Alastair Sooke on a photograph that captures Picasso's playful side
Sometimes it feels strange to glimpse genius up close. Here is Picasso, the thundering force behind almost every development in the history of art in the first half of the last century, with his arms crossed in a playful sulk. He may have been in his seventies when the picture was taken, but his pose conveys all the youthful energy of a little boy throwing a strop.
The moment was captured in his studio in the small town of Vallauris on the Côte d'Azur in 1953. The man behind the camera was André Villers, a young photographer of 23 who had bumped into le maître by chance that spring.
