This 1938 work, Buste de Femme (Dora Maar), State IX (Bloch 308), is an etching on copper printed on Chine volant untrimmed paper, and it represents one of the later states in Picasso’s celebrated series of etched portraits of his muse, Dora Maar. The piece exemplifies his absolute command of intaglio printmaking and his ability to evolve an image across multiple states, deepening its psychological resonance and technical complexity with each reworking.

Etching on copper allowed Picasso to create finely controlled, incisive lines while retaining flexibility to rework and build up layers of detail. By State IX, the plate had been reworked numerous times, and the image bears the richness of this cumulative process. The background is now heavily darkened, contrasting sharply with the figure and intensifying her presence. The use of Chine volant paper—an extremely fine, delicate sheet often mounted onto a stronger support—heightens the impression of clarity and delicacy, capturing every etched detail with precision.

In this state, Picasso employs not only pure line but also areas of shading and crosshatching, introducing textural complexity that was absent in earlier versions. The etched inscriptions at the bottom, inverted and difficult to read, function both as text and as an extension of the graphic composition.

The portrait is unmistakably Dora Maar, yet reimagined through Picasso’s radical fragmentation of form. Her head, elongated and mask-like, is split across two planes, emphasizing her duality. The eyes, rendered with cross-like marks, are both piercing and distant, conveying tension and psychological weight. Her body and garment are depicted with geometric patterns and pointillist marks, lending texture and solidity, while her long hair falls in striated strokes that echo the vertical pull of the composition.

Compared to earlier states, this version carries more drama and intensity: the darkened background sets the figure in relief, heightening her sculptural presence, while the dense marks across the torso create a sense of materiality that anchors the portrait.

This work epitomizes Picasso’s brilliance in the intaglio medium. Etching is traditionally a precise and disciplined process, but Picasso approached it with the freedom of drawing, continually altering plates across multiple states. By the ninth state of Buste de Femme, we see not only his technical virtuosity—the layering of line, texture, and shadow—but also his restless creativity, refusing to settle until the portrait embodied the psychological depth he sought.

The comparison between early and late states reveals his process-driven mastery: what begins as spare, linear contour drawing in State I develops into a dense, brooding, and richly textured image in State IX. This evolution highlights how Picasso used etching not merely to reproduce images but as a laboratory for artistic invention.

Dora Maar, a photographer and intellectual deeply involved with the Surrealists, was Picasso’s partner during the late 1930s and early 1940s—a period marked by both personal passion and historical upheaval. She was famously the “Weeping Woman” in Picasso’s work, embodying the anguish of war and personal turmoil.

In Buste de Femme (Dora Maar), Picasso abstracts her into a composite of emotional states. The fractured face, simultaneously tender and severe, captures both intimacy and distance, muse and enigma. The layering of etched marks mirrors the psychological layering of Dora’s role in his life: lover, intellectual collaborator, and subject of endless artistic exploration.

Buste de Femme (Dora Maar), State IX (Bloch 308) is a masterful example of Picasso’s etching practice, where technical command and emotional intensity converge. Through successive reworkings, he transforms the portrait into something far more than a likeness—it becomes a meditation on identity, complexity, and the fractured modern psyche.

This work affirms Picasso’s place alongside Rembrandt and Goya as one of the greatest etchers in art history, demonstrating how line, shadow, and texture can be pushed to their expressive limits. Dora Maar emerges here not only as a muse but also as an enduring symbol of Picasso’s ability to capture the inner life of his subjects with unrelenting power.