Symbolism: Cultural Frame

GUERNICA

On first showing, Guernica came under severe criticism from fascists (“degenerate”) and communists (“anti-social”)

alike, besides baffling many critics and viewers.

GUERNICA

Starting on the 1st of May 1937, Picasso took five weeks to complete Guernica, which was staggeringly fast for such a

monumental work. Forty-five dated sketches for the composition and figures show how it evolved.

COMPOSITION

MORE PRELIMINARY SKETCHES

MORE PRELIMINARY SKETCHES

The painting it divided into three parts united by a triangular structure.

This composition draws the viewer’s attention to the screaming horse.

TRIANGULAR STRUCTURE

The canvas was so high, Picasso had to slope it against the wall at one end of his studio to fit it into the space. He used

a ladder and brushes strapped to sticks to reach the top part of the painting.

THE SCALE

‘The bull is not fascism but it is brutality and

darkness… (Picasso, 1945)’

The ambivalent bull/minotaur figure obsessed Picasso and was a regular theme in his

work. Here, the visible presence of a faded third eye

shows how Picasso was continually reworking this painting. The final version

shows the helpless bull confronting the viewer with

human eyes.

THE BULL

The bull is both the hero and the victim.

He stands almost protectively over the woman screaming and mourning her daughter’s death,

yet the bull is also amid the carnage, staring helplessly

towards the audience with human eyes, mouth wide and gaping.

Picasso was influenced by Surrealism, and the bull was

adopted as a motif that symbolised man irrationality by

the Surrealists.

THE BULL

Originally, Picasso drew a boldly raised arm with a clenched fist (the familiar

salute of the Spanish Republican forces) as the painting’s focal point. However, unhappy with the obvious symbolism, Picasso replaced the raised arm with

the twisted features of the horse, whose spiked tongue evokes the primal scream

of pain of the innocent victims of war.

Many feel the horse is a direct symbol of the pain of the people of Guernica,

with the dotted lines on it’s body reminiscent of how the attack flooded

the newspapers with printed text of the horrors they experienced.

THE HORSE

After erasing much of his overly symbolic imagery, Picasso couldn’t resist leaving several hidden motifs

within the painting.

These included a second bull’s head, formed by the horse’s bent

front right leg, which appears to be nuzzling the statue’s hand. While the bull appears to be neutral, it could be goring the horse from

underneath.

There is also a hidden skull within the horse’s nose.

HIDDEN WITHIN THE HORSE

Picasso originally painted a sun before converting it into an eye with a light bulb.

The electric light bulb is a source of evil, the spotlights of the air bombers that searched down into Guernica for targets with their bombs and machine guns, which challenges the soft, innocent light of the lamp.

The Spanish word for light bulb is bombia, which is similar to bomba, the Spanish word for bomb.

EYE AND LIGHT BULB

The woman holding the lamp with the candle light

illuminates the chaotic scene, was recognised as a symbol of enlightenment. This motif has also been used most famously

by the Statue of Liberty.

WOMAN HOLDING THE LAMP

The image of the grief-stricken

mother holding her dead child echoes a

famous pose of suffering in art,

most famously in Michelangelo’s

Pieta.

Picasso distorts the mother’s body – splayed fingers, arched neck and gaping mouth,

releasing a silent scream – to heighten the

emotional impact.

WOMAN HOLDING DEAD CHILD

Pieta depicts Jesus cradled on his mother Mary’s lap after the crucifixion. Michelangelo was only 24 when he completed Pieta.