Painted four years before his death, Picasso’s portrayal of these figures shows them frozen in an ambivalent moment, one of both sexual pleasure and terrifying violence. He represents the male figure as a musketeer with triangular hat and sword, a recurring theme in his art beginning in 1965, perhaps as a result of having recently read The Three Musketeers, Alexander Dumas’ novel of swashbuckling heroes.

Here Picasso places the brazenly phallic sword at the center of the large canvas, pointed directly at the woman’s genitals, and emphasizes the woman’s sexuality, as her clothing falls away to expose exaggerated breasts. The increasing sexual aggressiveness in Picasso’s late work was dismissed by many critics; only after his death have these paintings been the subject of renewed scholarship.

Wall label, 2021.