Why was Les Demoiselles d’Avignon controversial when Pablo Picasso painted it?

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907) was considered controversial primarily because it represented a radical and shocking departure from traditional artistic conventions.12

The painting’s reception was negative for several key reasons:

• Subject Matter: The work depicts five prostitutes from a brothel on Calle Avignon in Barcelona. Rather than presenting them as conventional images of beauty, Picasso rendered them as provocative figures who challenge the viewer with a direct, unsettling gaze.12
• Violent Treatment of Form: Picasso employed a radical geometric style that fractured the female body into angular, distorted shapes. This "violent treatment" of the human form was seen as a direct assault on the art-historical traditions of the time.132
• "Primitive" Influence: The inclusion of masklike faces, inspired by Picasso’s study of African art, was highly unconventional. This aesthetic choice, while later recognized as a foundational step toward Cubism, was jarring to his contemporaries.124

Due to the intense negative reaction from friends and fellow artists, Picasso kept the painting out of the public eye for nearly a decade before it was finally exhibited in 1916.12