Picasso and Gjon Mili: drawing with light

In 1939 Mili began dissecting movement with rapid-sequence firing that showed multiple images on a single film frame.



Gjon Mili, a technical genius and lighting innovator, visited Pablo Picasso in the South of France in 1949.



Mili showed the artist some of his photographs of ice skaters with tiny lights affixed to their skates, jumping in the dark — and Picasso’s lively mind began to race.



This series of photographs, since known as Picasso’s “light drawings,” were made with a small flashlight or “light pencil” in a dark room; the images vanished almost as soon as they were created.



“Picasso gave Mili 15 minutes to try one experiment,” LIFE, the magazine Mili worked for, wrote in its January 30, 1950, issue in which the images shown here first appeared. He was so fascinated by the results that he posed for five sessions.”



The series is a very beautiful collection of the work of the artist and the photographer encounter.