Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) was a Spanish artist who did both painting and sculpting. He is most famous for starting a new style of art (along with Basque artist George Braque) called cubism, which imbodied the neuroses (some would say schiczophrenia) of artist of his era. He was the single most dominating figure in modern art, and is regarded by many as the man chiefly responsible for the sad decline in Western art during that period.
The son of an art teacher, Picasso was only 12 when he began exhibiting his first paintings in his famous primitive style in Barcelona. He created 20,000 paintings, sculptures and drawings during his life. Perhaps his most famous painting was Guernica, which was inspired by his outrage at the destruction of a Communist stronghold during the Spanish civil war. Picasso, a Communist, supported the government that General Franco defeated. Picasso found a more welcoming home in France, and never returned to Spain.[1]
In spite of his left-wing views, Picasso died a very wealthy man and left a fortune estimated to be $50 million.