Christmas has come early for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in the form of a significant gift from Janice and Henri Lazarof: 130 paintings, sculptures and drawings, including 20 works by Pablo Picasso. The collection could be worth as much as $100 million.

According to museum director Michael Govan, the acquisition will greatly enhance the museum's collection of modern art at a time when obtaining a body of work of this caliber on the open market would be financially impossible.

LACMA's senior curator of modern art, Stephanie Barron, said the gift was negotiated over a period of several years, and on Jan. 13 approximately 80 pieces from the collection will go on display to the public.

"We are deeply grateful to Janice and Henri Lazarof for bringing this collection to LACMA," Govan said. "At a time when the art market has made it nearly impossible for museums to purchase works of this quality, this important acquisition brings to the people of Los Angeles works by key figures that define the modern century."

Among the 20 works by Picasso (produced between 1905 and 1970) are 17 portraits, many of them women with whom he shared his life, including the artist's mistress Dora Maar, from the 1930s, and his wife Jacqueline, painted in the early 1960s.

In addition, the Lazarof gift includes seven bronzes and one painting by Alberto Giacometti; 21 watercolors and paintings by Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky; as well as works by Alexander Archipenko, Constantin Brancusi, Georges Braque, Edgar Degas, Lyonel Feininger, Fernand Léger, Henry Moore and Camille Pissarro.

Barron said that "having these works available at LACMA will forever change how future generations of visitors will understand modern art in Los Angeles. That these marvelous works of art will have a permanent home in the museum is an example of the greatest philanthropy."

The collection was assembled by composer Henri Lazarof and his wife, Janice, who is a daughter of the late banker-philanthropist Mark Taper.

Henri Lazarof was born in Sofia, Bulgaria, in 1932, studied music in Jerusalem and Rome before coming to the United States in 1957, where he continued his musical studies at Brandeis University. In 1959, Lazarof moved to Los Angeles, where he became a teacher of French language and literature at UCLA, three years later joining the university's music department where he is professor emeritus.

– Jim Farber (310) 540-5511 Ext. 416; jim.farber@dailybreeze.com