Picasso's Guernica Research Articles

Picassos "Guernica". Zum Bundnis von Avantgarde und Demokratie

Modern art has reflected the struggle between democracy and totalitarism in different ways. The most important expression of this is Picasso's Guernica (1937). Inspired by the Civil War in Spain but based on the liberal structure of the artist's political personality, the picture has an open and universal meaning. Despite of Picasso's strong political involvement against Franco, Guernica avoids any partialism. It is a symbol not only against war in general, but also of individual - and therefore democratic - freedom. This corresponds with the fact that the republican government of Spain had not exerted any influence on the contents or stylistic features of the work. At the Paris World Fair of 1937 Guernica stood in a fundamental and systematic contrast with the artistic contributions of the Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. According to Picasso's will, Guernica's coming home to Spain was linked with the reestablishment of democracy in the country.

Painting Out Pop

Painting Out Pop

Images of war: Picasso's Guernica

Picasso painted Guernica following the bombing by German aeroplanes of the Basque town of that name during the Spanish Civil War of 1936–39. The painting provoked controversy and remains controversial. Its symbolism puzzles because of the discrepancy between its central images and the bombing. This paper resolves the puzzle first by distinguishing “Picasso's Guernica”, as a symbolic object in itself, from "Guernica”, as a composition of symbolic images, and arguing that it is the first, not the second, that represents the bombing; and secondly by drawing on an anthropology of Spanish culture to interpret the images.

Music as Culture: Toward a Multicultural Concept of Arts Education

What is music? What is painting? What is dance? According to Dictionary of Cultural Literacy,1 and painting (and so on) a priori fine arts. Hence, nature of is considered to lie in of generally and in classics particularly: that is, works deemed noteworthy on basis of established status as enduring points of reference in culture.2 Thus, to E. D. Hirsch and his colleagues, value of and painting (and so on) is twofold: they are not just occasions for private appreciation and enrichment ... but also indispensable symbols of national existence. ... not just objects for private pleasure and contemplation, but essential symbols that have helped define what we collectively are.3 Included among Hirsch's indispensable symbols of American life (posited as information that American needs to know) following: Debussy's La Mer, Picasso's Guernica, Rodin's Thinker, Bach's Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring, Irving Berlin's White Christmas, and The Road to Zanzibar, starring Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, and Dorothy Lamour.4 To many people, Hirsch's concepts have ring of common sense. Indeed, people frequently conceive painting (and so on) in terms of products, pieces, objects, or works and will no doubt continue to do so for some time. Moreover, it would be difficult to deny Hirsch's claim that people use art to embody and transmit culture: the sum of attitudes, customs, and beliefs that distinguishes one group of people from another.5 proof of this lies in fact that although every culture has something we might reasonably call music, for example, is not a unitary phenomenon. People do not immediately understand, appreciate, or enjoy the music of other cultures. On contrary, people within cultures and between cultures frequently speak in terms of our and their

Picasso's Guernica: history, transformations, meanings

Perhaps no 20th-century painting has captured the cruel effects of war as powerfully as Picasso's Guernica. The author not only traces the extraordinary creation of the painting but also establishes the context in which the bombing took place and the form in which news of it reached Picasso. This book received the 1988 American Society for Hispanic Art Historical Studies Distinguished Publication Award.

Picasso's Guernica: illustrations, introductory essay, documents, poetry, criticism, analysis

Picasso's Guernica: illustrations, introductory essay, documents, poetry, criticism, analysis

How do the Political Effects of Pictures Come About? The Case of Picasso's Guernica

