From National Gallery of Canada:
This playful portrait depicts Dora Maar, Pablo Picasso's legendary mistress and principal model from 1935 to 1943. A painter and Surrealist photographer, Maar was known to be intelligent, friendly, and emotionally intense. In 1937, she helped Picasso find the studio where he would paint his famous "Guernica", which she documented photographically in seven stages. A number of Picasso's characteristic distortions appear in this work: the model's mouth and nose are depicted in profile, her nostrils are grossly exaggerated, and her dark eyes are set at different levels.