Join us for a Members-only tour of Picasso: Designed by Paul Smith with the Gallery's Senior Curator, International Art, Dr Sophie Matthiesson. This tour offers an opportunity to encounter the breadth and depth of Picasso’s creativity.

Picasso like you’ve never seen him before. Encounter the Blue and Rose periods, Cubism, portraits and more in the first solo exhibition of Picasso’s work in Aotearoa New Zealand in more than 30 years.

Bringing together outstanding works from the Musée national Picasso–Paris in a special collaboration with legendary British fashion designer Sir Paul Smith, the exhibition unfolds across atmospheric rooms that draw on the colours, shapes, patterns and textures of Picasso's artworks. Smith’s experiments with light, colour, shape, feeling and his Signature Stripe reimagine how we experience the artworks.

The tour takes place outside Gallery opening hours and is limited to 25 guests. When you arrive, please meet in the foyer. Refreshments will be served in the Members lounge following the tour.

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This exhibition is organised by Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki in collaboration with the Musée national Picasso–Paris.

Dr Sophie Matthiesson

Dr Sophie Matthiesson is Senior Curator, International Art at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki. She has curated Manpower: Myths of Masculinity (2021) and Heavenly Beings: Icons of the Christian Orthodox World (2022 and MONA, Tasmania, 2023), both of which have associated publications. More recently she has co-curated Threads of Time: Travel, Trade and Textiles (2023–26), Gothic Returns: Fuseli to Fomison (2023–25) and The Robertson Gift: Paths through Modernity (2024).

She was previously curator of international art at the National Gallery of Victoria (2006–19) where she led the 2012 Melbourne Winter Masterpieces exhibition Monet’s Garden. Her doctoral research was on artists in prison in the French Revolution and received the Prix Marianne Roland Michel award from the Institut de France.