This year, a leading fine arts auction house put 172 ceramic works and etchings by the legendary Picasso under the hammer. The star of the collection was the Visage Tourmenté, a Picasso Gold Platter that has been away from the public eye for more than 40 years.

The Gold Visage Tourmenté is one of Picasso’s highly valuable works.

The high estimate was attributed to its rarity, as it happens to be one of Picasso’s rare gold pieces. He focused mainly on ceramics and silver. The Picasso Visage Tourmenté is the only gold platter of the 19 designs produced in collaboration with master goldsmith Francois Hugo, the rest being created out of silver. The previous owner of this unique piece of art purchased it directly from Hugo in the 70s. The Visage Tourmenté has Picasso’s stamp on it, being unique and unreplicable. That it is among only a handful of his artistic experiments with gold also makes it a one-of-a-kind collectible item.

Picasso is known for using various techniques on different mediums, one of them being ceramics. His interest in ceramic art started in a rather simple way. He decorated everyday items like bowls, plates jugs and pots with colored glaze.

The neck of a vase transformed into the neck of a human and plates became bull-fighting arenas. He took his imagination and artistic genius further to change the shape of functional objects and turned them into compelling art forms.

A few of his ceramics were up for sale at the auction, and estimated to be worth anywhere from a few hundred to thousands of dollars. The interest in his ceramic work was propelled by the success of the 2012 Madoura collection, a name inspired by the Madoura workshop where Picasso modeled some of his first ceramic and pottery figurines.

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J.Valente