Alan Wood-Thomas' Friendship with Pablo Picasso

Alan met with Picasso in Paris at La Rotonde in Montmartre, Paris.  He was intrigued with the man and his art. This deep impression is visible in much of Alan's work. 

In April 1973, when word of Picasso's death reached Alan, he locked himself in this studio in Clinton, Connecticut.  After two weeks, he emerged with a series of 15 Intaglio Etchings called The Burials of Picasso.    He created 6 sets of this series.  Three of the sets remain as part of the collection.  In 2014, a family friend notified us that the copper plates used to create the series were found in their father's storage.   These plates are also now part of the 

Wood-Thomas Art Collection. 

Synopsis:     These etchings inhabit the "historical hinge" between Picasso’s final breath and the enduring influence of his late-period style. The series moves away from narrative to focus on the raw mechanics of his last years: bodies that are stretched or fragmented, and spaces that feel increasingly tight and reflective. The work replaces the mythic energy of the early 20th century with a "quiet reckoning"—a stillness that acknowledges physical limits and the finality of time. By using an urgent, minimalist line, the series engages in a posthumous conversation with the artist’s ghost. It is less a tribute and more an exploration of the silence that follows the end of a visual era, finding a new way to speak through the remnants of a modernist tradition.