1925, Pablo Picasso, Woman with Mandolin -- Norton Simon Museum (Pasadena)
From the museum label: Picasso created this deceptively simple picture using a technique, called graffito, generally associated with ceramics, not oil painting. After applying two or more layers of contrasting color (blue over white, pale pink over brown), the artist scraped off the top layer or layers of paint to create an incised line drawing in the color underneath: the white frets of a brown guitar, the dark and light contours of bare breasts, and so on. The effect thus produced is curiously naive, rather like a child's drawing. The picture dates to 1925, the beginning of Picasso's engagement with the Surrealist movement, whose members prized children's drawings and pocket-knife graffiti.
1925, Pablo Picasso, Woman with Mandolin -- Norton Simon Museum (Pasadena)
From the museum label: Picasso created this deceptively simple picture using a technique, called graffito, generally associated with ceramics, not oil painting. After applying two or more layers of contrasting color (blue over white, pale pink over brown), the artist scraped off the top layer or layers of paint to create an incised line drawing in the color underneath: the white frets of a brown guitar, the dark and light contours of bare breasts, and so on. The effect thus produced is curiously naive, rather like a child's drawing. The picture dates to 1925, the beginning of Picasso's engagement with the Surrealist movement, whose members prized children's drawings and pocket-knife graffiti.