Where to See The Three Dancers: Tate Modern, London

Picasso rendered this The Three Dancers in 1925, marking a violent break from his classical period. Three distorted figures dance frantically before a balcony. Their angular bodies and grimacing faces express psychological torment rather than graceful movement.

Picasso painted it during marital crisis with his first wife Olga. He later revealed the painting memorialized his friend Ramon Pichot, who died during its creation, and Pichot's wife Germaine, who had driven another friend to suicide. The painting anticipates Surrealism and connects to Guernica's anguished figures. It hangs at Tate Modern.

Three figures dance before a balcony in frenzied, contorted poses. The central figure raises her arms; the others flank her in angular distortion. The mood is violent rather than joyful.

The painting marks Picasso's turn toward Surrealism and away from Neoclassicism. Its violent distortion anticipates Guernica and influenced generations of expressionist painters.

Picasso three distorted figures dance frantically before a balcony. The work is executed in oil on canvas.

The Three Dancers

More by Pablo Picasso

Les Demoiselles d'Avignon

Details

Where to See It

The Artist

Cite or Embed This Work

Garçon à la pipe (Boy with a Pipe)

Fillette à la corbeille fleurie

Weeping Woman

Also at Tate Modern, London

Mrs George Augustus Frederick Cavendish Bentinck and her Children

Lightning with Stag in its Glare

Lobster Telephone

Nebuchadnezzar

Guernica

The Old Guitarist

Self-Portrait

Metamorphosis of Narcissus

Three Dancers

Three Ballet Dancers

Three Dancers in an Exercise Hall

The Scream

Olympia

Portrait of Germaine Raynal

Portrait of Picasso

Street, Berlin

About The Three Dancers

Own Art Like This