Image: Source-linked image unavailable pending an exact holding-museum object record
View source →Harlequin and His Companion
Pablo Picasso, 1901
Technical Details
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
73 × 60 cm (28.7 × 23.6 in)
Style
Post-Impressionism / Painting
Decade
1900s
About This Work
Harlequin and His Companion places two figures associated with the world of performance at a café table. The harlequin's patterned costume and the companion's pale dress establish a contrast between theatrical identity and a subdued social encounter. Their stillness and separation within a shared setting allow the scene to be read as an early meditation on companionship, performance, and isolation rather than as a straightforward narrative of entertainment.
Dated 1901, this oil on canvas is cataloged here in Picasso's early Blue Period orbit, when Parisian cafés, performers, and emotionally charged figure groups became recurring subjects. The work is often discussed alongside Post-Impressionist approaches to café life, but the catalog avoids assigning influence beyond what its current evidence supports. The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts is listed as the holding institution; a mismatched reproduction has been removed until an exact source-confirmed museum image can be established.
Current Location
Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow, Russia
Public Collection — Open to visitors
Visit museum website →Valuation & Provenance
2026 Estimated Value
$25–45 million (est.)
* Estimates are based on comparable auction results and market analysis. Not a formal appraisal.
Last Known Sale
No public auction record — held in permanent museum collection
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