Why did Pablo Picasso keep Les Demoiselles d’Avignon out of public view for years?

Pablo Picasso kept his 1907 masterpiece, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, out of public view for nearly a decade primarily due to the overwhelmingly negative reaction it received from his peers.1

When Picasso first showed the painting to a group of friends—including fellow artists Henri Matisse and André Derain—in July 1907, their response was so unfavorable that he chose to roll up the canvas and store it away. The work was considered shocking and offensive because it depicted five prostitutes in a radical, geometric style that challenged traditional notions of beauty and artistic convention. The figures' provocative gazes, the use of masklike faces influenced by African art, and the unconventional, fractured space were perceived as a direct assault on the art-historical traditions of the time.12

Picasso did not finally exhibit the painting to the public until 1916.1