This article' is not concerned with the history of Guernica 's creation nor with the uniquely welldocumented process of its making, which have been discussed on numerous occasions.2 Nor do I intend to deal with the controversies over the correct interpretation of the symbols in the picture, those endless disputes concerning the precise meaning of the bull and horse.3 Rather, I wish to offer a few observations about the political effect of the work, and then try to indicate what general conclusions we might be able to draw from this. Picasso painted the picture on commission from the Spanish Republic and its Popular Front government for the Spanish pavilion at the International Exhibition held in Paris in 1937. Unlike most other nations, the Spanish Republic did not represent itself in the exhibition in terms of its economic power, but in terms of its cultural values, among which works of art of the avant-garde took pride of place (Picasso, Calder, Miro, Gonzalez and others had all offered works of art). In this way the Spanish Republic embattled as it was by the fascists enlisted international solidarity with the help of artists. Though the Spanish pavilion was first opened in June 1937, too late to be included in the illustrated guides, and though the press hardly took any notice of it, its impact, and in particular that of Picasso's work, seems to have been considerable. If one is to believe the observations published in the Cahiers d'Art, the basic content of the picture was readily recognised by the visitors, who were in no way an artistic audience.4 Picasso himself called the picture his answer to the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica after which he named his painting by the German fascists.5 Guernica was then on everybody's lips and had come to serve as a symbol of the victims of the fascist terror.6 Not surprisingly, Picasso's picture was criticised, as was the whole avant-garde, both by the left and the right. Much more surprising, however, is the amount of spontaneous acclaim it received, both from the left and from the liberal bourgeoisie. Though the organ of the French communist party, L'Humanite, refrained from taking any view on the subject, a number of communist artists expressed great enthusiasm over the picture. One only needs to think of Eluard's tributes, or the following comments by Johannes Wiusten, a German artist living in exile in France:7 Picasso's great work, the bombing of Guernica, is in no way second to Dix's trench scenes, as far as horror is concerned. (Nobody would have anticipated that abstract forms had such a realist impact! ) Art critics may consider its value for art history. What grips me about it, immediately in the same sense that there is something that severs any possible connection between the defeatist Dix and the militant anabaptist Griunewald is the bull, which raises itself up from the midst of the catastrophe; it pauses, imperturbable, in the midst of this hell. No muscle hints at flight amid the general rout. It watches out, its sharp horns at the ready, its tail nervously lashing about only it does not yet see the opponent which it will fall upon in a moment....

Review: The atomic-bomb paintings

In his dissection of the writings of Brecht and Sartre, Adorno lays out the dilemma of post-Holocaust art. His earlier formulation had been direct and seemingly unequivocal: “To write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric.” Now he characterizes that aphorism as expressing “in negative form the impulse which inspires committed literature.” Still, Adorno's attack on “committed literature” does allow for an art “such that its mere existence after Auschwitz is not a surrender to cynicism.” But: “Works of less than the highest rank are also willingly absorbed as contributions to clearing up the past. When genocide becomes part of the cultural heritage in the themes of committed literature, it becomes easier to continue to play along with the culture which gave birth to murder.” Adorno contrasts this situation with Picasso's Guernica, an “autonomous” work of art; such works “firmly negate empirical reality, destroy the destroyer….”

These Are Not Brushstrokes: in Homage to Picasso's Guernica (After a Viewing in Madrid)

These Are Not Brushstrokes: in Homage to Picasso's Guernica (After a Viewing in Madrid)

