Awards

• Winner of Whitbread Book Awards: Biography Category 1991
• Winner of Whitbread Book Awards: Book of the Year 1991

Overview

The beautifully illustrated fourth volume of Picasso's life - set in France and Spain during the Spanish Civil War and World War II - covers friendships with the surrealist painters; artistic inspiration around Guernica and the Minotaur; his muses Marie-Ther se, Dora Maar and Fran oise Gilot; and much more. 'A masterpiece' Sunday Times 'Magisterial... thrilling' Guardian 'Terrifically enjoyable' Daily Telegraph The beautifully illustrated, long-awaited final volume of John Richardson's magisterial Life of Picasso, drawing on original research from interviews and never-before-seen material in the Picasso family archives. The Minotaur Years opens in 1933 with a visit by the Hungarian-French photographer Brassai to Picasso's ch teau in Normandy, Boisgeloup, where he would take his iconic photographs of the celebrated plaster busts of Picasso's lover Marie-Ther se Walter. Picasso was contributing to Andre Breton's Minotaur magazine and spending time with the likes of Man Ray, Salvador Dali, Lee Miller, and the poet Paul luard, in Paris and the south of France. It was during this time that Picasso began writing surrealist poetry and became obsessed with the image of himself as the mythic Minotaur. Richardson shows us the artist being as prolific as ever, painting Walter, as well as the surrealist photographer Dora Maar, who became a muse, collaborator and lover. The bombing of Guernica in April 1937 would inspire Picasso's vast masterwork of the same name, which he painted in just a few weeks for the Spanish Pavilion at the Paris World's Fair. When the Nazis occupied Paris in 1940, Picasso chose to remain in the city despite the threat that his art would be confiscated. In 1943, Picasso met Fran oise Gilot who would replace Maar and inspire a brilliant new sequence of paintings. As always, Richardson tells Picasso's story through his work, analysing how it shows what the artist was feeling and thinking. His fascinating and illuminating narrative immerses us in one of the most exciting moments in twentieth-century cultural history, and brings to a close the definitive and critically acclaimed biography of one of the world's most celebrated artists.

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Reviews

[Richardson] set the standard for modern artists' biographies...The fourth and final volume...is a worthy follow-up to its predecessors... just as rich, just as astounding. -- Sebastian Smee * Washington Post * The final chapter of a magisterial biography... The author's unique, extensive knowledge and insider information about Picasso - both the man and artist - informs insightful explications of the nuances and symbolism in Picasso's works... A masterful accomplishment. * Kirkus Reviews * This first volume of an amazing life is the finest biography of an artist I have read...the ultimate and irreplaceable biography, the biography which proves that Picasso's famous luck has held out. -- Waldemar Januszczak * Guardian - Praise for Volume I * Magnificent...Richardson's book is intellectually thrilling and visually dazzling...an indispensable study of the unnatural, blasphemous, sometimes obscene and mostly glorious madness known as art. -- Peter Conrad * Observer - Praise for Volume I * What makes the two published volumes so outstanding is the sense of Picasso the man emerging - in all his complexity - alongside the superb analysis of Picasso the artist. -- William Boyd * Spectator - Praise for Volume II * Magisterial... Richardson's ambitious project dwarfs all previous biographies of Picasso... [He] has a gift for telling pen-portraits and makes vivid an entire gallery of pioneering dealers and early collectors. -- Frances Spalding * Sunday Times - Praise for Volume II * Gossipy, profound, insightful and non-judgemental, Richardson is terrific company. This volume joins its predecessors as unrivalled among artists' biographies -- Jackie Wullschlager * Financial Times - Praise for Volume III * No man is better qualified to write the biography of Picasso...he writes with such fluency, simplicity and clarity that his knowledge and illuminating wisdom are very lightly borne... a marvellous book. -- Brian Sewell * Evening Standard - Praise for Volume III * A fluent writer with a gift for narrative and a sensitive ability to read the artist's work in relation to his life... The decade covered in this volume, which turns on Picasso's identification with the part-beast, part-man mythical Minotaur, is a tumultuous one, both in public and in private life... [it is] deftly presented as Richardson moves from the man to his circle to his art to larger historical events. -- Siri Hustvedt * New York Times Book Review * Personal and political collide in lively fourth volume of detailed biography... The Minotaur Years retells what might be considered a familiar story, but carries it off with a liveliness generated by short chapters, sharp judgements and occasionally waspish dismissals, all dispatched at pace. It is the fruit of 60 years of thinking, conversing and speculating about the artist, underpinned by detailed looking, research and investigation of his movements moment by moment. -- Matthew Gale * The Art Newspaper *

