4 Mai 1945 is one of the most historically precise works in Pablo Picasso's entire graphic catalogue. The date inscribed in the plate - 4 May 1945 - is not incidental. It falls four days before the unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany on 8 May 1945, in the final days of the Second World War in Europe. Paris had been liberated eight months earlier. Picasso, who had remained in the city throughout the Occupation - working, defying, refusing to leave - was now emerging from the most politically and personally charged years of his life into the first tremors of peace. This etching was made in that extraordinary interval.

The composition reflects the lightening of spirit that accompanied liberation. Three figure studies occupy the plate with the economy and confidence of an artist working at the height of his powers: a delicate profile, a soulful frontal portrait, and a classical standing nude. Where Picasso's Occupation-era works had often been darkened by compression, psychological weight, and the fractured distortions of Cubism deployed as a language of anguish, 4 Mai 1945 returns to something more lyrical - a classical serenity of line that speaks of relief as much as artistry. The draughtsmanship is of the highest order: each figure rendered with minimal but perfectly judged marks, demonstrating the extraordinary facility that had been Picasso's since childhood.

The work is an engraving of the second state, printed by Roger Lacourière - the master printer at whose Paris atelier Picasso produced some of the most celebrated intaglio work of his career, and whose technical collaboration was central to the achievements of Picasso's graphic output across three decades. The second state designation is significant: it denotes a reworked plate, representing a deliberate refinement of the image from its first conception - a distinction that places this impression within the documented scholarly canon of Picasso's print production.

The impression is held in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York - confirming its place among the most significant graphic works of Picasso's immediate post-war period.