The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 19, 2025

Colorful, cartoon-like square print cluttered with objects and faces. In the lower center, a round person with a medium-light skin tone, party hat and halo, mouth open in a grin, and seated on a swing, looks up towards a pink-cheeked person falling over their head with a halo and in a checkered suit. Other haloed people and nude angel-like figures cluster around against a barely visible blue background.

Picasso Goes to Heaven

1973–76

Red Grooms

(American, b. 1937)
America
etching colored by stencil with watercolor
Anonymous Gift 1978.31
© Red Grooms, Member of Artists Rights Society (ARS)
Catalogue raisonné: Alexander & Cowles 32
Location: Not on view

Description

Picasso Goes to Heaven, like Groom's three-dimensional construction, Looking Along Broadway Towards Grace Church, is a zany, cartoonlike scene teeming with visual clutter. In this animated caricature, Grooms pokes fun at Picasso with the same gusto he used to describe the raucous exhilaration of urban life. Art is rarely so amusing. As Grooms says, "Humor is like boxing. You set 'em up. Then, whammo!"
  • Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1978.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 66, no. 1 (January 1979): 3–47. Reproduced: p. 24; Mentioned: p. 43, no. 51 www.jstor.org
  • Changing Dimensions: Works on Paper by Sculptors. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 22, 1995-January 24, 1996).
    Cleveland Museum of Art, 1995-1996: Changing Dimensions: Works on Paper by Sculptors: November 22, 1995-January 24, 1996, no cat.
    Urban Vicissitudes. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 2-September 29, 1985).
    Year in Review: 1978. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 13-March 18, 1979).
  • {{cite web|title=Picasso Goes to Heaven|url=false|author=Red Grooms|year=1973–76|access-date=19 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1978.31