The painting called The actor deep a vertical cleft of about six inches (15cm) in the lower right-hand corner.
But the despoil did not interest the "focal iota of the composition" and should be repaired for an exhibition final this year, the museum said.
The work from the Rose period was painted in the winter of 1904-1905.
The sustain should be completed in time owing to the Picasso magnetism the Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition, which commit feature some 250 works from the museum's mass and is due to originate at the end of April.
The unusually large canvas, measuring 6ft by 4ft (1.8m by 1.2m) and which depicts an acrobat mannered condemn an abstracted backdrop, was harmed on Friday.
But the despoil did not interest the "focal iota of the composition" and should be repaired for an exhibition final this year, the museum said.
The work from the Rose period was painted in the winter of 1904-1905.
The sustain should be completed in time owing to the Picasso magnetism the Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition, which commit feature some 250 works from the museum's mass and is due to originate at the end of April.
The unusually large canvas, measuring 6ft by 4ft (1.8m by 1.2m) and which depicts an acrobat mannered condemn an abstracted backdrop, was harmed on Friday.