Magnificent, unparalleled... How [Volume IV] manages to be as gripping as it is, as fresh as it is, only the gods of art can answer... Richardson is both an intimate witness and a ravenous historian... No one will ever again be able to combine Richardson's personal familiarity with Picasso with such impressive levels of history, insight, detail, gossip and breezy writing. The greatest art biography ever written can never have a proper ending. It's an incomplete masterpiece. But a masterpiece nevertheless. -- Waldemar Januszczak * Sunday Times * Magisterial... What has always made Richardson's biographical work on Picasso so alive is the fact of his personal friendship with the artist. It is thrilling to read a narrative in which scholarly prose is regularly interrupted with the phrase Picasso once told me ... followed by an entirely fresh anecdote... How lucky we are...that Richardson lived long enough to get this far. -- Kathryn Hughes * Guardian * Terrifically enjoyable... irresistible. -- Alastair Sooke * Daily Telegraph * [Richardson] set the standard for modern artists' biographies...The fourth and final volume...is a worthy follow-up to its predecessors... just as rich, just as astounding. -- Sebastian Smee * Washington Post * The final chapter of a magisterial biography... The author's unique, extensive knowledge and insider information about Picasso - both the man and artist - informs insightful explications of the nuances and symbolism in Picasso's works... A masterful accomplishment. * Kirkus Reviews * Personal and political collide in lively fourth volume of detailed biography... The Minotaur Years retells what might be considered a familiar story, but carries it off with a liveliness generated by short chapters, sharp judgements and occasionally waspish dismissals, all dispatched at pace. It is the fruit of 60 years of thinking, conversing and speculating about the artist, underpinned by detailed looking, research and investigation of his movements moment by moment. -- Matthew Gale * The Art Newspaper * A fluent writer with a gift for narrative and a sensitive ability to read the artist's work in relation to his life... The decade covered in this volume, which turns on Picasso's identification with the part-beast, part-man mythical Minotaur, is a tumultuous one, both in public and in private life... [it is] deftly presented as Richardson moves from the man to his circle to his art to larger historical events. -- Siri Hustvedt * New York Times Book Review * Richardson's monumental biography...comes at you like a roar... As biographer, Richardson is clever, amusing, flamboyant, outrageous - a worthy match for his subject... Even incomplete, this is Richardson's masterpiece. -- Laura Freeman * The Times * Enlivened by...anecdotal intimacy... Richardson...has ingeniously deciphered the art without demystifying the artist. -- Peter Conrad * Observer *

A powerhouse of a book . . . Not only a reconsideration of Picasso but also a reckoning on the art and culture of the century in which he played so essential a role . . . Richardson is juggling so many people and themes and events with such aplomb that readers may not quite realize what literary pyrotechnics are involved. * The New York Times Book Review (on VOL. III) * One of the great intellectual undertakings of our time has been Richardson's multivolume biography of Picasso... Richardson leads us through the grand story with energy, wit and authority. * Time (on VOL. III) * [A] work so rich with information and insight that it will forever change our understanding of the artist . . . John Richardson's A Life of Picasso is the last work that will ever be written by a friend of the painter . . . It is a magnificent achievement . . . Sixteen years ago in a review of the first volume, critic John Golding said that when completed A Life of Picasso might prove to be the most remarkable biography of an artist ever written. Now that three volumes have been published, this predictions seems likely to be true. * The New York Review of Books (On VOL. III) * Magisterial and definitive . . . [I]nformed by Mr. Richardson's consummate knowledge of Picasso's work . . . * The New York Times (ON VOL. III) * Superb scholarship [combined] with a delicious style and unfailing wit. * The Wall Street Journal (ON VOL. III) *

