Le Reve (“Dream” in French)is a 1932 oil painting (130 × 97 cm) by Pablo Picasso, then 50 years old, portraying his 24-year-old mistress Marie-Thérèse
Pablo Picasso‘s most famous, expensive and also controversial painting of all the time.
He had various periods of different types of depictions in his art during his lifetime. This style is said to be near style of Fauvism, which also used contrasting colors.
The model for the painting was Picasso’s long-suffering mistress Marie-Thérèse Walter. Picasso met the pretty young blond in 1927 at the Galeries Lafayette in Paris
She was 18 years old. Picasso was 45
Still married to his wife Olga Khokhlova. Immediately, Picasso became infatuated, and he and Marie-Thérèse began a secret affair.
Le Reve, or “The Dream”, is said to have been painted in just one afternoon. With simplistic lines and brash colors, the painting is representative of how Picasso saw Marie-Thérèse; as an object of sex.
Picasso said, 'A painting comes to me from afar; who knows how far; I divined it, I saw it, I did it, but even so , the next day, I cannot see what I have done myself. How can anyone penetrate my dreams, my instincts, my desires, my thoughts, which have taken so long to develop and to see the light of day, and comprehend what I have put into it, perhaps even against my will.