The 256 paintings in China's traveling Pablo Picasso exhibition, the largest held in Asia, arrived Tuesday in Beijing, the third stop of its tour, according to Wednesday's  Beijing Times.
   
The exhibition hall, the Beijing Imperial City Art Gallery, will display the works from March 26 to May 26, according to the exhibition organizer Beijing Radio.
  
These paintings, valued at an insurance premium of more than 100 million yuan (about US$12.1 million), have already been on display in south China's Shenzhen and east China's Shanghai for the past three months.
   
Picasso's paintings span his lifetime and cover a wide range of subjects including animals, portrait, poems and classical literature.
   
The French Picasso Foundation, the owner of most of Picasso works, greatly supported the exhibition. Chinese and French organizers booked a specific flight compartment to transport the paintings directly from Europe, said the organizer.

(Xinhua News Agency March 17, 2005)