Punching Marginal Holes in Poetry

Punching Marginal Holes in Poetry Robert Bator Parents who anxiously consulted Dr. Spock to know precisely when their toddler would build a tower of blocks can be similarly relieved to learn that their first grader knows consonant digraphs. As each of 260 such criterion reference skills are mastered through eighth grade by a student, Chicago Public School teachers punch holes in the margins of reading mastery cards. But some skills, like interpreting time lines, are more easily ticked off than interpreting Tennyson. So Laura, a bright eighth grader, found. She had long since "mastered" subordinate elements of poetry (rhyme scheme, simile etc.) via multiple choice or true-false tests. For example she had been asked to identify alliteration in this short poem: I Am a soft, sad, silhouette—sitting still,surrounded by silver moonshineand sand-shadowed splashing sounds—singing silent searching,tossing stones to the crashing surf. Since all but three words of the poem written by a local high school student (as an exercise in a creative writing class?) do alliterate, and there are only two sound patterns to locate, the test was overcoached. No wonder teachers complain that a student could "master" the skills in such coached quizzes and still not [End Page 48] know how to apply the skills in a more open setting. For example, the test of skill 'NC20: Understanding Symbolism" was also based on a short poem, "Flower in the Crannied Wall." Asked to explain the meaning of the flower, Laura wrote that it stood for beauty. Wrong, she was told. Try again. Enduring the same test repeatedly, Laura eventually recanted and confessed that the flower stood for "God and man," which she plucked from the poem's last line: "I should know what God and man is." Her ticket punched, Laura moved on to high school, but she had better graduate soon because the public high schools are plotting similar "continuous progress" checkoffs. A recent issue of Chicago Lawyer warns of an "Art Judgments" quiz. Students are asked to pick which of four opinions about Picasso's Guernica is correct. One of the two acceptable answers is: "The color suits the mood." Judged a wrong answer is: "I don't like it." In Chicago, anyway, students should beware of honesty. Often the choices are so obvious, judgment hardly enters in. When a teacher warrants that a child "distinguishes between realism and fantasy," it means simply that, given "City Streets and Country Roads" by Eleanor Farjeon and Eugene Field's "The Sugar-Plum Tree," the student could guess which has a "real world" setting. The titles alone would spare the student the task of reading, much less analyzing, the poems. From recognizing onomatopoeia to understanding a poem, as any teacher of literature will attest, there is quite a leap. Any real attempt to measure the child's responses to literature must attempt that leap. Otherwise, there are real grounds for the fear that written tests may supplant the ultimate of objectives—the enjoyment of literature. As Doris Young warns in A Critical Approach to Children's Literature (p. 101), "There is concern that procedures designed for research might become the major teaching strategy."1 The sum of oversimplified tests will never equal the whole of poetry. To refuse to risk a range of valid answers, to value equally the student's ability "to alphabetize to the second letter" with "writes own poetry," each as l/260th of a reading process, is absurd. Ticketing a child's path through isolated poetic elements should not supplant an extensive guided tour of the entire realm of poetry. Robert Bator Olice-Harvey College, Chicago Note 1. Sarah Innis Fenwick, ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967). Copyright © 1982 Children's Literature Association

Book Reviews

Abstract Abstract Clarence G. Schulz and Rose K. Kilgalen. Case Studies in Schizophrenia. New York: Basic Books, 1970, 288 pages, $8.95. Reviewed by Edward S. Filicky, PhD D. W. Winnicott. Playing and Reality. New York: Basic Books, 1971, xiii + 169 pages, $6.95. Reviewed by Barney Greenspan, Ph.D. Dirk L. Schaeffer. Sex Differences in Personality: Readings. Belmont, California: Cole Publishing Company, 1971, 180 pages (paperback), $3.50. Reviewed by Laura Barbanel B. B. Wolman (Ed.). The Psychoanalytic Interpretation of History. New York: Basic Books, 1971, x, 240 pages. Reviewed by Henry P. Hoey D. W. Winnicott. Therapeutic Consultations in Child Psychiatry. New York: Basic Books, 1971, 410 pages, $15.00. Reviewed by Shanti Tayal, Ph.D. Donald M. Uhlin. Art for Exceptional Children. Dubuque, Iowa: Wm. C. Brown, 1972, 146 pages, $3.50, paperbound. Reviewed by Florence Diamond J. L. Gewirtz (Ed.) Attachment and Dependency. New York: Halsted Press, 1972, 251 pages, $10.95. Reviewed by Leonard B. Olinger, PhD R. H. Woody and J. D. Woody. Clinical Assessment in Counseling and Psychotherapy. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1972, 370 pages. Reviewed by Dale D. Simmons, Ph.D. Paul Ekman, W. V. Friesen, and Phoebe Ellsworth. Emotion in the Human Face. New York: Pergamon, 1972, 191 + xii pages. Reviewed by Clifford H. Swensen Anthony Storr. Human Destructiveness. New York: Basic Books, 1972, 127 pages, $5.95. Reviewed by Norman Tallent Henry V. Dicks. Licensed Mass Murder: A Socio-Psychological Study of Some S. S. Killers. New York: Basic Books, 1972, xiii + 283 pages, $7.95. Reviewed by Rolland S. Parker, PhD T. R. Young. New Sources of Self. Elmsford, New York: Pergamon Press, Inc., 1972, 114 pages, $6.50. Reviewed by Ray A. Craddick James N. Butcher, (Ed.) Objective Personality Assessment: Changing Perspectives. New York: Academic Press, 1972, 212 pages, $6.95. Reviewed by James H. Johnson Donald P. Kent, Robert Kastenbaum, and Sylvia Sherwood. Research Planning and Action for the Elderly. New York: Behavioral Publications Press, 1972, 569 pages, $19.95. Reviewed by Margaret Mercer, PhD Rupert Wilkinson. The Broken Rebel: A Study in Culture, Politics and Authoritarian Character. New York: Harper and Row, 1972, 390 pages, $12.95. Reviewed by Emanuel Berman Alfred B. Heilbrun. Aversive Maternal Control. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1973, 324 pages, $15.95. Reviewed by Albert I. Rabin, PhD Irla Lee Zimmerman, James M. WooSam, with Alan J. Glasser, Clinical Interpretation of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale. New York: Grune & Stratton, 1973, 224 pages, $7.95. Reviewed by Ronald E. Smith, PhD Hilde Bruch. Eating disorders: Obesity, Anorexia Nervosa and the Person Within. New York: Basic Books, 1973, 396 pages, $12.50. Reviewed by David C. Murray Edith G. Neisser. Mothers and Daughters. Harper and Row, 1973, 396 pages, $10.00. Reviewed by Pamela Osborne Munter Rudolf Arnheim. The Genesis of a Painting: Picasso's Guernica. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973, 145 pages, 70 illustrations, $5.95, paper. Reviewed by Florence Rand Diamond

