Hello everyone and welcome to the youtube channel Sigfrido Millequadri. In this video I will tell you about Guernica, the famous work created by Pablo Picasso. Perhaps the most famous painting of the entire twentieth century - Let's go immediately to discover it guernica and a famous painting created by pablo picasso in 1937 a monumental work full of pain and agony and for this universally recognized as a symbol against all war and violence the title of the work is linked to the Basque city of Guernica which was atrociously bombed by the German air force supported by the Italian one a massacre that cost the lives of many civilians, elderly women and children to fully understand the picture is important and reconstruct its genesis in January 1937 picasso who lived in paris he was commissioned by the spanish republican government to create a large painting for the spanish pavilion within the universal exhibition planned in the french capital starting from june 1937 picasso started work very slowly so much so that in april he had not yet decided what to paint on April 26, suddenly came the news of the bombing s u guernica made by the Nazi aviation support of Franco's troops in the context of the Spanish civil war picasso at the sight of images like the one we see spread in the newspapers was troubled by the incident and began to think of a work that would recall the thermal tragedy and therefore a ' historical work rare aspect in the art of the twentieth century because it takes up a happened event that had international importance but it is also a work that has made history because he is an artist of great stature and in 37 he was probably already the most famous and celebrated painter at world openly sided against the violence perpetrated by the Nazi regime I will try in the course of this video to start from the objective data or the large painting as it shows itself to our eyes if we observe the work we hope inside this large canvas if we try to feel it with an open mind we realize that we are faced with a piercing cry of pain launched by Picasso humanity with its own language or very original that still takes up a cubist style builds a complex work where different figures are protagonists 9 precisely of which 6 human three animals each with its own identity and meaning but all connected united by the pain that runs along all twenty-seven square meters of the canvas of jute a common denominator of the characters in the picture and the wide open mouth that cries out in despair at its own pain in the face of an inhuman tragedy the cubist style in Guernica is functional to the objective to demonstrate this tragedy not so much for the simultaneity of points of view that characterizes figures represented as for the sense of fragmentation disintegration destruction of the form that this style transmits to us picasso or once the decision was made he began to work feverishly starting from May 1st , making numerous preparatory sketches and completing the large canvas in five weeks of this tour de force we have the real photographic documentation zzata by dora maar then lover of picasso and photographer I will show you later in the video two of these photographs documenting the painter's second thoughts in progress I give you some general information on the painting the title and guernica the author pablo picasso the painting is an oil on canvas and was made between May and early June 1937 the dimensions are 349 cm x 776 the work is kept at the museo nacional centro de arte reina sofia in madrid the painting was commissioned to picasso for the pavilion of spain at the universal exhibition in paris as mentioned and occupied a wall of the ing in the pavilion itself after the exhibition the large canvas was exhibited in some european cities then it was sent to the united states where it remained until 1981 the painting was owned by the Spanish state who had commissioned and paid for Picasso but the painter expressly asked that the work not return to Spain until democracy was re-established before to begin the analysis of the painting I will tell you about my personal experience when I visited the reina sofia museum in madrid a few years ago I was deeply impressed by the atmosphere in the room dedicated to guernica the room was very crowded but absolute silence reigned it is not possible to take photographs of this work the museum invites us to understand that we are in front of a painting with a very strong symbolic value that must be respected observe guernica must be a way to reflect on the atrocities of which man was capable in silence we must hear the cry of pain that rises from the canvas which is that of all the innocent victims of every war and collect it internalize it I will now try to analyze the painting in detail the interpretations of the scholars are very varied and not unique regarding different parts of the painting I will only resume some completely introductory and not exhaustive ideas if we observe garnica we realize in the meantime that there we find in front of a scene that partly to a domestic interior partly an exterior the chandelier in the center makes us think of an interior the irregular wings that we can see in the background should be walls also the square tiles on the ground make us think of the floor of a room on the right side of the painting we observe instead of the houses on fire and therefore here the scene seems to take place outdoors always on the right side but slightly more in the center we can also notice the tiles of a roof it seems plausible to me that Picasso wanted real to use a representation that is an internal and an external one at the same time because the bombed houses of guernica had just been uncovered and the domestic intimacy had been violated the barbarism and after the bombing it was visible to all and picasso there is the exhibition some scholars believe that the painting should be read from right to left so that the visitor is in the entrance to the Spanish pavilion of the universal exhibition first encountered the right part of the picture according to other analyzes characters present in the work are divided into two large groups one consisting of the three animals the bull, the horse and the dove the other of the six human beings other studies still observe how a rigorous composition exists classic underlying the apparent chaos surely we can see a pyramidal construction in the center of the work with the chandelier as apex and also a triptych composition where the two women placed at the right and left end of the canvas represent the two lateral doors picasso knew the tradition perfectly painting and with