Picasso Metamorfosi: Body and Antiquity Collide in Milan

Palazzo Reale in Milan hosts 'Picasso Metamorfosi,' an exhibition exploring Pablo Picasso's dialogue with classical antiquity and the human body, part of the Picasso Mediterranée cycle. The show traces the Spanish master's (Malaga, 1881‒Mougins, 1973) metamorphic approach through themes of the kiss, mythology, and ceramics. Curated with non-obvious comparisons, it highlights Picasso's 'cannibalistic' fusion of pleasure and death, his engagement with the Louvre and Cycladic idols, and his playful yet serious ceramic works that parody Etruscan and Greek precedents. The exhibition features surprising, high-quality works despite a somewhat linear layout in the palace's halls. Critic Stefano Castelli notes the show's intellectual depth, avoiding mere iconographic matching, and emphasizes the artist's self-aware, preemptive parody of cliché. The body, particularly the female form, emerges as the true protagonist, oscillating between harmony and war, fusion and struggle.