John Richardson’s nimble, riveting narrative has lost none of its momentum in this third installment of Picasso’s four-volume bio. As his art takes on a classical tinge, Picasso frolics in the Mediterranean sun with the likes of Gerald and Sara Murphy, with-it Americans who were on top of the Paris scene in the twenties (they practically invented the Riviera as a playground for artists and the rich). But darkness is never far behind: The artist remains obsessed with maintaining his privacy from a public that becomes more prying as the years go by.
A Life of Picasso: The Triumphant Years, 1917–1932
John Richardson
Knopf
$40
