Simona

“I love you”, You did not say it first and neither did I, but when
you say it and when I do, we speak like savages who have found three
words and worship them. (Winterson, 1994, p 153)

You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.
Buddha

My very first love for art

I think i’ve always liked paintings. At first, because they were pretty and beautiful and..well…just perfect. But there was something missing. What was that I only realized when I came across Guernica by Pablo Picasso. Since then I’ve read about it a lot and tried to experience it but seeing the original (it is HUGE by the way)in Madrid last spring was extraordinary.

Normally I would say that art does not have to be explained and that it has to be perceived through one’s own personal dimension.  This piece of art on the other hand hides a story behind it. and if u can’t see anything in it but bunch of black, white and gray irregular forms it will give u some start.

On April 26th 1937, Guernica was bombed causing many casualties, women and children. The bombing of Guernica was only one episode of Spanish Civil War. In 1939 the civil war ended and the regime of Franco began.

 The bombing prompted Picasso to begin painting his greatest masterpiece… Guernica. A masterpiece that shows sufferings of innocent people, despair, violence, death…and…hope. It became a wide known symbol of peace.

As Picasso absolutely refused to explain the painting and that led to numerous ways of its interpretation. In the painting there are a lot of hidden symbols. There are some, that everybody agree on. I wonder what did Picasso think about those “findings”.  I especially admire the facial expressions, kind of giving a feeling of silent scream and the contrast of the candle and the light bulb that will be explained below.

Those are quite common explanations and hidden symbols in the painting:

• The overall scene is within a room where, at an open end on the left, a wide-eyed bull stands over a woman grieving over a dead child in her arms.
• The centre is occupied by a horse falling in agony as it had just been run through by a spear or javelin. It is important to note that the large gaping wound in the horse’s side is a major focus of the painting.
• Under the horse is a dead, apparently dismembered soldier; his hand on a severed arm still grasps a shattered sword from which a flower grows.
• On the open palm of the dead soldier is a stigma, a symbol of martyrdom derived from the stigmata of Christ.
• A light bulb blazes in the shape of an evil eye over the suffering horse’s head (the bare bulb of the torturer’s cell.) Picasso’s intended symbolism in regards to this object is related to the Spanish word for lightbulb; “bombilla”, which makes an allusion to “bomb” and therefore signifies the destructive effect which technology can have on society.
• To the upper right of the horse, a frightened female figure, who seems to be witnessing the scenes before her, appears to have floated into the room through a window. Her arm, also floating in, carries a flame-lit lamp. The lamp is positioned very close to the bulb, and is a symbol of hope, clashing with the lightbulb. 

The outline of the face can be seen in the lines and background tones of the composition, the eyes and the tuft of hair to the right of the face are clearly visible.

The Harlequin appears to be crying a diamond tear for the victims of the bombing. The diamond is one of the Harlequin’s symbols and in Picasso’s work it is a personal signature.

 The preoccupying theme of Guernica is of course death; reinforcing this, in the centre of the painting is a hidden skull which dominates the viewer’s subliminal impressions.

The skull is shown sideways and has been ingeniously overlaid onto the body of the horse, which is also a death symbol. The skull’s mechanical appearance seems appropriate to the modern weaponry used in the 1937 bombing. Picasso often hid one or more related symbols within a particular image as seen here.

 Below the dying horse in the centre of the painting is a concealed bull’s head contained in the outline of the horse’s buckled front leg. Its location infers that that it is plunging its horns into the horse’s belly from below… the goring of the horse in the bullfight was a favourite subject for Picasso and has strong sexual overtones.

What I love about it is the complexity of the painting letting me find different things and different interpretations. But no matter how long I look at it, the unease feeling that it gives me is not going away. The feeling of wickedness of the world.

 Not just look at it, see it.