Picasso and the Nazis

The French did their best to go on as if the German Occupation and the
War did not exist in their own personal worlds. The French prided
themselves on being survivors and whether heroic or not they were
going to survive this German occupation. There were plenty of
problems to overcome during this time from economic disaster to
ideological skirmishes to just finding enough food to eat.
Survival was going to take some serious existential hard work.

It was into these horrid conditions that Picasso decided to enter back
into Paris from western France.

The French were going to experience four years of totalitarian tyranny
and Picasso decided to go through this horror with everyone else.
Many French found that Picasso's act of being in Paris, at great risk
to himself, was an act of enormous courage. If Picasso, who did not
have to be there, was going to live through this with us then there is
hope we can all live through this oppression thought many French.