Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter born in Malaga in 1881 who became the most famous, versatile, prolific, and influential artist of the 20th century. He was the son of a painter and drawing master and was absorbed in art from childhood, his first word is said to have been 'piz' baby talk for 'lapiz', 'pencil! Between 1900 and 1904 he alternated between Paris and Barcelona, and these years coincided with his Blue Period, when he took his subjects from social outcasts and the poor. In 1904 he settled in Paris and quickly became part of the avant-garde movement.

He married in 1918 and became involved with the Surrealists in Paris in the early 1920s. He produced perhaps his most famous work, Guernica in 1937 following his horror at the bombing of the small Spanish town during the civil war. His post-war work does not compare to that of his early paintings and sculpture, but his output continued to be great until his death in 1973.