Critique of Guernica by Pablo Picasso

Introduction

Pablo Picasso is well known as painter, sculptor, ceramicist, stage and graphic designer, and draughtsman. He was born at Malaga in the south of Spain. His date of birth is reported as October25th, 1881. His father was a drawing teacher, so Picasso's talent was recognized early. By the age of fifteen, he had his own. Many friends from his early Parisian days appreciated his creative astuteness, artistic energy, and independent will. Picasso was a stocky, robust Spaniard with a striking personality. Everyone who met him formed a high impression of him.

At the start of WWII, Picasso at once announced his endorsement for the Republic. He collected vast donations for the movement. He also consented to a commission to paint a wall painting for the Spanish pavilion at the International Exhibition of 1937 at Paris. Before he had even started, reports arrived that on April 26th, 1937, Nazi aircrafts, sent by the regime to help the Fascists, had bombed the Basque town of Guernica. Picasso immediately started working on preliminary sketches. He painted the huge canvas in about a month. It became the manifestation not only of suffering of Spain but also of the smashing effects of warfare on the victims all over (Blunt, 24)

Description

Guernica was painted over a period of two months. It resulted in an tremendous, ravaging depiction of the repugnance of war in austere black and white; measuring eleven feet in height (almost double Picasso's height) by twenty-five feet long— so large, that Picasso had to tie his paintbrushes to long sticks to finish it. Absent are signals of resistance and hope like a striking raised fist. These were removed from early adaptations of the work. In their place, the picture is filled exclusively with death and horror . this is ...