this totally twentieth-century work in style it still takes compositional and iconographic cues from the entire history of painting by observing the painting we feel a sort of thrust of honda steeped in agony and fear that runs from right to left as if it were the shock wave of an explosion then starting from the right we see a woman who raises her bra hello to heaven maybe a quote from goya's shooting on May 3 around her is above her we see the triangular flames flare up we notice how the woman has tear-shaped eyes this shape and also taken up by the woman who holds the baby in her womb from the opposite side of the painting at both ends so we see the same evocation of pain through tears the female characters are prevalent in the work and it is possible that picasso wanted to emphasize how the city was bombed on a market day when the men were from front making the attack against the civilian population even more brutal always on the right side of the painting but further down I call it a woman who runs away to the left we see her naked because she was probably welcomed in her intimacy by the tragedy above this woman on the run picasso paints a mysterious figure who seems to be leaning out of a window and who holds out his arm holding a gas lamp in the hand this lamp is placed next to a chandelier with an electric light bulb this dichotomy between electric and gas light is read as a regression of progress the horrors of war make civilization, represented by electric light, retreat to a more primitive state the flame in the central area of the picture dominates the figure of a horse that proceeds to the right but which turns its head to the left also seems to neigh in terror to see the shape of the horse well try to observe the four legs with the hooves and the large tail the horse is wounded and we see a spear stuck on his body it is certain that picasso in his long and formidable career has taken countless ideas from the history of art some scholars have identified several references to the past even in guernica personally I find it possible the fact that for the same of the horse the painter from malaga thought of the incredible horse of the triumph of death cons erved in palazzo abatellis in palermo the italian painter renato guttuso who had personally known picasso declared that the spanish certainly knew the fresco from palermo all the lower and left part of the work is occupied by a figure lying on the ground with arms outstretched running along the base of the painting this male character interpreted as a wounded soldier holding a sword broken by the same hand in his right hand seems to blossom a flower beyond the destruction seems to emerge a symbol of hope perhaps the only one of the entire work even the left hand of the soldier and interesting we note how the palm is furrowed by countless broken lines and it is possible that picasso symbolically wanted to represent the disintegration of life let's now analyze the upper left part next to the wide open mouth of the horse just hinted at in the background we see a bird perhaps a dove symbol she also seems to be of peace wound with a broken go and from the open beak to his left we see the bull a figure that had already appeared in previous works by picasso the bull that has human eyes should represent brutality and darkness as picasso himself would have declared under the bull we find a kind of pity a mother who holds a child in her lap with the head upside down and without pupils then probably dead the mother screams all her pain and from as mentioned the tear-shaped eyes the fingers of her hands creating an impressive tangle on the body of the newborn an aspect that in my opinion is overlooked in many analyzes of the painting the relationship between the bull and the woman the bull literally hangs over her we also notice how the animal shows testicles right next to the woman's bare breast the bull really looks like represent the brutality the bestiality the prevarication humanity therefore turned its back on civilization and therefore on the beautiful to the harmony to the balance and has m Having obstructed the horror of which Picasso is capable, he has therefore staged this horror through the disintegration and fragmentation of the forms, everything is broken, broken, harsh in forms and even devoid of color, the painter uses only black and white and a wide gradation of grays this choice may have been suggested by picasso also from the view of the photos of the bombings in black and white to close the analysis I thought I would show you two photographs taken by dora mara that show us the work in progress in the photo we see the work just sketched on the large canvas starting from the right we see how Picasso has already outlined the woman with her arms raised with around the flames that come out of a window we then notice three female figures, the one that protrudes from the window with the lamp, the one that runs to the left and then a third on the ground that does not appear in the final version in the center we notice the body of the horse with the head lowered, however, the chandelier on the ground is the soldier with the broken sword of which we see the whole body with his feet to the left and one arm raised with a clenched fist which will then be removed by the painter perhaps not to give a specific political connotation and make the message against universal the war the bull in this first phase to the body to the left on the opposite side compared to the final version the woman with the child and already similar to the final one in this second image picasso has begun to apply the backgrounds with the various shades of gray here the third figure female on the right has disappeared but we are still very far away and from the final version we finally return to the image of the work after having seen the previous photographs here everything seems perfectly organized and calibrated both in the composition and in the drafting of the garnica grays in addition to the symbolic meaning that I have repeatedly taken up in the course of this video reveals itself as a work of extraordinary painters quality ca a synthesis of the language of the avant-gardes capable of looking also at the classical Guernian tradition is certainly one of the highest peaks of twentieth-century painting if you liked the video put me like it subscribe to the channel you guide a thousand paintings let me know in the comments what you think analysis that I made guernica what do you think of the work and the debate around this painting so fundamental for the art of the twentieth century I look forward to seeing you in the next video