Denver Art Museum announces ‘Picasso: Magician,’ largest collection of artist’s work ever shown in Colorado

You know the viral “OK, I like it…Picasso” sound from social media videos? Denver will soon get to say it about the real thing. The Denver Art Museum just announced “Picasso: Magician,” the biggest collection of Pablo Picasso’s work ever shown in Colorado. Denver is the only U.S. city getting it. If you want to see this show in America, you’ll have to come to the Mile High City.

The exhibit includes 150 works, 130 of them by Picasso himself. It covers 70 years of his career, with paintings, sculptures, drawings, prints and ceramics, and it follows how he kept reinventing the human figure, from Cubism to surrealism. About 80 pieces are coming from the Musée National Picasso–Paris, which has the largest Picasso collection in the world. Others are coming from collections in New York, Dallas and elsewhere, and more than 30 are from the museum’s own collection. “Pablo Picasso was just like a magician,” said museum director Christoph Heinrich, “with unlimited thinking and the ability to transform reality into new creative forms full of humanity, mystery and emotion.”

It’s a big deal for Denver. The museum’s last Picasso showing was a small display of works on paper about 40 years ago, and there’s been nothing since. This one fills the museum’s Hamilton Building, the jagged, titanium-covered building downtown. It’s also a fitting home for an artist who painted faces from three angles at once.

You’ll need some patience. “Picasso: Magician” opens Oct. 31, 2027, which is Halloween, and runs through Feb. 27, 2028.