Of Death and Awareness: 

Picasso’s Vision of Life in Guernica

Habib Rezaei

The monumental painting Guernica by Pablo Picasso emerged in response to a critical situation in Spain. This work was a reaction to the bombing of a Spanish town by General Franco. Regardless of the reasons and circumstances surrounding this horrific event—which claimed the lives of nearly 1,850 people—what becomes significant is the Spanish painter’s reaction to the tragedy.

Guernica stands apart from many of Picasso’s other works. Its distinction lies primarily in the pervasive presence of death and awareness throughout the piece.

Picasso’s presence in France during its occupation by the Nazis did not bring about significant consequences of war in his personal life. Although he was painting at the Louvre during this time, the works he created were not related to the war or its aftermath.

The war to which Picasso responded was the Spanish Civil War. What became evident to the painter after this event was death—one of the four existential boundary situations.

Perhaps, for the first time, Picasso felt death close to him. Until then, he had often experienced love, another boundary situation.

Boundary situations refer to those conditions that can only be truly understood by going through them.

Picasso turned his attention to the massacre of his fellow civilians. From this emerged a work whose subject is death, suffering, and human pain.

Our understanding of boundary situations is highly complex. What Picasso knew of death was limited.

The bombing of civilians and their mass killing plunged Picasso into a deep void, resulting in a profound identification with the event. In such a state, he achieved a kind of understanding of a boundary situation—one that he could only convey by personally experiencing it.

What takes place in this work is, more than a report on the death of Spanish civilians, a report on the death of Picasso himself.

2010
Citation: ‘Adabiat-e Aqaliat’ ( in Eng: minority literature)