Picasso at the Petlz

Even a modest selection of his work shows the range of expression of which Picasso was capable. Take the collection of his etchings, lithographs, aquatints and linocuts on display at the Peltz Gallery through March 15. Though informally arranged on the walls of this home-turned-gallery, amongst a clutter of prints and paintings by other, often local artists, a few of his works have the power to arrest you as you make you way up the stairs or edge your way around a pile of unframed paintings propped against a wall. In fact I rather more enjoy seeing them in this type of setting than the hushed and hallow confines of an art museum. Among the pieces on display are a few Intaglio prints from his 1930s Vollard Suite, named after the famous french art dealer who commissioned them. Another appropriate name for them might be "Beauty and the Beast," revel as they do in the contrast between fluid and finelyworked pathos of the female form and the strernly etched countenance of the male agressor. These prints are a lesson in economy and exactitude - what only a few artists (Matisse probably better than anyone else) could achieve with one single, searching stroke of the pen.