Toward a Psychology of Art. Collected Essays

Toward a Psychology of Art. Collected Essays

Images of Eros and Thanatos in Picasso's Guernica

Picasso's story of the wrestling match that took place between Marie Therese Walter and Dora Maar in his big Rue des Grands-Augustins studio while he was painting Guernica is one of the wry anecdotes that Francoise Gilot recounts in My Life With Picasso. Since Guernica has been nominated “the” masterpiece of the first half of the twentieth century, and since previous interpretations of this great painting have proved so contradictory, the above story suggests a new direction of attention that may prove useful in attempting to decipher its real meaning. The importance of the work justifies another try.

Book Review

Abstract Arnheim, Rudolf, “Picasso's Guernica, The Genesis of a Painting,” University of California Press, Berkeley, California, 1962. Pp. 139, $8.50. Reviewed by Irving R. Stone

Character and Theatre: Psychoanalytic Notes on Modern Realism

One of the persisting functions of art, even of iconoclastic art, is the restoration of morality. Art continues to find eloquence for our suffering, heraldry for our strife, lyricism for our passion. And one of its ways of doing this is by reminding us that while we exist in society, we are also participants in culture. Beyond the immediacies of our everyday lives, we have a kinship with generations.If it can be said that certain times are better and others worse for art, then these times seem very bad indeed. Cultural exponents of contemporary society have been especially scarce. I have in mind the past twenty years. Picasso's Guernica, a bit of fiction, some poetry by Randall Jarrell are among the last works of art which managed to salvage any dignity from society's military impulses.

Images of Eros and Thanatos in Picasso's Guernica

Images of Eros and Thanatos in Picasso's Guernica

Recent Views on Tragedy Ancient and Modern

In 1958 the American Council of Learned Societies devoted its thirty-ninth annual meeting to a consideration of ‘the present-day vitality of the classical tradition.’ The focal point in the two-day program was the persistent influence of certain aspects of Greek tragedy upon the arts in our time: two versions of the Antigone (Sophocles’ and Jean Anouilh's) were presented on the same evening; there were lectures on ‘the tragic sense’ in Picasso's Guernica and in contemporary painting and music; but the most striking affirmation of the theme was a lecture on ‘The Vitality of Sophocles’ by Professor H. D. F. Kitto of the University of Bristol. One of the most distinguished of modern classical scholars, Mr. Kitto is well known among American students for his book, Greek Tragedy, published in 1939. In addition to his work on tragic drama here considered there appeared in print last year a small volume by him on Sophocles as dramatist and philosopher. In 1957 Harvard University published a long-awaited, monumental study of Aristotle's Poetics by Professor Gerald F. Else of the University of Michigan, and in 1958 The Johns Hopkins Press published in book form six lectures delivered in Baltimore by Professor Richmond Lattimore on The Poetry of Greek Tragedy. That these classical scholars should have, during recent years, made such varied contributions to an understanding of Greek tragedy — a field to which each of them has devoted a major portion of his academic life — is noteworthy but scarcely surprising, since the Greek theatre and the Greek tragedians have been a perennial subject in the history of classical philology.