Les Demoiselles d’Avignon

I am a world of shapes and bright colors. If you look closely, you can see my pretty pinks, my warm oranges, and my calm blues. I am not soft and round. I am full of pointy triangles and strong squares. Inside my world live five friends. They are made of shapes, too. Their faces look like special, interesting masks, and their bodies are made of sharp lines. They are looking right at you. They want to say hello. I am a very famous painting, and my name is Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.

My painter was a man with a big imagination. His name was Pablo Picasso, and I called him Pablo. He lived in a beautiful, busy city called Paris a long, long time ago, in the year 1907. Pablo wanted to create something brand new, something nobody had ever seen before. He didn't want to paint soft, round people. He wanted to paint strong, bold friends. He picked up his paintbrush and made zig-zag lines and pointy shapes. He got his ideas from looking at amazing masks and statues from faraway places in Africa. He worked for a very long time, painting and changing things for many months, until he thought I was just right.

When people first saw me, their eyes got very wide. They were so surprised. They had never seen a painting like me before. They said, “Look at their pointy noses and their big eyes.”. Pablo wasn’t trying to make his painting look exactly like people. He was showing everyone a new way to see the world. He showed them that art can be about feelings and ideas, not just what our eyes see. Now, I live in a big museum where lots of people come to visit me. I love it when children look at my shapes and colors. I hope I make them want to pick up their own crayons and paint something brand new, just from their own imagination.