It's Flashback Friday and National Cuddle Up Day, which encourages cuddling to stave off the January cold. May these pleasant curios add to the comfort! 
D'aww. Does it get any cuter than this father and son playing it up in the sun? Between his harrowing forays into combat, famous wartime photographer Robert Capa spent his time in the company of illustrious friends, like painter Pablo Picasso. Shown above is a photo he took of the artist and his adorable son, Claude, at a seaside resort on France’s Côte d’Azur in 1948. Claude was the child of Picasso and one of his mistresses, Françoise Gilot, who was 40 years his junior. By the time this wholesome photo was taken, Capa had already documented the Spanish Civil War and stormed Omaha Beach alongside soldiers on D-Day. Due to his unrivaled reputation as a war journalist, and his publicized relationship with Gerda Taro—an equally fearless photographer—his talent for bubbly candids has otherwise been forgotten. And with friends like Ernest Hemingway, Henri Matisse, and others, it's a real shame. Though Capa would die an untimely death on May 25, 1954, in French Indochina, both his heartwarming portraits and his grisly war scenes live on as testaments to the many merits and detriments of humankind.
 

Image credit & copyright: Cornell Capa / International Center of Photography / Magnum Photos.
 

Created: 1904
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 21.3 x 25.6 in (54 x 65 cm)
Current location: São Paulo Museum of Art, São Paulo
 
Suzanne Bloch is not impressed. Last week, we heard the story of how the Mona Lisa went missing for two years in the early 20th century. Today, we take a look at the victim of a much more recent theft. The Portrait of Suzanne Bloch, one of Pablo Picasso’s iconic Blue Period portraits, was stolen a mere nine years ago this week from the São Paulo Museum of Art. That robbery, though, was caught on security cameras, and the painting was recovered undamaged less than three weeks later. The uninterested-looking subject is Suzanne Bloch, a Wagnerian opera singer who ran in Picasso’s social circle. We may never know how closely this portrait matched Bloch’s actual temperament, because as in other Blue Period paintings, the somber mood and blue hues reflected the painter’s own melancholy following a friend’s suicide. These made them a harder sell at the time, but today, Portrait of Suzanne Bloch is valued at over $50 million. Now that’s a fact bound to have made both Bloch and Picasso smile.

Title: Woman at the Theater

Artist: Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)
Created: 1901
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 31.9 x 23.6 in (80 x 60 cm)
Current location: Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel, Switzerland
 

Grow up and be an artist? Pablo Picasso didn't have to wait that long. The art prodigy had his first major exhibit on Paris' famous rue Lafitte, known for its prestigious art galleries, this day in 1901. At the young age of 19, the Spanish-born Picasso was taking in the Parisian night life and artistic influences from the region, culminating in works like Woman at the Theater. While this may not be a painting from the cubist Picasso we're used to, elements of the artist who was dying to break out of his formal training are visible. The woman's face bears some of the flat perspective Picasso was so fond of, and the lower half of the painting dissolves into an abstraction of colors and space where it's hard to tell where the woman's dress ends, and the room begins. Though all of the primary colors shine in Woman at the Theater, Picasso would soon narrow his palette to just one for his Blue Period (1901-1904), to match the somber mood he felt after the suicide of a good friend. Even prodigies aren't immune to the plight of the tortured artist!

Title: The Blue Room
Artist: Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)
Created: 1901
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 21 x 24 in (50 x 61 cm)
Current location: The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.
 

Picasso certainly had a few things hidden up his sleeve. In the aftermath of a friend's death, the artist, born this day in 1881, started painting solely in blue and green hues to creatively express his loss. Known as his Blue Period, this era also included several depictions of women like the above work, where one bathes alone in the privacy of her apartment, her face made blank to indicate her anonymity. The intimate moment holds a secret of its own; struggling to make ends meet this early in his career, Picasso often painted over works he hadn't been able to sell. When conservators placed this painting under X-rays, they found underneath a portrait of a pensive man sitting in an armchair. To the naked eye, a few brushstrokes towards the top of the painting protrude through the layers of paint give away the fact that there's something below. When the figure was discovered in 2014, it stirred speculation in the art world about who this particular man might be, in his fancy dress coat and bow tie. That secret may be one that we won't be able to unearth!
 

Below: the figure revealed by infrared x-ray technology.

 

D'aww. Does it get any cuter than this father and son playing it up in the sun? Between his harrowing forays into combat, famous wartime photographer Robert Capa spent his time in the company of illustrious friends, like painter Pablo Picasso. Shown above is a photo he took of the artist and his adorable son, Claude, at a seaside resort on France’s Côte d’Azur in 1948. Claude was the child of Picasso and one of his mistresses, Françoise Gilot, who was 40 years his junior. By the time this wholesome photo was taken, Capa had already documented the Spanish Civil War and stormed Omaha Beach alongside soldiers on D-Day. Due to his unrivaled reputation as a war journalist, and his publicized relationship with Gerda Taro—an equally fearless photographer—his talent for bubbly candids has otherwise been forgotten. And with friends like Ernest Hemingway, Henri Matisse, and others, it's a real shame. Though Capa would die an untimely death on May 25, 1954, in French Indochina, both his heartwarming portraits and his grisly war scenes live on as testaments to the many merits and detriments of humankind.
 

Below: a boxer with his son at the legendary Stillman's Gym, New York (1937); a student acting in a propaganda play, Hankou, China (1938); and Ernest Hemingway like we've never seen him before (1944).
 

