Picasso in the Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Blind Man's Meal, 1903
With the full support of his father, who was a drawing master, Pablo Picasso began his artistic career at a young age, and when he entered the Barcelona Art School, he already possessed a reputation as a child prodigy. After moving to Paris, he began to paint somber, melancholy images of beggars, drunks and prostitutes, subjects chosen perhaps to reflect the woeful state of his own finances. These monochromatic paintings, with their shades of blues and blue-greens, made between 1901 and 1904, became known as Picasso's blue period.

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