Obituary: Dora Maar

When I was a young and raw student in Paris with Nadia Boulanger and Darius Milhaud, Tony Mayer, who was then the cultural attache to the French Embassy in London, on one of his regular visits to Paris, took me down to his crumbling chateau in Menerbes and thence to Dora Maar's house, writes James Stevens [further to the obituary by Michael Peppiatt, 1 August] .

During the visit Maar took us, unbelievably, to her lavatory. There were some nails sticking out from the wall and wound round these nails was a linear composition in wire made by Picasso himself whilst "at stool". She had kept this, inviolate, ever since.