Image credit & copyright: Cornell Capa / Robert Capa / International Center of Photography / Magnum Photos.
 

What does a baby armadillo become when viewed through the surrealist lens of Dora Maar? The one in this photo, titled Père Ubu, was meant to embody the bestial nature of the royal anti-hero in Alfred Jarry's satirically absurd play, Ubu Roi. Maar's strange, imaginative work was partly an homage to her avant-garde contemporaries who were pushing the boundaries of art, reality, and good taste in the early part of the 20th century. The artist, born on this day 110 years ago, was an established photographer and painter in France when she became a colleague and occasional muse for artists and intellectuals like Man Ray, Georges Bataille, and most notably, Pablo Picasso. Unfortunately, Maar abandoned her interest in armadillo portraits and other creative endeavors as her relationship with the cubist painter grew (Picasso was notoriously unkind in his artistic assessment of photographers). In later parts of her career, she only brought out her camera on rare occasions—like when she documented Picasso's painting of the Spanish Civil War mural Guernica in a series of black and white photos. When the two broke up in 1946, Maar became reclusive, rarely making images anymore. What remains of her artistic outpouring is sometimes shocking, often dreamy, and always captivating.

 

Below: Maar capturing Picasso's Guernica process, Double Portrait, Paris, and a portrait of Maar by Man Ray.
 

Image credit & copyright: Dora Maar, Museum of Modern Art / Artist's Rights Society
 

Title: Seated Woman 2017
Artist: Omar Aqil
Created: 2017
Medium: Cinema 4D-Vray, Photoshop, Illustrator
 
Pablo Picasso, meet the 21st century. The pioneering painter's cubist figures get a modern 3D makeover in Omar Aqil's series, MIMIC. Aqil, a Pakistan-based art director and digital artist, wanted to rethink how Picasso's abstract forms could interact with one another. Seated Woman 2017, as the title suggests, is inspired by Picasso's warm-hued 1930 painting of the same name (pictured below). The original is geometric and spatially ambiguous; Aqil's version distinguishes itself with rounded, sharp-edged, and distinctively layered shapes. We'd be totally convinced this composition was created from real props, were it not for the chair on the left—notice how it appears to recede in an unnatural way, almost as if flat. That's because Aqil, bringing Picasso's works fully into the modern era, rendered all the MIMIC images digitally using Cinema 4D-Vray, Photoshop, and Illustrator. We love his whimsical take on the classic images, and think Picasso would have also approved. He is, after all, credited with the mantra: "Good artists copy, great artists steal."

 
Below: Pablo Picasso's Seated Woman, 1930.
 

 
Below: a few more of Aqil's MIMC creations next to Picasso's originals.
 

 
Image credit & copyright: Omar Aqil
 

Title: Unknown
Artist: Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)
Created: ca. 1930-1970
Current location: Los Angeles Police Department, Los Angeles, California
 

Maybe the Los Angeles Police Department should have put this missing Picasso on the side of a milk box? Recently, the LAPD and Interpol were given a tip that revived a cold case known as "Operation Demetra," and a cache of paintings and expensive goods presumed to be missing for 25 years were finally found, including one from famed cubist, Pablo Picasso. This colorful painting was originally stolen during a string of break-ins in Hollywood and LA's Westside areas the 1990s. The case was reopened earlier this year, when a Southern California auctioneer thought a recent sale lot looked suspicious. The thieves turned out to be two Armenian nationalists, of whom one died and left the goods to his heirs. Though this Picasso piece is easily identified by its multi-perspective cubist style from his later works, many of the other paintings recovered are unidentified. Currently the LAPD is working with the J. Paul Getty Museum to identify them, and a website has been created with photos to encourage the public to come forward with any information they might have. Like the subject of a Picasso painting, they might have to sit with a lot of patience to completely close the case!

 

Below: a few of the other recovered artworks on display in the LAPD's unusual gallery. The first of which is presumed to be a work by the dadaist Joan Miró.
 

Image credit & copyright: Los Angeles Police Department
 

It's Flashback Friday! Enjoy this favorite from the Curio Cabinet archives.
 

Title: Seated Woman 2017
Artist: Omar Aqil
Created: 2017
Medium: Cinema 4D-Vray, Photoshop, Illustrator
 
Pablo Picasso, meet the 21st century. The pioneering painter's cubist figures get a modern 3D makeover in Omar Aqil's series, MIMIC. Aqil, a Pakistan-based art director and digital artist, wanted to rethink how Picasso's abstract forms could interact with one another. Seated Woman 2017, as the title suggests, is inspired by Picasso's warm-hued 1930 painting of the same name (pictured below). The original is geometric and spatially ambiguous; Aqil's version distinguishes itself with rounded, sharp-edged, and distinctively layered shapes. We'd be totally convinced this composition was created from real props, were it not for the chair on the left—notice how it appears to recede in an unnatural way, almost as if flat. That's because Aqil, bringing Picasso's works fully into the modern era, rendered all the MIMIC images digitally using Cinema 4D-Vray, Photoshop, and Illustrator. We love his whimsical take on the classic images, and think Picasso would have also approved. He is, after all, credited with the mantra: "Good artists copy, great artists steal."

 
Below: Pablo Picasso's Seated Woman, 1930.
 

 
Below: a few more of Aqil's MIMC creations next to Picasso's originals.
 

 
Image credit & copyright: Omar Aqil