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A newly discovered painting by Pablo Picasso of the French photographer and painter Dora Maar completed during the German occupation of Paris that has not been seen for 80 years, has been unveiled.
The work, Bust of a Woman in a Flowery Hat (Dora Maar), was finished towards the end of the couple’s turbulent nine-year relationship and shows Maar in a softer, more colourful light than Picasso’s previous portraits of his then lover.
Picasso made many paintings of Maar, including the famous, Portrait of Dora Maar and Dora Maar au Chat, but she said of them: “All of his portraits of me are lies. They’re all Picassos. Not one is Dora Maar.”
The couple met at the end of 1935 when she was taking photographs to promote Jean Renoir’s film The Crime of Monsieur Lange. At the time, Picasso was in a relationship with Marie-Thérèse Walter, with whom he had a daughter Maya, that continued during his years with Maar.
He frequently represented Maar, whose masochistic tendencies fascinated him, as a tortured figure often in tears as in La Femme qui pleure (Weeping Woman), which experts say he intended to represent the suffering of the Spanish civil war but was also indicative of his alleged abuse of Maar and the couple’s many physical fights.
In the rediscovered work, Maar’s face, fragmented but painted in bright colour without perspective, appears anguished and on the point of weeping. At the time Maar had learned that Picasso, then 61, intended to leave her for the artist Françoise Gilot, 21.
The portrait was completed in July 1943 and was only displayed a handful of times outside his Paris atelier in the Rue des Grands Augustins. It has been in a private collection since it was bought in August 1944 a few months before the liberation of Paris.
Its existence was known from a black and white photograph taken shortly before it was sold that featured in an art catalogue. The seller, who inherited the painting from a grandparent, an unnamed French collector, has asked to remain anonymous.
The Nazis occupying Paris during the second world war considered Picasso’s work “degenerate”, which led to raids on his atelier and threats of a ban on exhibiting his paintings.
Maar, who died in Paris in 1997 aged 89, is credited with being Picasso’s muse as well as his subject and lover, but she was a surrealist photographer in her own right and her style had a major influence on his work during their relationship.
The auction house Lucien Paris, which has conservatively estimated the oil painting measuring 80cm x 60cm at about €8m (£6.9m) but expects it to fetch far more, had kept the painting’s existence a secret before unveiling it to the press on Thursday.
Auctioneer Christophe Lucien said it was a significant discovery and described the work as a masterpiece and a rare example of how Picasso’s output was a much needed light during the dark days of the occupation. He said experts knew it existed from the photographs but it was the first time the true colours of the work could be seen.
“It is not only a milestone in the history of art but also in the private life of Picasso,” Lucien said.
“It is a refreshing portrait of Dora Maar; exceptional and full of emotion. Discovering it is a big moment in our lives as experts.”
The painting will be sold at auction by Lucien Paris on 24 October and will be on display for three days before the sale.
