Picasso's tragic first wife emerges from the shadows

Spanish painter and sculptor Pablo Picasso separated from his first wife, Olga Khokhlova, in 1935. They never divorced; she died in 1955. [Photo/Agencies]

By then Picasso was leading a double life having become infatuated with a buxom 17-year-old French girl, Marie-Therese Walter, who he picked up in the street.

In one telling photo taken by Picasso in his studio, the slim and elegant Olga is shot sitting on a chair behind which looms a nude of the voluptuous Marie-Therese who－unbeknown to Olga－had replaced her in his bed.

Olga's grandson Bernard Ruiz-Picasso said that the family's letters and photos allow a "really fascinating study of the direct links between the artist, his work and what was influencing him at the time".

Picasso's friend and biographer, the British art historian Sir John Richardson－who described Olga as "rather neurotic"－has already called the trove "a revelation and absolutely astonishing. It opens up his life," he said.

Picasso has often been condemned as a macho misogynist, whose sex drive and selfishness left a trail of destruction behind him－with Marie-Therese, his second wife Jacqueline Roque and a grandson all committing suicide.

But curator Emilia Philippot said the documents show a more nuanced view of his relationship with Olga, with one home movie showing her plucking daisy petals and mouthing the words, "He loves me, he loves me not."