The Secret of Dora Maar's Notebook. The Diary of Pablo Picasso's Mistress

A: Aragon. B: Breton, Brassai, Balthus ... I thoughtfully flipped through these few yellowed pages of an old notebook. K: Cocteau, Sh: Chagall ... E: Éluard ... D: Giacometti ... each time a phone number, often an address. Twenty pages mentioning the greatest artists of the post-war period. Who could have known them well and closely interacted with these geniuses of the twentieth century? It took me three months to discover that I held the notebook of Dora Maar. The very same one whom in 1936 at the Parisian café Deux Magots Paul Éluard introduced to Picasso, who became his friend, model, and muse for 9 years. Picasso often created images of the sorrowful Maar; in his work, she forever remained a crying woman. Dora Maar, a photographer, an artist who gave herself to Picasso, and then, consumed by passion, a recluse artist who devoted herself to God. For two years, the author worked on the diary, unraveling the secrets of Picasso’s muse, meticulously penetrating into the essence and trying to understand the place of each genius in the life of his mistress and to approach the secrets of the Crying Woman. Now this diary is before you. Brigitte Benkemoun - journalist and writer. She is the author of several biographical or autobiographical works: The Little Girl in the Photograph, Albert the Magnificent, and The Secret of Dora Maar's Notebook. The Diary of Pablo Picasso's Mistress, which received the Geneviève Moll Prize for Biography in 2019.