What was the original title of Les Demoiselles d'Avignon?

The original title of Les Demoiselles d’Avignon was “Le Bordel d’Avignon.” Picasso used the blunt title for the painting’s subject: five women presented in a brothel-like interior, connected to Barcelona’s Carrer d’Avinyó.

Picasso worked on the canvas mainly in 1907 at the Bateau-Lavoir in Montmartre. Its fractured bodies, sharply shifting viewpoints, and mask-like faces challenged conventional ideas of beauty and representation, making it a landmark in the development of modern art and Cubism.

The famous title was not Picasso’s preferred choice. Poet and critic André Salmon used “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon” for the painting’s public presentation at the Salon d’Antin in 1916, giving the work a less scandalous name. Picasso reportedly continued to refer to it as his “brothel” painting, so the modern title can obscure its deliberately provocative origin.