"Clever, amusing, flamboyant and outrageous... Even incomplete, this is Richardson's masterpiece. * The Times, *Books of the Year* * Richardson's monumental biography...comes at you like a roar... As biographer, Richardson is clever, amusing, flamboyant, outrageous - a worthy match for his subject... Even incomplete, this is Richardson's masterpiece. -- Laura Freeman * The Times * Magnificent, unparalleled... How [Volume IV] manages to be as gripping as it is, as fresh as it is, only the gods of art can answer... Richardson is both an intimate witness and a ravenous historian... No one will ever again be able to combine Richardson's personal familiarity with Picasso with such impressive levels of history, insight, detail, gossip and breezy writing. The greatest art biography ever written can never have a proper ending. It's an incomplete masterpiece. But a masterpiece nevertheless. -- Waldemar Januszczak * Sunday Times * What a magnificent resource this four-volume biography is, unfinished...yet unrivalled in its blend of erudition and gossipy insights. * Financial Times, *Books of the Year* * Magisterial... What has always made Richardson's biographical work on Picasso so alive is the fact of his personal friendship with the artist. It is thrilling to read a narrative in which scholarly prose is regularly interrupted with the phrase ""Picasso once told me ... "" followed by an entirely fresh anecdote... How lucky we are...that Richardson lived long enough to get this far. -- Kathryn Hughes * Guardian * One of the great biographical enterprises of our times. * New Statesman, *The Best Books of 2022 So Far* * Terrifically enjoyable... irresistible. -- Alastair Sooke * Daily Telegraph * No previous biographer of Picasso has commanded such detail, range and depth when dealing with this unendingly inventive and ferociously experimental artist. This fourth volume...reflects Richardson's gift for merging the personal with the professional. * Literary Review * Gripping, highly readable and thoughtfully illustrated... It's hard to imagine that he could be bettered as our guide in the labyrinth of the minotaur. -- Stephen Smith * Financial Times * Enlivened by...anecdotal intimacy... Richardson...has ingeniously deciphered the art without demystifying the artist. -- Peter Conrad * Observer * Every page carries an entertaining story or a fascinating gobbet of artistic gossip. -- Craig Brown * Mail on Sunday * A fluent writer with a gift for narrative and a sensitive ability to read the artist's work in relation to his life... The decade covered in this volume, which turns on Picasso's identification with the part-beast, part-man mythical Minotaur, is a tumultuous one, both in public and in private life... [it is] deftly presented as Richardson moves from the man to his circle to his art to larger historical events. -- Siri Hustvedt * New York Times Book Review * Personal and political collide in lively fourth volume of detailed biography... The Minotaur Years retells what might be considered a familiar story, but carries it off with a liveliness generated by short chapters, sharp judgements and occasionally waspish dismissals, all dispatched at pace. It is the fruit of 60 years of thinking, conversing and speculating about the artist, underpinned by detailed looking, research and investigation of his movements moment by moment. -- Matthew Gale * The Art Newspaper * [Richardson] set the standard for modern artists' biographies...The fourth and final volume...is a worthy follow-up to its predecessors... just as rich, just as astounding. -- Sebastian Smee * Washington Post * The final chapter of a magisterial biography... The author's unique, extensive knowledge and insider information about Picasso - both the man and artist - informs insightful explications of the nuances and symbolism in Picasso's works... A masterful accomplishment. * Kirkus Reviews * Monumental... Nobody has brought us closer [than Richardson] to understanding this extraordinary and complex artist. -- Miranda France * Prospect * [A] magisterial work... superbly illustrated. -- Nicky Haslam * Oldie * [A] magisterial and superbly illustrated biography. -- Ysenda Maxtone Graham * Daily Mail, *Book of the Week* * Monumental... This uncompleted project will surely be the Ozymandias of all biographies, since Richardson's talents were uniquely matched to his protean subject. -- Fram Dinshaw * Catholic Herald * Wonderfully lively, greatly informative and memorably insightful... a great read. -- Alexander Adams * Jackdaw *"

Author Information

John Richardson was born in London in 1924. He studied art at the Slade School but soon gave up painting for art criticism. In 1949 he moved to France, where befriended Picasso, Braque, Leger, and Cocteau. The first volume of his magisterial four-volume A Life of Picasso won the Whitbread Prize in 1991. He was also the author of the memoir, The Sorcerer's Apprentice; an essay collection, Sacred Monsters, Sacred Masters; and books on Manet and Braque. He wrote for the New York Review of Books, New Yorker and Vanity Fair. He was made a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy in 1993, and served as the Slade Professor of Fine Art at Oxford University from 1995 to 1996. He died in 2019.

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