture: Representation and Transformation, exh. cat. (New York, 1996), p. 87 (ill.), as Minotaur and Woman.
The Picasso Project, Picasso’s Paintings, Watercolors, Drawings, and Sculpture: A Comprehensive Illustrated Catalogue 1885–1973, Surrealism 1930–1936 (San Francisco, 1997), p. 173, no. 33–060 (ill.), as Minotaur (The Rape).
James Wood, Treasures from the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago, 2000), p. 278 (ill.).
Rafael Jackson, Picasso y las Poéticas Surrealistas: De la biología a lo sagrado (Madrid, 2000), pp. 224–225, fig. 183, as El Abrazo.
Picasso Érotique, exh. cat. (Paris, 2001), p. 41, fig. 2, as Minotaur and Woman.
Christopher Lloyd, Picasso and the Art of Drawing (London, 2018), pp. 146-49, pl. 102.
Enrique Mallen, The On-Line Picasso Project (http://www.tamu.edu/mocl/picasso/), no. 33:140 (ill.), as Minotaur.

New York, Museum of Modern Art, “Modern Drawings,” 1944, pp. 75 and 96 (ill.), as Minotaur.
Princeton, N. J., Princeton University Art Museum, “Loan Exhibition of Picasso Drawings,” January 10–31, 1949, cat. 30 (ill.), as The Minotaur.
New York, Museum of Modern Art, “Picasso: 75th Anniversary Exhibition,” May 22–September 8, 1957, p. 73 (ill.), as The Minotaur; traveled to The Art Institute of Chicago, October 29–December 8, 1957.
Philadelphia Museum of Art, “Picasso,” January 8–February 23, 1958, cat. 131 (ill.), as The Minotaur.
Paris, Galerie Knoedler, “Picasso Dessins and Aquarelles,” October–December 1966, cat. 62 (ill), as The Minotaur.
The Art Institute of Chicago, “Picasso in Chicago,” February 3–March 31, 1968, pp. 57 and 117, cat. 90 (ill.), as Minotaur and Woman.
The Art Institute of Chicago, “A Quarter Century of Collecting: Drawings Given to The Art Institute of Chicago, 1944-1970 by Margaret Day Blake,” April 28-June 7, 1970, n.p., cat. 46 (ill.).
Paris, Musée de Louvre, “Dessins français de l’Art Institute de Chicago de Watteau à Picasso,” October 15, 1976–January 17, 1977, pp. 82–83, cat. 82 (ill.), as The Minotaur.
Frankfurt am Main, Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunsinstitut, “Französische Zeichnungen aus dem Art Institute of Chicago,” February 10–April 10, 1977, pp. 182–183, cat. 88 (ill.), as The Minotaur.
New York, Museum of Modern Art, “Picasso Retrospective,” May 1–September 16, 1980, p. 312 (ill.), as Minotaur and Nude.
Cambridge, Mass., Fogg Art Museum, “Master Drawings by Picasso,” February 20–April 5, 1981, pp. 182–183, cat. 76 (ill.); traveled to The Art Institute of Chicago, April 29–June 14, 1981, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, July 11–August 23, 1981.
The Art Institute of Chicago, “Great Drawings from The Art Institute of Chicago: The Harold Joachim Years 1958–1983,” July 24–September 30, 1985, pp. 206–207, cat. 96 (ill.).
Art Institute of Chicago, “Picasso and Chicago”, February 20-May 12, 2013, p. 69, cat. 127 (ill.), cat. by Stephanie d’Alessandro.
The Art Institute of Chicago, “Picasso: Drawing from Life”, November 11, 2023 - April 8, 2024.

Henry Kleemann, New York, by 1944-at least Jan. 1949 [New York 1944; Princeton, N. J. 1949]. Sylvester W. Labrot, Jr., Hobe Sound, Fl., by May 1957-at least 1964 [New York 1957; according to Jaffe 1964]. Galerie Knoedler, Paris, by Oct. 1966 [Paris 1966]. Sold by E. V. Thaw and Company, New York, to the Art Institute, 1967.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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