Guernica Research Paper

Guernica (1907) was the most explicitly political work Picasso had produced. Guernica a works of great importance, a monumental statement about the general inhumanity of war. The series of Weeping Women, suggested a similar humanist response to the events of the Spanish Civil War, but were also based on personal circumstances, being portraits of Dora Maar with her chrematistic and extravagant clothes and hats. Picasso’s paintings of the Second World War continued to express the violence and oppression of the times, but in a much subtler muted way. Picasso tuned to humble objects, still lives of food, candles, symbolic skulls, portraits of Olga with her features and limbs twisted and contorted into to uncomfortable grimaces and poses. Picasso's

In 1936, Spain had entered a bitter civil war, after a coup attempt led by General Franco against the democratic Republican coalition government. Franco’s military aims were supported by elements of the Spanish military, together with German and Italian fascist forces. His political aims were also supported by major elements in the Spanish church, industry and aristocracy. But he was bitterly opposed by many of the citizens. In January 1937, a delegation from the increasingly-beleaguered Republican government visited Picasso at his home in Paris, and asked him to create a large painting for the Spanish Pavilion at the forthcoming World’s Fair in that city. The Pavilion was intended to be an anti-Franco propaganda exercise for the government. The delegation suggested to Picasso that his participation would serve to remind the people that he was a son of Spain, and that he opposed the fascists. However, Picasso was initially lukewarm about the proposal. The projected size of the work was daunting, and he was uneasy with the idea of being commissioned to do specific work. He was also reluctant to engage in such an overt propaganda effort.

At first sight, it may seem easy to explain. Some of the black-on-white lines in Guernica look like newsprint. When Picasso painted his visual cry of anguish, the bombing of Guernica by Hitler's air force in support of Spanish fascists on 26 April 1937 was news. Painting his instant response that same year in Paris, he was reporting current events. The newspaper grey of his painting (in an era before color newsprint) stressed its immediacy. Picasso Black and White explores this artist's lifelong interest in stripping color out of painting: his attempt to replace sensual pleasure with intellectual