The Minotaur

This violent drawing captures a half-man, half-bull Minotaur raping a woman. The figure of the Minotaur dates back to Greek mythology: it inhabited a labyrinth, devoured innocent people, and was ultimately slain by the hero Theseus. In the 1930s, when Picasso made this work, people understood the Minotaur as a manifestation of unconscious and uncontrolled desire. Despite the horror of such imagery, the beast in some ways may have embodied Picasso’s own self-perception as a womanizer.