A rare Picasso masterpiece from his Blue Period is to go up for auction.

Sotheby’s New York believes there will be strong interest when the La Gommeuse oil-on-canvas goes up for sale on November 5 with an estimated €53 million price tag. It includes a recently revealed portrait on the back.

Works from Picasso’s 1901-1904 Blue Period – which is “prized as his breakthrough” era – rarely come up for sale, Simon Shaw of Sotheby’s said. Many of Picasso’s works from this period are held in major collections at venues including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Guggenheim Museum, both in New York, and the Musee Picasso in Paris. La Gommeuse dates from 1901.

It has a naked woman on the front and a previously unseen portrait of Picasso’s friend Pere Manach on the back. Manach is wearing an exotic headdress and has his head on a female body in a dancer's leap.