Artist: Pablo Picasso

Style: Cubism

Topic: Circus People Family

Date: 1905

Museum: National Gallery of Art (Washington, United States)

Family of Saltimbanques (La famille de saltimbanques) is a 1905 painting by Pablo Picasso. It is considered the masterpiece of Picasso's Rose Period sometimes called Picasso's circus period. Its dimensions are 212.8 x 229.6 cm or (83 3/4 in × 90 3/8 in); and (framed 240.4 x 256.3 cm). The painting depicts six saltimbanques, a kind of itinerant circus performer, in a desolate landscape. The composition groups them together, but they do not seem connected to each other and are not looking at each other. It was painted during a period from late 1904 to early 1906, where Picasso explored themes using the saltimbanque. Picasso frequently attended the Cirque Médrano in Montmartre. Critics have suggested Family of Saltimbanques is a covert group portrait of Picasso and his circle, symbolized as poor, independent, and isolated.