Picasso’s Art of War.
Pablo Picasso threw U.S. officials into panic on February 2003 in New York. The Secretary of State, Colin Powell, was about to declare war on Iraq, when one of his aids had noticed that Powell was standing right in front of Guernika. For Powell this meant one thing, Guernika had to be covered, urgently. Only when U.S. and U.N. staff hid Picasso’s masterpiece, Powell went in front of microphones and cameras and announced the upcoming war to the world.
So, what happened? What secret does Guernika guard?
‘Guernika should burn’
Guernika was a small Basque town in Spain with only seven thousand inhabitants. Travellers and locals would occasionally feel strong winds blowing in their faces, something that happens often in mountainous regions. However, in the mid 1930’s Spain, it was a different wind that everybody could feel — it was wind of change.
When the Spanish Civil war broke out in 1936 between Nationalist and Republican forces. Basques — who were proud of their history and culture — sided with Republican forces and embraced the opportunity to get freedom from monarchy that Nationalist forces tried to protect.
Basques fought bravely against the nationalist forces led by General Franco. Franco found ‘good friends’ in Germany and received military and financial aid from recently established Nazi government . However, despite of the aid coming from Berlin, Nazi-Fascist alliance needed a new, easy and ‘cheap’ way to spread horror among Basques and force them to retreat.
The way they chose was terror.
It was about four in the afternoonon a spring Monday, 26 April: a market day. The people of Gernika were emrging from their siesta. Shops and banks were opening; old men in long Basque moustaches were sitting outside cafés, toying with brandies, drinking the April warmth. The sky was limpid. Out of the blue a speck appeared, a solitary plane. It made a few low passes over the market and the assemly house with the oak at its back, and then, hangin over the densest part of town, discharged six bombs. The town was immediately engulfed in smoke and flames, while the plane rose again into the unstained sky.
Minutes later three more planes dropped 50-killogram bombs and inflicted a storm of havoc that continued for over an hour. The people of Gernika couldn’t find a cover anywhere in the town, every building was bombed and even the most sacred place in town — the local church (where some thought might be safe) was violently destroyed.
In a third wave, the planes delivered a payload of 300 aluminium-cased tubular incendiary bombs, designed to maximize conflagation on the ground and turn town into bowl of fire. It took three hours to reduce Gernika to that ashy cauldron. (1)
This was a pure act of terror. Strategically insignificant Basque town, became a ‘training ground’ for a new ways of getting the enemy into horror. Some of the manuals of ‘terror instructors’ advised: “If cities are destroyed by flames, if women and children are victims of suffocating gases… if the population in cities far from the front perish due to bombs… it will be impossible for the enemy to continue war’
The tears of Picasso.
The events in Guernika changed Picasso. The artist who previosly was, according to art historian Simon Schama, indifferent to current events, could no longer ignore the events that were happening around him — Nazi rise in Berlin led by Adolf Hitler and Fascist governments of General Franco in Spain and Benito Mussolini in Italy.
In order to raise awareness about the massacre of Guernika and the perished souls, he had to create a work, that could transfer the humans who looked at his painting in the galleries into the heart of horror of the town.
Back to Iraq
Seven decades later, in the warm headquarters of United Nations, Guernika proved the ultimate power of art. The painting that showed crying children, screaming women, burning houses was, as an oracle, telling to the world seven decades later that the horrors of Guernika are going to be repeated in Iraq.
The painting showed that even when — you are the most mightiest country in the world; the most powerful news organisation around; you can throw armies and dictators; get rid of them; and you can cover the whole thing live. But don’t tangle with masterpiece. (2)
In the words of Pablo Picasso himself “Art is a lie which makes you realize the truth’.
Reading & Watching.
I strongly recommend a book written by Simon Schama which is called “The Power of Art”. He also has a BBC TV Series based on his book.
